Indonesia is the largest archipelago country in the world, with over than 17.000 islands spanning from east to west. For better or worse, it also houses the most abundant amount of people ever inhabiting a country in the world, numbering up to 200 million. Naturally, such numbers widespread throughout an extremely large archipelago would produce a huge amount of cultural variety and diversity, and as food is one of the inseparable parts of a society’s culture, it is then stand to reason that Indonesia has one of the most diverse cuisine traditions in the world. One of the finest example of this is Bandung, who already garnered a reputation as the place for an unforgettable journey of delectable cuisine experience.

And yes, I’m talking in a roundabout way when all I really want to say is that this post will be the first part of my series of posts regarding the spectacular cuisine options of Bandung. The first food on the plate right now is Batagor.

Batagor is one of the most well-known foods in Indonesia. It is short of “Baso (meatball), Tahu (the closest in English for this is tofu), and Goreng (Fried)”, so in proper English it should be, like: Fried Tofu Meatball. It is usually served on a wide plate with a healthy dose of peanut sauce, ketchup, and chilli, although even without all of those additional ingredients the Batagor can still stand on its own quite proudly. In Bandung, this food can literally be found almost everywhere, either sold in a permanent establishment like a restaurant or in a pushed mobile carriage the locals would refer to as “gerobak dorong” (roughly translates to “pushable carriage.”) Typically the money one should pay in order to enjoy a plate of Batagor is quite cheap, with the gerobak variety ranging from around Rp. 5.000 (around US$ 0.5) or Rp. 7.000 (around US$ 0.7) and the restaurant variety usually costs Rp. 10.000 (around US$ 1) or at the most around Rp. 20.000 (around US$ 2)

If you want to sample a Batagor that is not just a Batagor, then you might want to cast your attention to Batagor Kingsley, located quite conveniently in Veteran Street Number 25, Bandung. It is a restaurant specializes in Batagor in particular, although it provides other options at the menu as well (but we will not seeing those other options in this post, sorry.) The Batagor served here has gained quite a respectable reputation even outside Bandung, and one taste to the tongue would reveal the reason why: the crunchiness and the smooth texture of each Batagor is just unrivalled. They are crunchy, yet at the same time the tenderness that born as you casually grind each batagor in your mouth before swallowing is just superb. As each Batagor meet its demise and slid helplessly into your stomach, there’s a delicate sensation left on your mouth as your tongue wriggle around asking for more……

Okay, so the description above may be an exaggeration, but really, if you are visiting Bandung and your stomach is craving for something delicious that is uniquely Bandung, you cannot and should not miss Batagor Kingsley. The only downside is that for Indonesian standards, the price they charge for a portion is uncharacteristically high (Rp. 18.000 (around US$ 1.8)) for three pieces of Batagor), but this is a case where the price fits the product, and every bite you take will continuously assuring you that every bit of money you pay is worth all the price……

Tags: Bandung, Bandung Food Testing, Batagor, Batagor Kingsley, Food, Food Testing
Categories: Bandung Food Testing

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 29th, 2009 at 5:55 PM and is filed under Bandung Food Testing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.