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Paul Young is a townie who graduated from the University of Illinois twice: once with a bachelors in graphic design and then again with a masters in education. Paul has been a foodie all his life (even though he didn't know what a foodie was until recently). He has eaten his way through New York City (eight years) and Milwaukee (two years), but has finally settled down here in Champaign-Urbana (since 1994). When he's not eating, he is either doing graphic design or teaching at Parkland College in order to earn money to buy food. In a former life, Paul was the founder and publisher of The Octopus, a weekly newspaper where he wrote about food every now and then.
We decided to stay in Ubud for a while since the eating was good and cheap. But as we looked around the dining rooms of Monkey Forest Road restaurants, we noticed that there were no Indonesians eating with us (just a lot of happy Europeans, Japanese and even a few Aussies). So we wondered, where do Indonesians go when they're hungry?
We've noticed smaller warungs (open-air restaurants) on side streets and alleys, but they're usually empty. Curiosity takes us back to the market where we saw quite a few little food stands always buzzing with activity. So I decide to go for a taste test (my partner Bonnie decides to sit this one out). Each food stand seems to be a one-woman operation (the men all seem to be out on the street hustling to be hired as drivers). Many stands seems to serve exactly the same thing: <i?nasi bungkus ("rice in a packet" mixed with meat and other "stuff"). Other stands specialize in satay (meat on a stick). Most food stands do just take out, but a few have a table and a bench, so I choose one that looked popular and made myself comfortable.
Back on Monkey Forest Road, everyone spoke English so ordering was not a problem. Here in the market, I had to point and use hand gestures to get what I wanted. At the satay stand, a sign said ayam and kambing. I knew ayam was chicken, but when I asked about kambing, the woman shrugged and then thoughtfully made a funny sound: "baaah-baaah." Ah, goat. Yes, two please.
Everything at the food stand was primitive but efficient. The rice cooker was a portable kerosene stove on the dirt floor, steaming the rice in a cone-shaped bamboo steamer. The satay was barbecued over coconut shells kept hot with a small electric fan. Everything tasted just as good as restaurant food, but at $1 to $2 a serving, it's a real bargain (even though I was probably charged tourist prices). Sanitation was a little scary — there was no refrigeration or running water in sight and people kept throwing money on top of the food when they were ordering — but I survived the meal to write about it.
