Yogyakarta Restaurants and Dining

(Yogyakarta, Central Java, Indonesia)

The Sosrowijayan area of Yogyakarta is absolutely loaded with cheap eateries and restaurants, serving all kinds of tasty Indonesian dishes, as well as Western fare. Street hawkers offer an endless array of cheap eats, often serving their spicy morsels on banana leaves or paper.

It is around Sosrowijayan where locals in Yogyakarta tend to eat out at night, and so if you are looking for a lively dining experience, come here at 21:00 or 22:00, when the fun begins. On the northern side of the Jalan Malioboro, local street traders start to pack up at this time, and straw mats are laid down outside, creating a traditional Indonesian dining area (warung lesahan).

What to Eat

The Indonesian cuisine of Yogyakarta is generally rather sweet in flavour, although in recent years, elements from European and Chinese dishes have started to influence local restaurants, and some dishes are something of a fusion of these different cultures. Dining specialities in Yogyakarta include the following dishes:

• Ayam Goreng - fried garlic chicken
• Bakpia - a pastry parcel of green bean paste
• Es Rujak - tropical fruit salad, with palm sugar, chillies and ice cream
• Gudeg - chicken, egg and jackfruit curry
• Jadah Tempe - fermented bean cake and rice cake sandwich
• Kelepon - sweet dumplings made with green rice flour and palm sugar
• Kipo - balls of tapioca dough and grated coconut