Testing the BBQ and exploring Balangan
Friday night was exciting for me, I got to give the new bbq a trial.
After swinging by Bintang supermarket on Jl. Seminyak and picking up a bag of rice, steak, tomatoes, lettuce and Italian dressing I felt ready to fire it up. I loaded my little coconut burner with charcoal and tore up some of the cardboard packaging that the gear came in. It went up like a torch and after 10 minutes the charcoal was ready to be dumped on the base plate of the bbq.
I have in the past spent an hour soaking charcoal in lighter fluid, waiting, lighting, watching it burn and fizzle out only to repeat. To all those people who have gone through the same thing I say forget the lighter fluid and buy one of these stoves.
The meat was on for about 40 minutes, slow cooking and while that was going on I fixed the salad. The final result was okay although I soaked the rice. Can’t wait to get some real coconut husks in the burner to see how they go!
Saturday was another lovely day and I rode down to the Bukit to visit a beach I had never been to, Balangan. As most people will be aware of the Bukit is the chunk of Bali that juts out at the bottom, with Nusa Dua on the eastern tip, Uluwatu on the western tip. Balangan is fairly close to Uluwatu and taking the Bypass towards Nusa Nusa I took the right turn up the steep hill towards Uluwatu.
Following the signs for Belangan I reached a housing development complex and a dead end. After asking a selection of locals and riding up and down the same hill still unable to find the bach one guy told me to take Jl. Uluwatu. I finally figured out I had to take the Dreamland road and go about 3 minutes past Dreamland for the dirt track to Pantai Balangan. Dreamland was a Tommy Suharto development and the locals now man a toll booth and sell access tickets for 5,000rp. The tickets say ‘We are traditional owners fighting to get back our land. We have been disspossed by Tomy Soeharto and his powerful friends. Your contribution assists us to raise our families. We hope you support our rights to regain our land.”
If I had ridden straight from my house in Seminyak to this sign it would of taken about 40 minutes.
The dirt track is stony and heavily rutted but even a ‘bebek’ or scooter can make it if you are carefull. You can actually ride all the way up to the few warungs on the beach. It took me maybe 10 minutes to navigate safely down.
The beach itself isn’t bad and had a lovely little bay to the south. Balangan is popular with surfers and I saw some nice waves rolling along the reef. A fellow working at one of the warungs told me there were not too many people surfing right now as it was low tide, “too many break” he said, from which I took to mean ‘dangerous’. The mornings can see a lot of surfers at Balangan.
I can tell that business is slack here and the bombing definitely took a toll. Surfers will always love the Bukit though so there will be a steady, if smaller flow of people.
I didn’t stay long and after a small Bintang and some chit chat with locals I made my way up the hill for a slow cruise down the hill to Jimbaran and back to Kuta.
The Bukit, while being a surfers hangout really does have some lovely beaches. Dreamland is very nice and the tiny bays on the south of the Bukit only require a 15 minute hike down to the beach. For visitors to Bali who are tired of Kuta Beach why not hire a Suzuki for 80,000rp with another tourist or even rent a car and driver for the day and explore a couple of beaches on the Bukit.
By Nick | Permalink
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Comments
Hi Nick, stuff going on over there sounds laid back and enjoyable…. I’m a new member and am curious if you might know of any cheap routes to Indonesia/Bali from either Japan or Korea? I can get there for free (Japan, Korea)but airfare seems to be around US800 onwards to Indo. The surfing there looks like a whole lotta’ fun. Good job on your dinner by the way……
jesse
Nick,
get yourself a rice cooker - it makes it impossible to screw up the rice, and keeps it hot for about an hour..
Cheers.
NICK: I agree with Duncan, rice cooker, wash rice, equal parts of rice and water, optional sprinkle of salt, 20 minutes later , poof, perfect asian nasih putih.
JINGRAM: Cathay Pacific, L.A. to BALI $599. Must book April for Sept - October departure. Or get the ALL ASIA pass $999. http://www.cathay-usa.com
T minus 27 hours till take off!! =:-D
Wyan, bebek (duck) is a local name for a Supra scooter.
Will have to pick up a rice cooker for sure. Or maybe my cleaner Putu could come over and do it.
Nick with the bbq tongs! The picture of your dinner here was a nice reminder of some great times over excellent food. I’m happy to send you some Newman’s when I get back to the States if you would like some.
Was it difficult to find a place that sold steak? Was it expensive? It looked perfect!
Hi Jen,
yes we did have some great bbq’s back in Oregon…deer and moose meat, not to mention the ‘Challenger Chicken’. (Challenger Chicken was the fatty bargain chicken I used to get in 10lb bags from Fred Meyers. When placed on the grill the fat would catch fire and send flames a foot in the air).
I’d prefer if you brought the Newman’s dressing with you and helped me eat. Another item that’s missing is the giant sized bottle of cheap red wine ( I used to keep a stash of these under my desk just in case).
Bintang supermarket sells everything so it was easy to find the items I used. I think the steak was 5,500rp per something. Will check on what that something was next time I go. The meat was actually okay.
I’m going to get my friend Ebong to score us some tuna fom the fishing village where he lives soon.
I tell you though that burner was the biznis!
Nick:
Here’s another vote for a rice cooker! Besides that, the food looked/sounded pretty darned good.
BBQ in bali…I’m jealous.
bebek = scooter ?