Top Five Post-Gig Munchies: Indonesia Edition

[by: Rx Zenabi]

Traveling to Indonesia for the first time gave me an opportunity to explore their world-renowned street food and local cuisine. I went to Solo, Indonesia for the 2-day Solo Harsh Fest which was one of the best extreme Indonesian and international harsh noise/power electronics/experimental music festivals. However, food was definitely one of the important side missions as well.

Here are the top munchies recommended by THC Zine before/during/after a loud night of Indonesian power electronics/harsh noise, or just about any local show for that matter.

Bakso

Bakso is the world renowned Indonesian meatballs, often made of beef, or sometimes a combo of beef and chicken. It’s often served with rice noodles and veggies, such as mung bean sprouts and green onions, and known as mie bakso. It can also appear in its fried version, also delicious as hell along with legit OG sambal. Whichever form it is, bakso rules. Eating both while hanging out with Remon Red and Jaw Surgery and listening to their stories at 3 AM was one of the most awesome times ever.

Solo City Fried Chicken & Sambal

Upon arriving in Solo City after a 7-hour but awesome and comfortable train ride, this was the proper late lunch. Flavorful Solo-style fried chicken with tofu, veggies, and more sambal kicked things off into HIGH gear. Thanks to Jaw Surgery for the food and drinks. Suddenly, heavy rains began to pour, so we sat it out while smoking gudangs and drinking ice cold root beers and cokes. Fn killer.

Nasi Goreng

Sometime in the evening in the midst of all the noise chaos, we decided to get some quick grub. Just at the crossroads street was a street food vendor with a gigantic wok and numerous ingredients in his old cart. Solo city Nasi Goreng is as legit as you can get, featuring the mighty combo of fried rice, spices, sambal, kecap manis, beef sausage, veggies, and other magickal elements stir-fried in blazing heat and served hot with fish crackers and iced tea. Fn perfect.

Curry Breakfast Combo Rice Meal at Gudeg Solo

On day 2 of Solo Harsh Fest, we filled up at one of Solo’s top local restaurants, Gudeg Solo. I forgot the name of this breakfast meal, but it was heavy and spicy and killer. Rice topped with Balbacua-style beef skin, chicken, beef, curry sauce, marinated eggs, and those giant crackers with very artful symmetrical design makes this the true breakfast of champions of power electronics noise heads. The traditional cold tea was killer, followed by a succession of gudang tokes.

Solo-style Beef Stew

After 2 days of intense and power packed noise, it was time to go home. Well for me at least. After the show and before taking a rest for a few hours watching MTV’s 90s all-day special on Indonesian cable Tv, we headed to a local eatery still open at 3 AM. Their hot beef stew soup with young corn, carrots, and red bell peppers and rice, served with an addicting pair of hot sauces served as the perfect night (dawn) cap after 2 days of intense noise partying.

Beef Rendang, Chicken, Soy Sauce Tofu with Rice & Mie Goreng

Jaw Surgery and the industrial gang and Bali sound artists all went to Bali that early morning to play at Chaos Non Musica 2024 fest. I caught an early train back to Jakarta.

Upon arriving at the station, I faced a multitude of dinner options. This included the A&W branch at the airport. That fast food chain hasn’t existed in the Philippines since the 90s after the last branch in Quezon City closed down for good. There are so many affordable good food in Indonesia, it’s so hard to choose.

I decided to eat local at the train canteen and was not disappointed. This combo meal was my last meal before going back home, and it was killer. The old couple who owned the stall gave me a mug of great hot tea to cap off the killer home-cooked meal.

I then took the airport bus and the only other passenger was a nice old dude who was talking to his wife on the phone. I immediately fell asleep, and woke up in front of the airport. The airport restrooms were world class and great, and I took a good sh*t before boarding the flight home.

Terima Kasi, Indonesia, I’ll be back real soon. Over and out.