Before this Indonesia trip, I gathered somewhere that one of the most largest franchise restaurants in the world (?) is
Rumah Makan Padang. In Jakarta alone, there are about 20,000 Padang restos. It said also that almost in every street in the cities of Indonesia, you could find one. Our challenge then was to find one in the small island Bintan in Indonesia. During
our mini tour of North Bintan , I actually totally forgotten about it cos I wasn't supposed to look for places to eat cos
a certain restaurant was already included in our packaged tour.
A food window display had reminded me thu' of this resto. We passed by a local town in Bintan and saw the window set-up ( photo above) looked familiar. .
It was a Rumah Makan Padang. I was just not sure if this one was a franchise of the original. But I bet from the window display it surely looked like an authentic one.
This kind of restaurant is actually famous for its various dishes with a combination of coconut milk and chilies. The cuisine had originated from the capital city of West Sumatera which is Padang. I had watched this franchise resto being featured in an Asian food channel. Saw how a table was served with massive small plates and bowls of dishes. The customer paid only for the ones he consumed. That's the way they do ala carte there. How convenient! Everything is just right on your table and no worry about the rest of the plates you haven't touched. The dishes were also mouth watering, the likes of
rendang, sambal, sate pandang, etc..
Yet, I failed to experience one. Our time was limited and in the course of this trip, we ate either in the hotel resto or in the resort_ no Rumah Makan Padang. But ofcourse I had the region's specialties like beef rendang and sate. Maybe next time.
