At Kubu on Bali, Chef Eka Sunarya turns foraging and farm-to-table into something deeper — an elegant, self-assured dialogue between land, culture and cuisine.
There are restaurants that cook from the land, and then there are restaurants that seem to listen to it. At Kubu, tucked into the folds of the Ayung River valley within Mandapa, A Ritz-Carlton Reserve in Bali, doesn’t just fall within the latter category — it verily defines it.
Set along a quiet bend of the river in Ubud at the edge of the luxury resort, Kubu is less a stately dining room than a series of quaint bamboo cocoons suspended between jungle and water. You arrive not so much at a restaurant as you do entering a tropical ecosystem. The air is thick with damp earth and the faint sweetness of jungle growth, the soundscape is all buzzing cicadas and gurgle of river rush.
This is, in other words, the sort of setting where calling it ‘farm-to-table’ feels almost reductive.
Because Kubu goes further than that.
The kitchen led by Chef Eka Sunarya works within a 100-kilometre radius, foraging and sourcing across Bali’s varied terrains — surging coast, verdant jungle, and dramatic volcanic highlands — with a near-religious commitment to using each ingredient from root to leaf. A respect for provenance. An understanding of terroir. Like Mandapa’s rooftop cocktail lounge Ambar, there’s also serious respect for tradition.
We hear such philosophy often enough. But Chef Eka himself is from Bali. He lives in Ubud. And he’s a very keen forager, working closely with local communities for ingredients that aren’t otherwise commercially available.
Crucially, it translates into cooking that feels, pardoning the pun, totally grounded.
Chef Eka’s menus — which lean into tasting formats — eschews theatrics. Instead, they unfold slowly, each dish a botanical essay begging to be read. Payangan Beans, for instance, arrive with braised beans served not as garnish but as protagonist. Here a medley of local heirloom varieties from black beans and green beans to mung beans and soy beans sourced from nearby Payangan comes arrayed with forest mushrooms and lashed with tree nut cream and a free-range egg yolk.
You also have Bali Community Fishery, which is essentially a ceviche… but make it Balinese. Here Chef Eka leans on passionfruit and rosella for tanginess, crunchy sweetness of radish, and wild herbs to accentuate the freshness of sliced sea bass.
Then there’s Baturiti Heritage Pig. Baturiti, for those who may not be aware, is where Bali’s iconic roast suckling pig, babi guling, originates. His version is slow-cooked pork belly presented in a very contemporary format, with green peppercorn and pepper leaf to add oomph and balance.
Likewise with Java Tokusen Beef, the slow roasted wagyu looking every bit like it comes from some fancy modern steakhouse but is made with local ingredients such as onions from the highlands of Bedugul and presented with a wine sauce rendered from local Balinese winery Plaga.
We love that at Kubu, indigenous greens, roots and fruits — things that in less thoughtful hands would be relegated to the sidelines — are given structure and meaning. There is a clarity to the cooking that recalls the best of contemporary European tasting menus, yet the flavour logic remains unmistakably Balinese.
Service, as one would expect in a Ritz-Carlton Reserve, is precise without being intrusive. Courses arrive with just enough explanation to situate you, but not so much that the spell of the surrounds is broken. You are left, largely, to your own devices — to listen, to taste, to make sense of it all.
And that, perhaps, is where Kubu truly stands out. In a time when terms like sustainability and local sourcing have become the lingua franca of luxury dining, it is far too easy to make loud claims.
By the time dessert arrives — a honey cake made with the honey from an indigenous Kintamani stingless bee variety — you begin to understand what Kubu is trying to do. The food does not lecture. Each dish carries with it a sense of where it comes from. There’s no intention here to redefine Balinese cuisine, nor to mimic global fine dining tropes, but to simply articulate a very Balinese conversation between land, tradition, and the culinary arts.
In the best ways possible, Kubu lets the land, and the bounty it provides, do the talking.
Kubu at Mandapa, A Ritz-Carlton Reserve
Address Jl. Raya Kedewatan, Banjar, Kedewatan, Kecamatan Ubud, Kabupaten Gianyar, Bali 80571, Indonesia (Google Maps link)
Opening Hours 5.30pm to 11pm daily
Tel (62) 361 4792791
Website www.kubuatmandapa.com
Facebook kubuatmandapa
Instagram @kubuatmandapa
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