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Sussex has plenty of excellent Indian or Thai restaurants, but an Indonesian gastronomic experience is harder to come by. Surprising, given that it is the world’s fourth most populated country and its scattering of over 17,500 islands lends itself to a great diversity in its cuisine.

Even more surprising considering that the country holds its food in high esteem and its dishes have a wide variety of flavour, whilst retaining a core identity that makes it unique.

Warung Tujuh is a lovely little restaurant that succeeds in bringing out the best of Indonesian cooking.  It is a little tucked away and the entrance is understated, although they have three floors, all illuminated by different colours. They have tried very hard to make it as authentically Indonesian as possible – the ‘Warung’ in the name refers to the roadside food stalls found all across Indonesia.

There is a core element to all of the dishes, bordering on simplicity, in that everything contains garlic, coconut and chillies, with a smattering of a spice combination (known as bumbu) containing cinnamon, lemongrass and nutmeg. But the dishes are prepared in such a way that to describe the food as a kind of confused hybrid between Indian and Thai – as I was foolishly led to believe before – would be to do it a great disservice.

Simple in essence, but a few surprises will await you if you’ve never sampled the cuisine before. A few Asian familiarities are present to create the mood music – the chicken and beef sate skewers for starters (£5.95) were a good case in point. The cumi cumi goring tepung (£5.75) – squid in fried batter – was excellent, the squid being unusually soft, devoid of the chewiness that can sometimes make this a menu slip-up. Don’t let the use of authentic names on the menu put you off – the staff are as knowledgeable as anywhere I’ve encountered.

A couple of mains, the sambai udang (prawns in spicy sauce) (£9.80) and the ayam bumbu (chicken in spices and coconut milk) (£6.95), were sampled at the host’s recommendation. Again, the simplicity of the dishes belied the complexity of the flavours in the sauce. The spicy deepness of the sauce, with the flavours of the bumbu simultaneously bursting through, made for a flavour I’ve never quite received anywhere else.

They also have superb vegetarian options, quite clearly as ingrained into the culture as the meat dishes, rather than a token add-on to cater for fusspots. The gado gado (lightly cooked vegetables with beansprouts, tofu and egg with peanut sauce) (£5.95) is superb.

The desert choices are just as interesting. I was presented with a jackfruit ice cream. Apparently the actual fruit is famed for its wonderful taste and foul smell! It is an almost indescribable taste, somewhere in between kiwi and pineapple, if put crudely. And all for reasonable prices, with a top-end main still less than a tenner.
You’ll probably come away wondering why Indonesian food isn’t as big here as it should be.

Words and pictures by William Lacy