[Bali] Alila Villas Uluwatu : The Warung and Cire

We decided to go for some local Balinese cuisine for our first Lunch at The Warung. Dropped by the restaurant pretty late (seemed like we’re always avoiding the peak dining hours), and there was no one else but us. Chose to sit outdoors, and it was not long before a staff came over with menus. Check out the menu here.

Personally, the top two reasons why I would give any resort a good review (and potentially a second visit) are the level of service, and the little details. I can come up with numerous examples, here’s one for Alila :

Bali, as a tropical destination, is obviously pretty hot and humid at all times of the year. What does this means? Hot and sticky = Eww. We’re pretty familiar with the weather, coming from sunny Singapore. Alila is very thoughtful in this aspect – providing all diners with cold towels and refreshing sprays before every meal. Kudos to them.

Ordered our food and the first item to come wasn’t something we had ordered. Alila took a refreshing spin on the idea of Congkak – a game of Malay origin. Check out the Wikipedia article if you’re interested. Using the Congkak board, they placed the complimentary starters in the individual slots. The waiter who brought it over gave us a little explanation as we listened and nodded.

At the two ends are two types of deep fried crackers, while the individual dips were in the middle – a total of twelve of them! Most of them were some variant of chili, which we love! The spiciest of them all is really good! There were also other stuff like pickled vegetables like cucumber and pineapple, onions and soy sauce.

Sambel Tapa
Tuna salad with young mangoes 

Pesan Wong
Grilled mushroom in banana leaf 

Bebek Bakar
Grilled duck with Balinese spice paste 

Balinese Red Rice
Whole grain rice? 

There are actually three types of rice to choose from – white, red, and yellow. The red rice actually tasted kind of like whole grain rice. The texture was a little bit raw and chewy.

Some drinks to quench our thirst :

Our verdict? Delicious! Special mention for the Balinese grilled duck which was very tender. We were pretty surprised to find duck on the menu here, as it isn’t that common in Singapore. We’re not big-eaters, and together with the complimentary starters, we were pretty stuffed by the end of lunch.

Our dinner at Cire for the day was actually a complimentary one, part of the package deal (air tickets, accommodation, etc) we purchased from our local agent. I have absolutely no idea why it is called “Dining by the Edge”. Cliff edge, perhaps? Sorry, the lighting at night was horrible. These pictures were the best that I managed to take =)

I’m not sure if it is Alila’s practice to serve complimentary items prior to dinner. We had the same experience when we stayed in Alila Cha-Am in 2009 and enjoyed many varieties of pastry! Tonight at Uluwatu, we were given some complimentary pastry with sour cream.

Ah. I had forgotten to take a photo of the menu. You’ll just have to take my description for it! The starter is some sort of Potato Cream, which had a foam-like texture.

No worries – the waitress offered to, and proceed to cut up the Roast Chicken into smaller pieces. It was plated together with mixed vegetables (peas, carrots, etc) and diced mushrooms.

Huge plate of Garden Salad for us.

The second main was some sort of smoked fish with mashed potato, and I can’t recall what exactly it is.

And to top it off, sweet sweet dessert.

Dinner was pretty alright, nothing surprising but definitely satisfying.
Check out the subsequent posts for more food @ Alila!

Alila Villas Uluwatu – Suprisingly Different