It was
a fortunate moment for me to be a part of this creative event launched by the Dua
Belibis group. They recently came up with this idea of collaborating with the
tenants in Pasar Santa to create their new signature dishes by using Dua
Belibis’s products.
On the
same day as I went to IHOP, I had my big dinner at PF Chang’s
at The Beach branch. PF Chang’s is another restaurant brand chain that’s quite
popular in Dubai and already had several branches spread around Dubai, and
obviously quite a number of following there. The name PF Chang’s itself is
curated from the name of the two owners: Paul Fleming and Philip Chiang (so
it’s PF and a tiwst of Chiang’s). I went there like around 5 PM and the
restaurant was already quite packed, and
as I finished my dinner, the restaurant was almost full house.
I just
had my dinner with blogger friends at this newly opened establishment in Plaza
Indonesia called Socieaty, YUP FINALLY another new restaurant opening in the
middle of this bullshit economy, which is a pretty brave move of them. Socieaty
is a new venture by the Les Amis group from the Singapore. The group itself has
been involved in the F&B business for more than 2 decades (21 years to be
exact), and not until 2015 that they opened Socieaty, an establishment which is
strongly related to the group itself, Les Amis itself actually means “by
friends” in English, and they’re creating this “Socieaty” where it’s all about
friends to friends, by friends and for friends.
I have
been hearing a lot of good things about this particular steak house hence I
think it should be amazing to have dinner here and actually experience
everything for myself. Still connected to my Shack Shake post, Texas Road House
is where I went to have dinner, and it’s also located in Dubai Mall. TRH is
HUGE in Dubai, and as I arrived, the queue quite long and I had to be on the
waiting list to wait for my table. Even before I am actually inside, I got the
feeling that I would love this place, when I hear “Texas”, this was something
that I really expected when it comes to the design, just this cowboy-ish pubs
and very American (seriously I don’t know how to explain it properly), but you
know when you watch cowboy movies and there are scenes where they come to a
certain old-school looking pub to save the world, and the pub consist of mostly
wood material layering all the design, crowded, rugged and in a way, dirty, but
dirty pretty and just something so Texas about it. This is what a casual
steakhouse should look like, when I don’t need to dress up and all that shit, I
just wanna have some good time, good food and good conversation.
The
old saying “an apple falls not far from the tree” metaphorically describes how
I see the F&B scene in Jakarta in the most fashionable way (of wording). As
an Indonesian, I think there’s this urge for us to keep missing Indonesian
food, face it, Indonesian food is our jam! I do love other food genres, but
Indonesian food will always have that irreplaceable space in my heart.
Sari
Rasa Group is undoubtedly one of the most successful F&B groups in
Indonesia, along with their culinary brands such as Sate Khas Senayan, Sate
Khas Senayan Express, Tamani Cafe and Tesate that are spread all around Jakarta
and doing very-very well, especially Sate Khas Senayan, I don’t see I’ve ever
seen an empty Sate Khas Senayan, it’s almost always packed, which should be a
good thing for them!
