one of the new hip in Jakarta! located strategically in Plaza Indonesia and managed under the same management of Ocha Bella, Le Jardin - Moovina is definitely just too good to be passed.. I have previously seen other blog post reviewing this place and fell in love with their effort to bring proper fine dining experience and atmosphere to a space inside a shopping mall..
it was on Thursday night, December 27 and somehow, the place was full by the time we arrived around 7 p.m.. I guessed Jakartans have already taken their holidays, eh? eventually, we put our names on the waiting list along with mobile phone number to be contacted once the table is ready.. we were told that we were waiting for four tables ahead of us.. seeing the atmosphere, we knew that the "four tables" separating us from our table was a far distance.. I mean, people coming there must have wanted to spend more time to chat and will definitely not leave early..
since we were hungry already, we decided to have our dinner somewhere else inside Plaza Indonesia and ended up in Kihana, a Japanese restaurant located right in front of Starbucks Coffee.. this place was also beautiful and very quiet with luxurious Japanese decorations, you'll feel like you were taken somewhere outside a shopping mall.. the light was dimmed to bring an intimate and romantic atmosphere.. the food was great and delicious but the pictures taken were just too shameful to be put in the blog..
around 8 p.m, we finally got a call that our table in Le Jardin - Moovina is ready and so off we went.. the place is indeed beautiful, resembling a garden decorated with huge grey sofa, marble tables and some wooden chairs.. the plants put inside the room was decorated with small lights and make the whole atmosphere just stunning.. I fell in love.. it was just beautiful.. our table was at the corner which was really cozy and very private.. the music was a bit loud so you need to half-shout to ensure that your friends heard what you said..
as we already had our dinner, we decided to try their desserts and drinks.. calvados (Rp50,000) and pavlova (Rp50,000) along with the sweet bites (Rp45,000) were our choices.. the sweet bites consisted of three cakes available in the front bakery upon your choice.. my friend picked blueberry muffin, apple muffin and chocolate cake.. the best of these was apple muffin.. it was smooth, fluffy and perfectly sweet.. the chocolate cake was not too impressive, though.. a bit too dry and it was hard! I even thought that it was some yesterday's left-over.. the worst would be blueberry muffin as it was as hard as rock with weird taste.. lesson of the day for me would be not to order from their bakery..
not waiting too long, our calvados and pavlova arrived.. the calvados is actually roasted apple flamed, salted caramel sauce on top of thin layer of crepe, served with vanilla gelato.. it was heavenly! the crepe was smooth and silky with crispy edges, combined it with roasted apple and the sweet caramel sauce, you get a sinfully delicious spoon of dessert.. the vanilla gelato was another treat, it was very smooth and sweet in a perfect level.. I love everything about this dish.. I remember the four of us were like 'enak banget.. ini enak banget' after our first bites.. so yeah, it was that good..
the pavlova was really pleasing for the eyes.. crisp meringue filled with lemon sherbet, seasonal fruits and passion fruit coulis.. I mean, look at those colors.. the meringue was sweet and crispy, typical children's dessert.. balanced with the sour lemon sherbet and the mango sauce.. it was a perfect combination of sweet and sour in one beautiful plate.. yum!
deciding what to have for dessert was easy.. however, deciding what to drink was hard.. I must admit that the drink menu was overwhelming.. six pages of almost A3 paper describing all the different types of drinks, mostly alcohol.. ranging from wine, tequila, martini and other alcoholic drinks I'm not familiar with, ended with a tiny section of non-alcoholic drinks.. the menu was very descriptive as each drink got a descent explanation underneath.. it took us almost 15 minutes just screening it, no, we didn't even go to details.. I decided to pick from their flavored tea section which was -even- divided into three sub-sections: ocha based, rosella based and black tea based.. I decided to have pomegranate & strawberry flavored ocha (Rp38,000) while my other friend picked kiwi & apple flavored ocha (Rp38,000), Jose Cuervo tequila (Rp80,000) and chocolate martini (Rp95,000)..
