cooking. eating. carousing.: menega cafe

Have you read my short post on Menega Cafe last year? If you haven't, go on, go ahead, click the link, read about it. It won't take long. I'll wait.

Dum dum dum....

There it is, as you can see, Menega is one of my favourite places to go to in Bali since my wedding organiser introduced it to me last year. And since this is my second post on this place, I won't rave about the food again.

Instead, I thought I'd show you the restaurant itself. Its scenic surrounding. Its cooking, from grill to plate.

Menega is a pretty humble restaurant, with a humble shopfront. These motorcycles out front must be the mode of transport for the cooks, waiters, waitresses, and cleaners working in the restaurant.

What you do when you get to the restaurant is, you go past the fresh seafood, past the cashier, all the way to the back, towards the beach, where all the tables are.

You grab a table and enjoy the view for one second. Before you get interrupted by a waitperson taking your drinks order.

The spectacular view is most scenic at dusk, when it's not yet completely dark, but dark enough for the candles to be lit. So romantic.

I'm quite proud of this picture, I must say. So lonely planet. You can see all the lights of five-star resorts twinkling in the distance. At the beach, a cart was selling grilled corn on the cob, children were dipping their toes in the water.

Once you've soaked up the atmosphere, you need to take note of your table number, you would then leave someone to man the table, while the rest of you go out the front, where all the seafood are.

There should be a person with a notepad, ready to take your order. There is only one method of preparation, that is grilled, so no need to specify that. What you need to do though, is pick the type of fish you want, specify how many prawns, how many clams, lobster, etc you want to order.

The seafood will then be simultaneously grilled and slathered with Menega's own secret marinade.

From the ten minutes I was there watching the cooking, the cooks were sacrificing their limbs for us. I wouldn't be surprised if they are burnt on a daily basis.

The yummy seafood will then be plated up beautifully and served to us.

We ordered for the two of us, half a dozen of prawns, a dozen of clams, a grouper, one bottle of chilled tea and one young coconut juice. Rice, condiment and kangkung in sambal sauce already included. All of these came up to Rp 236,500.

That's about $25, well worth it for the meal alone, but to include the price of the romantic view, it's extraordinarily cheap.

Nothing to do now, but eat.