From what I read, Eastern & Oriental is a collaboration between a well-known chef i.e. Will Meyrick who has two award-winning restaurants in Bali with the people behind Loewy and Union, another two very successful F&B outlets in Jakarta. I've only been to Loewy once but have been to Union couple of times, simply because Union is pretty near where we stay. Union is one place that is so popular for its red velvet cake that getting seats there is nearly impossible without reservation in advance. They do entertain walk-ins but it's a long queue. It would be a blue moon night if one walk in on one fine day and finds them able to sit you immediately!
Clearly, Eastern & Oriental is the place to be seen. At least for the moment. Decor-wise is very much in line with the theme from Loewy and Union, ala early 20th century Paris. Clientele in Eastern & Oriental tended to be more chic society whereas Loewy is more business/professional and Union is more laid-back, hang-out type.
It was around 7ish by the time we reach there last Saturday. We didn't make any reservation and the hostess was able to fit us in for dinner between 8 till 930pm. We took that immediately. Meanwhile, she ushered us to wait at the bar first while the wait staff prepared our table.
While at the bar, I ordered one of their in house creation, a mocktail made up of coconut juice (which I realised belatedly is coconut milk) and guava sorbet with a hint of kaffir lime leaves. When first presented, my initial reaction was "Uh oh" Coz it looked like one whole glass of coconut milk! Cholesterol alert!! But when I took a cautious sip, it was surprisingly nice. And I love the hint of kaffir lime leaves which kinda "cut" the "fattiness" of coconut milk. To be honest, the main reason I ordered this was because I'm a huge fan of pink guava. And the abundance of pink guava in Indonesia means that a lot of the pink guava juices, and in this instance sorbet are freshly made.
After about 15 minutes wait, we were shown to our table and our server for the night is surprisingly well-trained. With Hub's friend being a bule (local slang for white man), our server made effort to converse in English and I would say she spoke pretty well. Obviously, one can see that the owners try to infuse a sense of uppity to the establishment by having the servers introducing themselves and mentioned that he/she will be the server for the night. What's more surprising is that they are pretty well trained in terms of food knowledge. Our server was able to recommend some of the more popular dishes and the restaurant specialties as well as advising us to only take 2 portion of rice because the one serving of rice is good for 2 small eaters.
And these are what we had that night. Picture quality slightly below my expectation because we had company, and I'm sure Hubs's bule friend must be thinking "Oh gawd, not another Asian with her food-snapping antics before digging in!" ;p
This is braised duck with green nahm jin. All of us love this dish a lot. I thought it's almost like the braised duck that my mom occasionally makes. And the green nahm jin is the little jar of chutney on the side, which is made up of (I suspect, based on my taste buds) cilantro, garlic, some green chillies (but not too much because it wasn't spicy at all), lime juice, fish sauce and palm sugar. Lovely!
Next up is the massaman lamb shank. I think this is Hubs's favourite. I've never been a big fan of massaman curry because so far, all the massaman curries I've eaten are quite big on the cinnamon flavour, which I'm not particularly fond of. But taste wise, it's good and the meat fell off the bone.
Another winner and that's according to Hubs.
Between the three of us, these two plus a stir-fry vege (which I didn't manage to snap a photo of) were just nice. A mention about the stir-fry. I liked it how they incorporate thai basil into the stir-fry, giving it a very nice taste overall. If you are fan of basil, make sure to order this.
Overall, Eastern and Oriental is a winner and we definitely will be back again. :)
p/s A visit to the toilet is a must. Because one gets a crash course on how to converse in Thai. And I'm seriously not joking!
****
Eastern & Oriental
Menara Rajawali,
1st Floor, Jl. DR Ide Anak Agung Gde Agung Lot#5.1
Kawasan Mega Kuningan.
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