Bali was a pretty lonely representative of Indonesian food in Bangkok. Revamped and renamed La Lune, its menu can now best be described as Tawandang Brewery with a splash of Jakarta. As the French name suggests (not), La Lune is a dizzying journey from German taverns (pork legs with mashed potatoes) to Bangkok-style izakaya (deep-fried river prawns with sweet ebiko sauce) with a detour through Thai pub food and, as a kind of afterthought, a page of Indonesian dishes. The kitchen pops it all out so quickly, you have to wonder if some magic Doraemon-style oven is involved. You bet. It’s called Mr. Microwave and it does a great job of delivering dishes that range, within the same plate, from stone cold to searing hot. The food even looks hastily put together. The signature spicy salmon salad involves over-cooked chunks of fish heaped with deep-fried seaweed, onions and a cloying sauce. All the flavors are pumped up to the max, and it ends up being plain gross. Not that simpler dishes fare any better. The beer-basted pork sausages are six depressing, chewy, chunks of fat with a sad vegetable garnish (mustard would have been a more sensible addition). The Indonesian dishes seem to be the safest bets, once you’ve sent them back for a second spin in the magic oven. The rendang daging (beef simmered in coconut and spices) and sup buntut (Indonesian style oxtail soup) are not earth-shattering but pack plenty of exotic spices and flavors. Even the unusually crispy eggplant in the terang balado benefits from being, well, unusual. Forget sitting indoors, where the owner seriously needs to clean up his junk. Outdoors, it’s all bare cement, neon beer signs, garden seating, and looming serviced apartments. With pints of Stella Artois on draft and a Singha beer girl on hand, you might say La Lune is actually a bar, but it fails in that respect, too, mostly thanks to the 1996 Greatest Hits soundtrack. On our last visit, we overheard the waitress chit-chatting about quitting. Wise move, lady. Corkage B200.
