Makanan Indonesia, West End

The Friday before last I went to Makanan Indonesia for my usual end of the week meal.  On this occasion I ordered tofu with peanut sauce as an entree and beef rendang for my main.  The tofu itself was fairly standard, perhaps a little watery, but still good.  The peanut sauce had a good consistency and reasonably good flavour.  The main downside was that the sauce had obviously been refrigerated, whereas the tofu had clearly only just been cooked.  I'd have preferred that the sauce was warm, or at least room temperature, and unfortunately, there was not enough of it to accommodate the five or six rather large pieces of tofu.  I have reviewed a couple of beef rendangs before in this blog, and Makanan Indonesia's is probably the weakest.  Don't let that lead you to conclude that it was in anyway bad.  Whereas the other beef rendangs mentioned in this blog were of restaurant quality, I believe that Makanan Indonesia's take on the dish is more like what I might expect Indonesian home cooking to be like, and there's nothing wrong with good home cooking.  The rendang itself was on the dry side, whereas I prefer a saucy beef rendang that I can dip bread in.  On this occasion, I did have some roti to accompany my dish, and despite the lack of sauce there was enough oil for me to soak up with my roti.  I am of the opinion that for some dishes oiliness is not necessarily a bad thing, and that was the case this time.  The flavours of the dish had permeated the oil and I was content enough to dip my roti in that.  The pieces of beef were certainly large, which can sometimes mean that they are under cooked, but this time they were cooked quite well.  There was probably the most onion I have encountered in any beef rendang.  My opinion on onion is quite outspoken.  I think it makes food taste worse, but I can eat it if I have to.  Having said that I have enjoyed many many dishes with the presence of onion.  This is because I don't mind it too much if the onion has almost completely dissolved in the sauce and becomes indistinguishable from the other flavours.  This was for the most part the case on this occasion. However, there was a sprinkling of fried onion on top.  Luckily for me and Makanan Indonesia, they were fried to a crisp, so much so that they mainly added some crunch rather than flavour to the dish.  Overall, for a dry rendang, this was an enjoyable, if far from perfect meal.