MAROUSH

Merhaba! A few weeks ago, I got a chance to come to Maroush, a middle eastern restaurant, located at Crowne Plaza Hotel, South Jakarta. It's an interesting visit, since I've never tasted any middle eastern food before.

The place is quite comfortable, with a hard cultural interior design, very middle easternish. of course. Dominated with red. One interesting thing, they have a small room for meetings, or another occasions, and there's a one big beautiful crafted table, imported straight from Turkey. It is so big, they can't get it inside the restaurant via normal way. So, they get it inside via the window using heavy machinery.

Enough with the interior design, now it's time to eat! First course, we got a plate of Hummus, Babaganush, Chakchouka, and Tabolue Salad. You might said, "What are those?", right? Well, so do I in the first place. Lemme explain them for you. Hummus is blended chickpeas, with sesame seed paste dressed with olive oil. Babaganush is char-grilled eggplant, tomato, and chili mixed with mashed garlic spring parsley, and olive oil. Chakchouka is char-grilled and sauted green and red paprika with tomato and olive oil. Tabolue Salad is chopped fresh parsley, tomato, onion, and boiled pounded wheat dressed with olive oil. And all of it are eaten with bread as their companion.

Proceed to next dish! Karidesli Peynirli Mantar. A quite long name for a food is it? So, it's basically a wood-fire oven baked mushrooms, cheddar cheese, garlic, and dried thyme topped with shrimps. It's juicy. Got a milky taste from the cheese. A simple dish, but good! Chicken Pastilla, sweet savoury Morrocan meat pie filled with chicken.

This is Feta Spinach Borek, a combination of spinach, oregano, and Turkish white cheese. A familiar shape, but have an original taste!

Another unfamiliar name of food, Feslegenli Patlican Sarmasi, fried eggplant parcels filled with sauteed vegetables and fresh basil. Despite the long name, it taste quite right. Me personally didn't too familiar with eggplant, but after tasting it, my personal perception of eggplants is changed, haha.

The left one, Doner Durum, grilled lamb fillet marinated overnight, stuffed in wood-fire oven bread mixed with lettuce, sumac, onion salad, and garlic sauce. And the right one, Firinda Ezmeli Balik. Fillet of marinated fish, pan fried with ezme sauce, sauteed veggies, and cheddar cheese. The texture is quite like a simple fish and chips we usually tasted. But the sauce gave it another sour taste. Like it!

And the main course, Lamb Shank Cous Cous. Wood-fire oven cooked lamb shank served with cous cous and coban salatasi. The lamb is soft, well cooked, but still got a little lamb smell.

Chicken Lemon and Olives, like the name, is chicken pieces braised with spice, garlic, onion, olives, and lemon cooked in tagine.

To end with all of those beautifully tasty food, we proceed into the dessert! Baklava! Baklava is layered filo pastry, butter, and pistachio, baked sweetened with homemade syrup and honey. I'm very interested with this pastry because I've read about it somewhere and very interested to taste it. And now I've tasted it, lemme give my approval sign of deliciousness! The syrup and honey really give it a very, very sweet taste. The pistachio quite crunchy and give another dimension into every bite. I would like to try more of it.

After all, it's a very delightful culinary journey! Thank you, MakanLuar for inviting me! Let's see you soon.

Maroush's Location:

Photos by Monica Lauricia (@monicalauricia) & Shendy Subroto (@shendysubroto) 

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