Nusa Indonesian Grill, Collyer Quay

Doesn't the person in the mural look like she's luxuriating in the pleasure of plunging a lightsaber into......whatever might have been that she was intending to impale? Look at that smirk.

Nusa (#01-03 Customs House, 70 Collyer Quay, tel : +65 8711 2181) is by Tambuah Mas. Indonesian, refined and a bit more contemporary than what one might encounter say "in the streets". In local colloquialism, it's a more atas version of Tambuah Mas.

Food's pretty good though. Like this rojak Jawa (Jawa as in Java, not the stunted cowled folks with glowing eyes in a galaxy far far away) which was sliced fruits with palm sugar syrup and finely crushed peanuts. It's sweet, a little spicy and definitely nutty with the citrus from said fruits.

We ordered their urap because the menu mentioned 'boiled vegetables'. Just needed to know that it's all cooked because I don't particularly enjoy the renditions with raw vegetables. Especially bean sprouts. Come and think of it, this looked the almost the same as the one served at Tambuah Mas. 

Paru goreng on skewers drizzled with kecap manis.

Their sayur lodeh tasted a little thin. Something we thought made better drinking than gravy on rice. We never needed that much gravy on rice here. Why?

Because their nasi kuning was good enough to eat on its own.

The sambal helps with most of the things we ordered. Except the kambing bakar.

Because the lamb was also good enough on its own. These were a little more done than what we normally go for and were glazed with something that might have been made with kecap manis. Meat had a good bite, prerequisite fat for flavour and pretty decent charring. Our first lamb in an Indonesian restaurant.

I was initially a little skeptical about their es krim kopi - that's an affogato with coconut ice cream. And something that they call Indonesian coffee. The balance hung heavy on both ingredients because there were only those two. Turned out that the coconut ice cream was sufficiently creamy that it worked and the strength of the espresso was...👍🏼.

More coconut ice cream, this time on avocado milkshake drizzled with palm sugar. It was less sweet than the ingredients suggested. Nice.