For the last two decades the popular opinion among Indonesians in Sydney was that Ayam Goreng 99 served the best Indonesian grub in Sydney. Thanks to My Delight, there’s now doubt. The tiny Mascot restaurant has been enormously popular since it opened in 2014.
In the early days, the shiny laminate tables were filled by the owners’ church friends – most of whom had tasted the same silky pork-sprinkled noodles and laksa-like rice-cake soup at the My Delight owners’ home or on one of the days trays of food were brought straight from their kitchen to the church.
It didn’t take long for the wider Indonesian to hear about the restaurant open in Mascot that grinds peanuts by hand for its gado-gado, makes its own meatballs for bakso vermicelli soup, and serves bakmi (those porky egg noodles) for less than $12. With new and eager customers came new demands for menu options. If someone can make a gado gado that rich and a simple bowl of egg noodles that desirable, imagine the possibilities when it comes to rendang or a something from the charcoal barbecue – some sticky pork ribs, say, and a fiery homemade green chilli sambal.
So, expect to wait for a table and make sure you look beyond the printed menu or the illuminated picture menu above the kitchen. The staff and the muddle of images plastered on and around the counter hold the secrets to the off-menu items – rich oxtail soup, salty banana leaf packages of spiced fish, and glistening pork ribs with meat so supple it can be eaten off the bone with a pair of chopsticks.