my drink came in a green-red combination which looked really appetizing.. turned out it tasted delicious as well, a tad too sweet for my liking though, but still acceptable.. I fancied my friend's kiwi & appled flavored ocha more than my own since it was sour and really refreshing.. perhaps, I've been eating too much sweet that I should have picked some fresh sour drink.. the Jose Cuervo tequila was mixed with sprite to make it drinkable.. it looked like iced water with lemon slice that I didn't bother to take a picture of it.. with 40% of alcohol (cmiiw), it tasted really bitter and definitely not my kind of drink.. on the other hand, the chocolate martini was really unique.. the glass was dipped with dark chocolate then filled with the bitter martini.. my friend loved it and I just thought it was okay.. don't think I would order it, though :)
not waiting too long, our calvados and pavlova arrived.. the calvados is actually roasted apple flamed, salted caramel sauce on top of thin layer of crepe, served with vanilla gelato.. it was heavenly! the crepe was smooth and silky with crispy edges, combined it with roasted apple and the sweet caramel sauce, you get a sinfully delicious spoon of dessert.. the vanilla gelato was another treat, it was very smooth and sweet in a perfect level.. I love everything about this dish.. I remember the four of us were like 'enak banget.. ini enak banget' after our first bites.. so yeah, it was that good..
the pavlova was really pleasing for the eyes.. crisp meringue filled with lemon sherbet, seasonal fruits and passion fruit coulis.. I mean, look at those colors.. the meringue was sweet and crispy, typical children's dessert.. balanced with the sour lemon sherbet and the mango sauce.. it was a perfect combination of sweet and sour in one beautiful plate.. yum!
deciding what to have for dessert was easy.. however, deciding what to drink was hard.. I must admit that the drink menu was overwhelming.. six pages of almost A3 paper describing all the different types of drinks, mostly alcohol.. ranging from wine, tequila, martini and other alcoholic drinks I'm not familiar with, ended with a tiny section of non-alcoholic drinks.. the menu was very descriptive as each drink got a descent explanation underneath.. it took us almost 15 minutes just screening it, no, we didn't even go to details.. I decided to pick from their flavored tea section which was -even- divided into three sub-sections: ocha based, rosella based and black tea based.. I decided to have pomegranate & strawberry flavored ocha (Rp38,000) while my other friend picked kiwi & apple flavored ocha (Rp38,000), Jose Cuervo tequila (Rp80,000) and chocolate martini (Rp95,000)..
my drink came in a green-red combination which looked really appetizing.. turned out it tasted delicious as well, a tad too sweet for my liking though, but still acceptable.. I fancied my friend's kiwi & appled flavored ocha more than my own since it was sour and really refreshing.. perhaps, I've been eating too much sweet that I should have picked some fresh sour drink.. the Jose Cuervo tequila was mixed with sprite to make it drinkable.. it looked like iced water with lemon slice that I didn't bother to take a picture of it.. with 40% of alcohol (cmiiw), it tasted really bitter and definitely not my kind of drink.. on the other hand, the chocolate martini was really unique.. the glass was dipped with dark chocolate then filled with the bitter martini.. my friend loved it and I just thought it was okay.. don't think I would order it, though :)
 |
| pomegranate&strawberry flavored ocha - chocolate martini |
overall, it was a well time spent.. I mean, great friends with great food in a great place.. oh, on top of above prices, we were charged with 10% tax and 10% service.. quite expensive but still worth the money :) now, will I come back? definitely will! I can't even wait to try their main courses.. until then, ciao!
Le Jardin - Moovina
Plaza Indonesia 3rd Floor #119
Jl. M.H. Thamrin Kav 28-30
Central Jakarta 10350
Ph.: 6221 2992 4567
Man, the pavlova could be even more drooling if it were taken during the day. But still, that already drools me enough.
ReplyDeleteSome says that the place is not really packed, but they just love to make you wait. =p
hahaha.. yes, unfortunately the light was terrible for food photography..
Deletewell, i heard about that.. but that time we visited, it was really packed, since we insisted to look inside first before leaving our phone number haha..