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Julia’s Indonesian Kitchen
910 NE 65th St.
Seattle, WA 98125

206.522.5528


Payment:
Cash, Visa and MasterCard accepted.

Hours:
Tuesday through Wednesday,
lunch only
11 a.m.-3 p.m. Thursday to Sunday, lunch and dinner,
11 a.m.-9 p.m.

 

June 2008

by A.V. Crofts

© Copyright 2008 ColorsNW Magazine

Homestyle Indonesian

Julia's Indonesian Kitchen a welcome taste of the Islands

Seattle welcomes thousands of international students to its colleges and universities each year. As the fourth-most populous country in the world, it’s not surprising that Indonesia boasts one of the highest percentages of those students. These Indonesian students are who we have to thank for the edible gift that is Julia’s Indonesian Kitchen, a cozy bungalow restaurant just west of Roosevelt Way on NE 65th Street in Ravenna.

Hungry for a taste of home, word spread among the students that Indonesian transplant Juliana Suparman, mother of three and grandmother of two, cooked up meals that could soothe any homesick stomach. Julia’s started as a robust catering company, which at its peak had Suparman cooking and delivering daily meals for as many as 100 students. “It really feels like mother’s food,” she says. So much so that eager students starting knocking on the door of the bungalow, hoping they’d find Suparman in the kitchen ready to dish up the foods they miss. Last July 7 (“Triple seven!”), Julia’s officially opened as a restaurant, transforming the space with Indonesian textiles, antique lighting and dark wooden tables.

Sorry students, no more deliveries. Time to close the books and visit the reigning mother of Indonesian cuisine in Seattle!

While Julia’s may have not yet celebrated its first anniversary, Suparman has been cooking for more than 35 years. In true maternal fashion, when pressed, Suparman gently shrugs off her cooking talent as if it was an unexpected but welcome byproduct of her early curiosity in the kitchen. “I have loved to cook ever since I was a child,” she says. Suparman recalls sneaking into the kitchen even before she was old enough to be deemed useful and be shooed out by the adults.

In keeping with her understated personality, Suparman will be the first to tell you she was in no position to launch this enterprise all on her own, and with the additional talent in her clan, she couldn’t have assembled a better business team. Her daughter-in-law, Yusi Sasmitra, a polished MBA with the warmth of a kindergarten teacher, puts her business administration degree to good use in promoting Julia’s and balancing Suparman’s culinary skills with her sophisticated understanding of running a business.

Rudy Tanumihardja, Suparman’s husband, having spent a distinguished career in the international logging industry, has now found a second career as the silver-tongued host at Julia’s (“She’s the boss now!”), where he holds court as Indonesia’s unofficial ambassador to Seattle. “I want Americans to know more about Indonesia than just Bali,” he says (ask him to point out his hometown on the wall map in Julia’s entryway).

Not to be left out, Sasmitra's husband (Suparman and Tanumihardja's son), Mars Tanumihardja, applies his computer science background to Julia's comprehensive website, with his sister Pat contributing to the website content and the press releases to announce Julia's grand opening “We don’t have titles,” Mars Tanumihardja explains. “It’s a family operation.”

If there was any doubt that Julia’s is truly a family business, it was put to rest during the course of my lively interview at the restaurant where Suparman, Rudy Tanumihardja and Sasmitra regaled me with stories, finished each others sentences, dispensed thoughtful praise toward each other’s strengths (“Everyone has their duties that are commensurate to their abilities,” says Tanumihardja), and each in his or her own way underscored that Julia’s is as much about sharing Indonesian culture with Seattle as it is about feeding appetites. “It’s nice that we can introduce Indonesian culture and the cuisine,” says Sasmitra. “Not only food for your body but food for thought.”

Much thought went into the menu at Julia’s, with benefit of market research garnered through the catering operation. “We selected which dishes were the most popular,” says Suparman.

For starters, I enjoyed the Risoles ($4.75), two folded, breaded pancake pockets stuffed with diced chicken and carrots in a creamy sauce. Perfect for fingers or a fork, the risoles come with a side dipping bowl of peanut sauce that has both crunch and kick – no wimpy Skippy-esque sauce here.

