Dining guide an appetizer, but not the main course
Jakarta Dining -- The Jakarta Restaurant Guide 2000 PT Indo Multi Media MNC Group, Jakarta 120 pages Rp 22,500
JAKARTA (JP): Need an easy-as-pie directory of Jakarta restaurants but too lazy to flip through the hefty restaurant section of the Yellow Pages?
Jakarta Dining, chockful of names, addresses and colorful advertisements helpfully arranged in various categories of cuisine (French, Indian, International, etc.) fits the bill. Thrown in for good measure are informative, well-written articles about all things culinary, including ones on Indonesian cuisine and street food, plus a map of the capital to help Jakarta neophytes locate the site of their choice.
That, in a nutshell, is that. The bulk of the book is devoted to pithy advertising blurbs; the unknowing might mistake these for reviews were it not for the occasional use of the first person and the requirements for advertisers tucked away in the back of the guide. One of the "rules" required for inclusion in the book is dependent on "owning or managing a good restaurant within Greater Jakarta", which conjures up the unlikely scenario of some restaurant owner mulling whether to place an ad because his or her establishment may not be up to snuff.
Jakarta Dining is a glossy, slickly produced guide. It does not purport to present a critical assessment of the restaurants despite the glowing foreword, no doubt ghostwritten, from the head of the Jakarta tourism agency touting the "top-flight selection of over 230 restaurants".
Take the advertising copy with a generous pinch of salt, for, it is, after all meant to get buns in seats. Still, buried in the flowery plaudits one sometimes gains unwitting insight into what awaits in the dining experience.
For instance, the entry "Expect titillation from the camp waiters" for a high-profile trendy restaurant should be read as a glitzy, all-frills establishment 1) serving culinary slim pickings 2) providing over-the-top service by a gaggle of limp- wristed waitpersons who answer to the names Mary and Blanche and 3) this is most definitely not an establishment for the entire family.
Another blurb, touting the great family dining at a ribs restaurant, held ironic meaning for this writer. Times change, but when I reviewed the same establishment in 1997 I found "the lashings of food and affordability come at the expense of taste ... there was no craving for a return trip anytime soon". Such is honesty -- a crack, in hindsight probably unwarranted, about the frozen cheesecake spinning off the fork and running the risk of putting a fellow diner's eye out earned an irate letter from the proprietor.
The advice here is to take the entries for what they are -- a clear-cut directory for sussing out new restaurants, finding their locations and trying them for yourself. If something reads like an ad (even if it comes under the nebulous rubric of a newspaper "review"), replete with raving compliments and gushing thanks to the chef, waiters and sundry help people for their "advice" in choosing the most exorbitantly priced items on the menu, well, then, chances are the so-called reviewer was a tad subjective.
The old adage of the proof of the pudding is in the eating really is true. It is up to you to taste for yourself what is on offer, but be sure to call ahead first as at least one of the restaurants has closed since the book was published.
-- Bruce Emond