Comments on: Feedmelah Travels! Babi Guling, Ubud, Bali, Uncle SG http://feedmelah.com/blog/feedmelah-travels-babi-guling-ubud-bali-uncle-sg/ Your Ultimate Restaurant Finder Tue, 24 Jan 2012 07:50:55 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Uncle SG http://feedmelah.com/blog/feedmelah-travels-babi-guling-ubud-bali-uncle-sg/#comment-86131 Uncle SG Tue, 13 Dec 2011 21:07:05 +0000 http://feedmelah.com/blog/?p=3279#comment-86131 Frank, I like your frank remarks. I agree with you absolutely. I have been back to Bali a few times but did not feel the urge to try their roast pork. I guess the best way to evaluate their Babi Guling is to say that theirs is the Baliness version and in an Islamic country like Indonesia we are thankful we have this Hindu island Bali where eating pork is freely available. Though Indonesia is Islamic it is much more liberal compared with Malaysia. The dwindling Chinese population in Malaysia, stricter Islamic religious belief and the media publicity of microscopic worms in pork have cause demand to drop and pig rearing business to contract. Hence price of pork meat has spiralled up over the years. The roast pork in Malaysia is as delicious as in Singapore, HK and China. Do come to Kuala Lumpur aka KL when you next pass through the region. It's a food paradise at affordable prices, 2.5 times lower than Singapore! Recently, I tried the roast belly pork at Noble House, Jalan Imbi, Kuala Lumpur. Its five layered, not just three layered. Each price is cut like a mahjong tile, just right size to slip into the mouth and it slowly melted with gentle nibbling awesome fragrant oiliness into your mouth. Just cannot describe it any better. If you like pork rib herbal soup, in Klang near KL this heavenly pork dish, a Malaysian invention is world famous. Singapore also has it but they are a copy cat at best. I like Anthony Bourdain and like Bobby Chinn and others their reviews are crappy sometimes. Anthony Bourdain's incessant chattiness bore me. I prefer Andrew Zimmerman though you may not because he reviews extreme foods. Eat well, stay well too. From Uncle SG. Frank, I like your frank remarks. I agree with you absolutely. I have been back to Bali a few times but did not feel the urge to try their roast pork. I guess the best way to evaluate their Babi Guling is to say that theirs is the Baliness version and in an Islamic country like Indonesia we are thankful we have this Hindu island Bali where eating pork is freely available.

Though Indonesia is Islamic it is much more liberal compared with Malaysia. The dwindling Chinese population in Malaysia, stricter Islamic religious belief and the media publicity of microscopic worms in pork have cause demand to drop and pig rearing business to contract. Hence price of pork meat has spiralled up over the years.

The roast pork in Malaysia is as delicious as in Singapore, HK and China. Do come to Kuala Lumpur aka KL when you next pass through the region. It’s a food paradise at affordable prices, 2.5 times lower than Singapore!

Recently, I tried the roast belly pork at Noble House, Jalan Imbi, Kuala Lumpur. Its five layered, not just three layered. Each price is cut like a mahjong tile, just right size to slip into the mouth and it slowly melted with gentle nibbling awesome fragrant oiliness into your mouth. Just cannot describe it any better. If you like pork rib herbal soup, in Klang near KL this heavenly pork dish, a Malaysian invention is world famous. Singapore also has it but they are a copy cat at best.

I like Anthony Bourdain and like Bobby Chinn and others their reviews are crappy sometimes. Anthony Bourdain’s incessant chattiness bore me. I prefer Andrew Zimmerman though you may not because he reviews extreme foods.
Eat well, stay well too. From Uncle SG.

