Sampling <i> Satay </i> in Indonesian Sultan’s Palace

Dining in a sultan’s palace may sound like an Arabian Nights fantasy, but it’s actually possible for tourists who visit this city in central Java.

Yogya, as Indonesians call it, is a mecca for fanciers of batik, shadow puppetry and classical Javanese music and dance, as well as a recommended headquarters for touring ancient Hindu and Buddhist monuments.

The most important of these are Borobudur, a massive 8th-Century structure considered the finest Buddhist monument in the world, and 9th-Century Prambanan, a collection of Hindu temples still undergoing restoration. Both are near the city.

The food is fine, too, and it’s sumptuously served at Joyokusuman Palace, where the reigning sultan, Sri Sultan Hamengku Buwono X, was born but no longer lives.

Since 1988, the palace has staged elaborate dinners complete with performances of music and dance. The dinners are for groups only, and reservations must be made a month or more in advance. But individuals can come on short notice for lunch, which has another advantage over dinner: There’s still time for a shopping spree afterward in the batik galleries that are scattered about the neighborhood.

Known as the kraton kecil (little palace), Joyokusuman is near the main kraton, where the sultan now resides. City tours include a look at this palatial compound. Along with numerous pavilions and halls, women’s quarters and a museum, it includes a small building dedicated to an important task: the brewing of the sultan’s tea.

Joyokusuman’s present inhabitant is the sultan’s youngest brother and adjutant, Gusti Bendoro Pangeran Haryo H. Joyokusumo, who plays host for the meals.

If they’re at home, Prince Joyokusumo and his wife, Bendoro Raden Ayu H. Nuraida Joyokusumo, might drop in and even stop by tables to chat. I missed this experience in June because the prince was on pilgrimage to Mecca.

The price for dinner is $15, which includes the show. Lunch, without entertainment, is $7.50. It takes a large staff to produce these meals, and there’s no scrimping on the food. You have to make several trips to the buffet to sample all the dishes.

Nevertheless, my group of Americans and Javanese had a regal time last June. We assembled for appetizers and a cool drink in the enormous open-air pendopo that fronts the palace. The pendopo is the Javanese equivalent of a veranda in the American South, and serves as a reception area as well as a stage for dance performances.

Because Indonesia is predominantly Muslim, our drink was nonalcoholic--a sweet, ginger-flavored, bright-red concoction called sirup secang. Branches of the secang tree are rubbed, then simmered with water to extract the vibrant color.

Waiters brought us plates of pisang keju-- fried bananas topped with shredded pale cheese. We also sampled jadah manten-- dainty, meat-stuffed rice cakes mounted in a framework of bamboo sticks, wrapped with banana leaf and garnished with a dab of rich coconut cream.

We sat on ornately carved upholstered chairs with our backs to a dark garden, as if in a drawing room whose walls had suddenly toppled, exposing us to the breezes. Although the evening was pleasantly cool, fans whirred above us.

Hanging lamps illuminated the pendopo, and the red-and-gold royal crest sparkled on the wall we faced. Beneath it, a gamelan orchestra played rhythmic, percussive Javanese music on a collection of gongs, xylophones and drums.

Soon, teen-aged girls in batik sarongs and headdresses trimmed with flowers and feathers appeared to perform a welcome dance, the golek ayun ayun. Then it was time for dinner.

We were awed by the luxurious furnishings of this grandiose, 75-year-old building, although the whitewashed walls and dark beams reminded me of a European country inn. The long dining table was set with gold-rimmed white china from Semarang, a city on the northern coast of Java. Elaborate ceramic chandeliers cast a glow over the plain white tablecloth and napkins folded like fans. The table and chairs were fashioned of wood from Kalimantan, which is the Indonesian portion of the island of Borneo.

Open French doors looked out into a patio lush with greenery, including mango and jackfruit trees. A waterfall trickled soothingly, and a small band of musicians sat on the ground, strumming an exotic serenade. This sort of dinner music is apparently the custom in Yogya. Wherever I ate, roving musicians would steal up, play for a few moments and vanish silently with a small tip.

The food was authentically Indonesian but mild enough for foreigners who don’t like hot spice. After the first course--broth with pasta and vegetables--we helped ourselves to such dishes as ayam goreng, ikan acar and mihun goreng. These translate to fried chicken, sweet and sour fish and fried noodles.

Bistik was not steak in the American sense, but slices of beef in a savory sauce. We were told that another dish, an unusual combination of meat and noodles topped with yellow potatoes, was a favorite dish of Sultan VIII (two sultans before reigning Sri Sultan Hamengku Buwono X). Satay ayam-- grilled skewered chicken morsels--came with a sweet peanut sauce.

Vegetarians could try sayur lodeh, vegetables cooked in coconut milk; hard-cooked eggs in a coconut-chile sauce, and stewed vegetables dominated by the dark-leafed sawi, a local cabbage. Big, fluffy shrimp chips called krupuk were served on the side like potato chips. And there was a spicy condiment called sambal terasi .

The Western-style salad was, perhaps, a legacy of the Dutch, Indonesia’s former colonial masters.

Fruits included the odd-looking salak, pineapple, watermelon, papaya, apples and bananas. The salak’s pale, sweet-sour segments hide inside a leathery brown peel that has earned it the nickname “snake fruit.”

The most unusual dish was manuk nom, a dessert of fermented glutinous rice-colored green with juices of the pandan leaf. This soft, sweet, winy-tasting mixture is spooned onto crisp fried wafers called emping . Sultan VII was especially fond of this treat.

The cooks in charge, Ibu Supat and Ibu Jinah (ibu is a form of address for older women and means mother ) have worked in the palace kitchen for almost 50 years. Only part of the work takes place in this large, plain, green-tiled room. There’s also an outdoor extension where helpers prepare and chop the ingredients.

After dinner, we wandered through the public rooms and saw the bedroom where the current sultan was born. It is now a museum. The two cooks, now bare-shouldered in their finest sarongs, sat on the living-room floor, showing how to pleat sarong fabric so that it hangs in graceful folds.

Then we returned to the pendopo for a series of dances, including one in which the monkey god Hanuman, a hero of the Hindu Ramayana epic, battles with an adversary. When it was over, the dancers formed a line and we shook hands with each one, ending with Hanuman, still gleaming with sweat and panting from his exertions. As a parting gift, we received small pottery jugs tagged with a thank-you card from the prince.

Our night of royal splendor over, we slipped back into reality just like Cinderella. Only instead of pumpkins, the coaches that waited for us had turned into motor bikes, taxis, ordinary automobiles and weathered becaks-- the bicycle-powered rickshaws that ply the city.

GUIDEBOOK

Palace Dining

in Indonesia

Joyokusumo Palace (also called Prince Joyokusumo House), Jalan Rotowijayan No. 5, Kraton, Jogjakarta 55132, Indonesia, local telephone 61520. From the United States, fax: 011-62-274-62004. All dinners by group reservation only.

For more information: Contact the Indonesia Tourist Promotion Office, 3457 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 105, Los Angeles 90010, (213) 387-2078.