Two weekends ago, my friend invited me to dinner at Arts Café by Raffles Jakarta. I never been to this place before so it was fun to check the place out. From the unique décor of Indonesian traditional artworks juxtaposed in the modern space, to the sleek wavy wooden panels framing the dining area, the interior of this restaurant is definitely memorable.

As for the food, we tried their all you can eat buffet which offers different selections of Asian and Western dishes. The dishes of the regular buffet was okay. There are enough variations of the menu items and they are seasoned well. Although if you’re a fan of bolder flavors, you might find the dishes are seasoned more on the lighter side (at least imho), but they’ll make you full without making you feel like your stomach is going to burst (again, imho). The dessert selections are quite varied from cakes, pastries, to Indonesian traditional snacks and sweets and they’re pretty good.

The AYCE also includes the recent additions to the buffet package which are the live cooking stations and show kitchen with menu curated by executive sous-chef Lukman. The menu for these two sections are more unique compared to the regular buffet stations which I think is one of the reason to try this buffet. The menu is still Indonesian inspired but, dare I say, with a twist, drawing inspirations from other culture’s dishes as well.

My favorite dish from the menu was Tuna na niura which is tuna placed inside a crispy nori cylinder with andaliman peppers and calamansi. From the presentation itself, the dish already intrigued me. But what I didn’t expect was the burst of flavors that exploded in my mouth the moment I bit into it. The dish is in a perfect bite size and the taste of tuna combined with the freshness of calamansi and contrasted with the texture of the crispy nori was very well balanced. It was such a pleasant experience, I had to go back and order a second portion. Other runner-up menus that are pretty tasty include Nasi Bebek Ireng, Rendang Tortellini, Sei Sapi En Croute, and Rawon Bakso.