Balinese Food @ The Waterlily Bistro, Mutiara Tropicana, Petaling Jaya

Balinese painting upstairs, refreshing mint lemongrass mojito

Checking out this place was more like a mission for my friend who has been searching for a suitable venue to throw a full moon party for her new baby. Loads of new places within the Aman Suria, Mutiara Tropicana area (as this row of shophouses is called) and even at Sunway Mas. I often get updates from my ex-colleague and a colleague of mine who live around here. So far, you have Betty's Kitchen (a place that serves Midwest non halal food that this lady learnt when she stayed with her daughter in places like Iowa and Minnesota), Rosemary Bites (seems to be more towards Italian), Char Siew Zhai (that flipping wantan noodles with char siu) and this place, Waterlily.

minced lamb with rice, chicken soto

Balinese food in the Klang Valley seems to be solely dominated by the people who first started out Bumbu Bali in Puchong. After the success of that place, they opened up a Waterlife Cafe also in Puchong. Subsequently other outlets in Sunway Pyramid and Solaris Mont Kiara was known as Ole Ole Bali while this is their latest addition. I suspect they decided not to use the same name for all their outlets since the perception of "being a chain of restaurants" will mean a drop in quality and etc. However, if you see their menus they're literally the same items - grilled seafood and meats served in various ways: over pasta, with mashed potato, with rice and sambals or in sandwiches. They're also the only place I know that serves sate lilit, minced seafood wrapped around lemongrass sticks.

grilled seafood with linguine pasta

Like their other outlets, the eateries are all decked out in Balinese items to give a kinda resort feel when you're dining out here. This particular restaurant tries to emulate that peaceful retreat feel but gets hampered as it faces the main road (they counteract it by pulling wooden chicks blinds to block out the sound). They also have the unfortunate luck to be next to a fella who fixes tyres, so occasionally you hear the whirl and wind of the machines used to remove the tyres from the car, breaking through the soothing rhythms of the Balinese music. Nevertheless it is still quite pleasant dining here. They usually open downstairs for daytime dining while upstairs seems more private (there's an air-conditioned are and a non air-conditioned area). You get to peek into upstairs when you walk up the staircase (no railings just the top part wrapped in rope, so beware those with small kids) lit up with floating candles as the toilets are upstairs.

Bits of Bali with the lemongrass ice tea

On to food, we have sampled their chicken soto (RM11) - chicken soup with bits of chicken and vegetables served with compressed rice cakes and weirdly enough, sliced garlic bread. Squeeze the lime given on the side to add a refreshing taste to the soup which tastes quite comforting. Their most popular order is the Nasi Campur - a mix of their specialties with sate lilit on the side. Having sampled that on numerous occasions in the other outlets, we went for the more unusual minced lamb. It is also served in a platter with yellow rice, the sambals and a keropok. The minced lamb was really good - tender with loads of chopped coriander all over it to give it flavour. Since I have not tried any of their western items, I decided to try their grilled seafood pasta (RM28). They're very generous with the amount of seafood - grilled squid, dory fish and prawns (that weren't very fresh!) that the plate seems to be overloaded with food. Underneath the bed of seafood, you find linguine tossed in a brownish sauce with chopped tomatoes and fried shallots. There's not much taste to the pasta sauce in terms of tomatoes but it's still a pleasant dish to chow down to with all the grilled seafood.

A large variety of drinks are also available here, including Monin syrup mixers. Tried their Mojito mixed with mint and lemongrass (RM11) that was refreshing but seemed to lack much taste of mojito syrup. The lemongrass tea we had the first time we ate here, seemed to be also missing much flavour as the chopped lemongrass in the sweetened tea wasn't adding any flavour to the drink. I guess the verdict is would I come back here again - personally I wouldn't mind since the food is pretty decent with a nice atmosphere. What I do notice is throughout the years from eating Bumbu Bali and Ole Ole Bali, the taste of the food seems to drop more and more. Initially Bumbu Bali was so tasty (but then I discovered it had MSG) hence I guess now they have omitted the MSG taste thus the food can be kinda bland tasting unless you add the sambals to give it more flavour. On throwing parties here, they do entertain this but sadly there's no special snacks or a catering menu. Instead, you have to order the a-la-carte dishes from the menu. The most they can entertain you with is a buffet spread based on their nasi campur dish (i.e. the yellow rice, grilled seafood, rendang, keropok and sambals). For a full set of pictures, see the Flickr set.

The Waterlily Bistro

No. 11-G, 11-1 & 11-2
Jalan Mutiara Tropicana 3
Mutiara Tropicana
Petaling Jaya

(Halal. Place is at the same row of shophouses where Jaya Grocer is located. To get here from PJ, if you are driving from Damansara towards the NKVE highway, just before the toll gate, take a left turn to Tropicana. Follow the road and you will see these row of shophouses on your left hand side.)

*Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here is entirely based on my personal tastebuds and may vary for others. This review is time sensitive; changes may occur to the place later on that can affect this opinion. The reviewer also declares that she has not received any monetary or non-monetary compensation from this place for writing the review.

Tagged with: Balinese Food+ Tropicana

Others who have also visited here:

• thenomadGourmand
• hAppY HapPy
• i'm saimatkong