]]> By: Frank D Law http://feedmelah.com/blog/feedmelah-travels-babi-guling-ubud-bali-uncle-sg/#comment-84892 Frank D Law Thu, 01 Dec 2011 22:15:51 +0000 http://feedmelah.com/blog/?p=3279#comment-84892 Stopped by Bali on our way back from Shanghai. Loved Bali, especially Ubud which is a place we would come back to again and again. This is our third visit to Bali so we decided to give Ibu Oka one last chance, in view of the many superlative reviews in guide books, travel channels and magazines. Reasoning: So many cannot be wrong. But it looks like they can be. Although the meat itself which was served piping hot, was generally underwhelming, gamy but flavorful enough, the crackling was still as tough as old leather shoes! It really made my DW and me wonder whether those folks who write glowing reviews of Ibu Oka and their babi guling, including Anthony Bourdain and the food critic from The Guardian have ever tasted suckling pig in a Chinese restaurant? If they have, they would have tasted exactly how good suckling pig should taste like with crackling so crispy thin that every bite is to be savored! It is highly unlikely that after that, they would ever venture to describe babi guling as amazing”, “fantastic”, “best ever” and all the silly hyperbole that have come to dominate this debate and given Ibu Oka an undeserved reputation. I have nothing against Ibu Oka per se. It is the integrity of reviews that I’m concerned about! To draw an analogy, if you live in a small outpost, say in the far reaches of Siberia, you may describe your local football outfit as “amazing”, “best in the world” or whatever superlative terms you may wish to employ, not out of intellectual dishonesty, but only because you have never been exposed to the silky skills of the likes of Barcelona or Manchester United. That is probably how it is with this “amazing babi guling” nonsense! We were in Shanghai for 9 days and tried Peking Duck and suckling pig IN SEVERAL RESTAURANTS and the stuff that they served up were slices of culinary heaven! As we live in San Francisco, we have developed an affinity for the dish. We know that everyone is entitled to their opinion. But how do you judge a dish when you haven’t tasted even remotely the best? It is really like the uncultured and the philistine trying to pontificate on high-brow literature and classical music! I’m a fan of Anthony Bourdain and look forward to his witty presentations but on this occasion he has dropped the baton big time! I certainly hope that Bourdain will wise up and realize that he has to remain totally objective. At the rate that he’s going, I fear that his credibility will soon be shot! Finally, we remain baffled over these superlative reviews, because when we compare Ibu Oka’s babi guling to the suckling pig we have tasted in Chinese Restaurants from this side of San Francisco to Melbourne to Hong Kong to Singapore and Bayswater in London, we have to say that if the Chinese version and Ibu Oka’s babi guling are compared and placed on a scale of 1-100, the Chinese version would easily place near a hundred and Ibu Oka’s would limp in below minus 10. That is the difference between a culture with 2,000 plus years of culinary development and a rank amateur! Stopped by Bali on our way back from Shanghai. Loved Bali, especially Ubud which is a place we would come back to again and again.

This is our third visit to Bali so we decided to give Ibu Oka one last chance, in view of the many superlative reviews in guide books, travel channels and magazines. Reasoning: So many cannot be wrong.

But it looks like they can be. Although the meat itself which was served piping hot, was generally underwhelming, gamy but flavorful enough, the crackling was still as tough as old leather shoes! It really made my DW and me wonder whether those folks who write glowing reviews of Ibu Oka and their babi guling, including Anthony Bourdain and the food critic from The Guardian have ever tasted suckling pig in a Chinese restaurant? If they have, they would have tasted exactly how good suckling pig should taste like with crackling so crispy thin that every bite is to be savored! It is highly unlikely that after that, they would ever venture to describe babi guling as amazing”, “fantastic”, “best ever” and all the silly hyperbole that have come to dominate this debate and given Ibu Oka an undeserved reputation. I have nothing against Ibu Oka per se. It is the integrity of reviews that I’m concerned about!

To draw an analogy, if you live in a small outpost, say in the far reaches of Siberia, you may describe your local football outfit as “amazing”, “best in the world” or whatever superlative terms you may wish to employ, not out of intellectual dishonesty, but only because you have never been exposed to the silky skills of the likes of Barcelona or Manchester United.

That is probably how it is with this “amazing babi guling” nonsense! We were in Shanghai for 9 days and tried Peking Duck and suckling pig IN SEVERAL RESTAURANTS and the stuff that they served up were slices of culinary heaven!

As we live in San Francisco, we have developed an affinity for the dish. We know that everyone is entitled to their opinion. But how do you judge a dish when you haven’t tasted even remotely the best? It is really like the uncultured and the philistine trying to pontificate on high-brow literature and classical music!

I’m a fan of Anthony Bourdain and look forward to his witty presentations but on this occasion he has dropped the baton big time! I certainly hope that Bourdain will wise up and realize that he has to remain totally objective. At the rate that he’s going, I fear that his credibility will soon be shot!

Finally, we remain baffled over these superlative reviews, because when we compare Ibu Oka’s babi guling to the suckling pig we have tasted in Chinese Restaurants from this side of San Francisco to Melbourne to Hong Kong to Singapore and Bayswater in London, we have to say that if the Chinese version and Ibu Oka’s babi guling are compared and placed on a scale of 1-100, the Chinese version would easily place near a hundred and Ibu Oka’s would limp in below minus 10. That is the difference between a culture with 2,000 plus years of culinary development and a rank amateur!

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