Julia’s Nasi Rames ($7.95) is a perfect choice for diners drawn to samplers. An order is served with a bowl topped with addictive crispy onion bits, a light corn fritter, and sambal goreng tahu (what appeared to be frozen green beans – or overcooked – and shredded carrot) with a white curry and fresh tofu. The dish is completed by the diner’s choice of a chicken, beef or vegetarian third dish. While I’m still learning to appreciate the wonders of tempeh, my dining companion pronounced the Orak-Arick Tempe Tahu vegetarian option delicious, as it combines sweet and soy sauce over tempeh and tofu chunks and cooked red peppers (I can vouch for the taste of the sauce over the fresh tofu and peppers). The Ayam Goreng Kalasan option offers a fried chicken drumstick and thigh. In my experience, Indonesians are serious about their fried chicken, and Julia’s is no exception (the chicken option is also available in a decent yellow curry).

The Bakmi Ayam Pedas ($6.95) packs some heat, but a marvelously sweet one at that. The dish fills a bowl with a bed of angel hair egg noodles topped with ground chicken, rich diced shiitake mushrooms and steamed bok choi. To finish the dish, I opted for two large fried origami-folded wantons filled with ground chicken (beef meatballs are the alternative). Finally, a bowl of hot beef broth is served separately to pour over the noodles. I loved the contrasting textures and flavors of this dish.

Vegetarians won’t go hungry at Julia’s, though there’s no question the carnivores have more to choose from. One vegetarian companion of mine enjoyed Julia’s Gado-Gado ($6.95), a fresh iceberg lettuce salad with fried tofu and hard-boiled eggs, with generous ladles of peanut sauce as dressing.

Julia’s grills up a respectable Satay Ayam ($7.95), served with four blackened skewers of chicken that are spiced, grilled (out of the four, two were over-grilled, so don’t forget to specify how cooked you would like them) and then served in a welcome bath of peanut sauce. Included pressed rice cubes make for great sauce sopping tools.

Given Indonesia’s history of colonization and the lucrative spice trade (the attentive diner will note that the apostrophe in “Julia’s” is a clove), it’s not just Indonesians in Seattle who welcome Julia’s arrival on the dining landscape, but the Dutch community as well. While Indonesia gained its independence from The Netherlands in 1949, many Dutch grew up with favorite Indonesian dishes and those in Seattle relish the opportunity to rediscover the flavors. Rudy Tanumihardja estimates that about half the Dutch community in Seattle has ties to Indonesia. “They tell me, ‘This is exactly how my grandmother used to cook!’ ” he says. “It brings back memories for them to come here and try the food.” Dutch customers stir memories for Tanumihardja as well. He was raised speaking Dutch (it was the language of instruction in the schools until 1959) and can now dust off his language skills. “Rudy now gets to speak Dutch again after 30 years!” says Suparman.

At Julia’s, drinks and desserts intermingle on the menu. I eagerly ordered the Es Alpukat ($3.25), an avocado shake, and it arrived with an unexpected drizzling of chocolate sauce. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m a certified chocoholic and the drink was both refreshing and scratched my sweet itch, but in the future I requested it unadorned.
I’ve sampled two bubble tea flavors, the Mango and Taro ($2.95). Instead of tapioca, the tea is served with gelatinous palm seeds (diners can request them without) and while the mango rings true to the advertised flavor (my dining companion ordered it and raved, I nearly missed the chance to sample it), I found the taro leaning a bit too far on the sweet side.

Finally, don’t let the look of the Kolak ($3.25) scare you off. This dessert is unfortunately the color and consistency of turkey gravy, but simmers melt-in-your-mouth sweet potato chunks, plantain coins, jackfruit pieces and palm seeds in sinfully sweet coconut milk sauce.

Repeat customers aren’t the only people in Seattle who have taken note of a new talent in town. “We were selected to be at the Bite of Seattle,” says Sasmitra. Therefore, from July 18 to 20, Julia’s fare will gain an even wider audience. I predict a bungalow bursting at the seams in Julia’s future.

Even though the pace of life is busy and promises to continue at this tempo, unlike the experience of most small-restaurant owners, life has actually calmed down for Suparman since opening Julia’s, now that the complicated coordination of daily deliveries has ended. While she and Tanumihardja originally relocated from Southeast Asia to Seattle to be near grandchildren (Sasmitra met their son when they were both international undergraduate students at the University of Washington) and ease into retirement, all agree that Julia’s is worth every minute of hard work.

“Indonesia is a very rich culture,” says Sasmitra. “If people want to experience Indonesia they can come here and get a glimpse.”

www.juliasindokitchen.com