Rumah Makan Padang

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.

Another Post-op Plate

This morning I was craving for fruits, other than mango pleeese! which I've been drinking (as smoothies) since day one of  my post operative saga. It has been a week since then and last night husband brought home some apples for me. I was supposedly dunk them into the blender and create another variety of smoothie. But I want some texture now! I had too much smoothies, I would vomit.
Ignoring the blender this time, I picked another kitchen tool  _ a peeler and  scraped for some apple meat. Failed! My maxilla is not yet ready for any solid food no matter how thinly sliced.



Above was resolved with tasty passion fruit pudding and strawberry flavored yogurt. Hmmm, not bad. That would do for now.

Nilupak na Saging

After almost a week , I'm still recuperating from a recent surgery. Surgical sites, still swelling with manageable pain. Meals are still stressfully soft and preferably liquid-y. Although I can't still go back to my regular activities, I'm happy that I could cook atleast one meal of the day for my family. Husband takes care of the rest. Another thing that I'm able to do now is prepare my own soft diet food. Yesterday, while my girls and hubby were enjoying their banana cue and turon, I thought I ought to enjoy some bananas too. Left were two pieces of large saging na saba (plantain). I boiled them. Peeled off. Mashed. Mixed with butter, sugar and condensed milk.



Sprinkled with grated cheese and voila_ I got nilupak na saging (mashed banana)!!! I worked from my own vague memory of nilupak na saging of my teens in my hometown. From my region it was called "niyubak". Vaguely, I remember attending some social gatherings in the province with my peers over this dish as the main call. The party was all about preparing this particular dish in bulk for everyone to enjoy. The procedures were similar to what I did (above) except we used giant mortar and pestle to pound the banana mixture. The tool is locally known as "lusong".

I'm not sure if I got the exact ingredients, maybe I missed some. Yet, my humble version of this soft banana dish had filled me up with sweet memories and nutrients.