Jakarta Indonesian Cuisine

After returning from a trip to Singapore, and REALLY enjoying the food there, I got my girlfriend to find some restaurants with approximately the same feel. She logged on and found that Jakarta had the highest score. We called and got a reservation without any problems. Parking was such an extreme headache. We would up parking 8 blocks away!This is a cute neighborhood restaurant that's wonderfully decorated. It's charming and the staff were very friendly. There were several people seated at 7p. After looking through the menu, we enlisted the help of the waitress. She asked us how spicy we liked our food--me VERY spicy, her OK spicy. We wanted an appetizer with banana leaves--she recommended the fish. We wanted some curry--she recommended the curry that was supposedly more flavorful than spicy (sounded great) and selected the chicken. And then something exotic. I had jackfruit curry in Singapore, both Malaysian style and Indonesian, so we tried the curry jackfruit with beef ... more

After returning from a trip to Singapore, and REALLY enjoying the food there, I got my girlfriend to find some restaurants with approximately the same feel. She logged on and found that Jakarta had the highest score. We called and got a reservation without any problems. Parking was such an extreme headache. We would up parking 8 blocks away!This is a cute neighborhood restaurant that's wonderfully decorated. It's charming and the staff were very friendly. There were several people seated at 7p. After looking through the menu, we enlisted the help of the waitress. She asked us how spicy we liked our food--me VERY spicy, her OK spicy. We wanted an appetizer with banana leaves--she recommended the fish. We wanted some curry--she recommended the curry that was supposedly more flavorful than spicy (sounded great) and selected the chicken. And then something exotic. I had jackfruit curry in Singapore, both Malaysian style and Indonesian, so we tried the curry jackfruit with beef and chicken.There was a table next to us that ordered the Javanese fried chicken. When we saw this dish on the menu, we envisioned something between FKC and the Chinese staple fried-boiled chicken. Wanting something more authentic, we passed, much to our disappointment. We should've ordered that.The fish on banana leaves turned out to be fish cake with a few scallions that was lightly pan-fried, placed on the banana leaf with a dollop of some peanut sauce. The portion was dinky and the taste disappointing--bland and definitely not very flavorful. Not worth the $4+. The jackfruit dish didn't even look that appetizing. She didn't like it and I found the taste too strong, very unlike the jackfruit I had in Singapore. Curry sauce was OK. The curry chicken was actually enjoyable, but the sauce was definitely not as flavorful as we had expected. Better than most, but uninspiring. Our lasting impression is that the meat is prepared ahead of time, without much marinating, but still cooked moist, and the sauce, which is probably kept very hot, is ladeled on right before serving. The dishes came out steaming, but got cold quickly. The menu says that the restaurant prides itself on authenticity. We were both not very impressed by the spices used or the preparation. We might return a second time to try the other dishes, but it won't be for awile. The coconut crepes, ordered next to us, looked nice, but after our meal, we weren't inclined to stay any longer for dessert. I know our rating was low, but it's a huge contrast to the other reviews above. We also noticed that the restaurant was full by then. Maybe others didn't really know how authentic Indonesian food was supposed to taste like?? less