Banana Leaf — Restaurant in Temple City

I've passed by Banana Leaf many times, always telling myself I'd visit one day. I've tried their lunch specials for take-out and wasn't all that impressed. And it wasn't until one of my friends asked for a restaurant recommendation did I finally get to try it out for myself. And it's probably safe to say that I won't be back anytime soon.

Banana Leaf is a small restaurant located on Temple City Blvd by the dance studio and bakery. There is a small parking lot in the back as well as street parking, but these spots can get filled up quickly, especially when it's during the evening. The restaurant itself has about 10 tables. The workers are pretty nice, but there isn't much service. We walked in and pretty much seated ourselves because nobody came to greet us for several minutes.

Grilled chicken skewers (chicken satay): The man taking our order recommended us to go with the combination satay, but I am not a fan of lamb, so I decided to just stick with chicken. This was highly recommended by Yelpers, and I'm glad I ordered this! This was probably the tastiest item out of everything we tried. Chicken was cooked well and had a nice char to it. It wasn't dry, but had good flavor, and the sauce it came with really enhanced the overall dish. Presentation of this dish was also pretty nice!

My friend ordered the coconut rice combination thinking it sounded good. When it came, we all looked at it with interest. There were lots of small portions on the dish that looked pretty interesting. But upon eating it ... not so much. Maybe I'm just not a big fan of Indonesian food, but several of the side dishes were not appetizing nor did they taste good. Peanut and anchovy and dried soy bean didn't appeal to us, but the fried chicken and coconut rice weren't so bad and were the stars of the dish. The fried chicken had good flavor and wasn't dry, and the rice had a good flavor as well. But there were so many things on the plate that we didn't like that it really overruled the rest of the dish.

My friend's brother ordered the banana leaf rice combination, a dish really similar to the coconut rice. After getting the dish and eating it, he said it tasted okay, but not something he'd want to order again. This dish came with a green bean and carrot vegetable that seemed to be from a can, as well as tofu and beef. It just didn't look good nor did it taste good.

I was also able to try their lunch specials when my co-workers and I ordered take out from this place. They offer a number of items at a pretty low price, and I decided to go with the chicken laksa curry. It came in a pretty decent sized container, but there weren't too many pieces of chicken as there was fried tofu. The curry was a lot thinner than I am used to, but the flavor was not too bad. Eating this with rice made for a decent lunch. The curry also came with some square flour chunks and bamboo sprouts. I think you're supposed to add it to the curry for extra flavor, although after putting it in, it didn't do much to add to the flavor. And I wasn't a big fan of those flour things either.

I tried the chicken and coconut rice lunch special and thought this was more worth it - and tastier, too! The chicken was slightly fried, but wasn't too oily nor dry. Had good flavor and a good amount of meat on the leg. The rice came with a few garnishes on top; thought it was pretty tasty.

tl;dr - While eating at the restaurant, service seemed to be a miss and the dishes that we tried were a miss as well. My friends ended up saying that they probably should have ordered dishes that others recommended as the ones they tried were no good. The only thing worth coming back for would be the grilled skewers, although I can live without it. But if you are interested in the lunch special, I think it's worth a try - especially if you're thinking of take-out. I would recommend ordering the fried chicken dish as that was the tastiest out of...

I came to this place today because I have been have been craving for Indonesian food for a while. This review is not to throw shade at the cuisine but to this place. I ordered the Nasi Padang and wasn't disappointed except for their chicken curry in the Nasi Padang. I was disappointed because as soon as I split the chicken from the bone, it smelled really bad! The chicken was not fresh! Coming from a culture that doesn't like to waste food, I still took a stab at it and to be honest, the chicken was horrible! It tasted and looked like the chicken was rotting away and they still decided to cook it. Talk about food safety. I could've gotten sick from it. Very disappointed in what I came out here for. I chose this place because the other Indonesian places were either fusion of Thai and Chinese mashed alongside Indonesian food which was not what I was looking for. No doubt the menu is good (they're the only ones in the area that were open and had authentic dishes) but please if you are the owner of this place and you are reading this, please practice food safety before any of your customers practice their right to sue you for damages because of food poisoning. Needless to say, I would not come back here again and I would not recommend this...

I came here few times not by choice. But it seems that their food quality getting worst. I bought lunch for to go but end up throwing it all away coz the salad(lalap) and the chili was spoiled n smell bad. Today, I came thought that would get different quality. I was wrong. The Nasi Padang looked so good, the colors were vibrant and quickly brought my appetite. But when I ate it, chicken was mushy...as it was made dayss ago, the chili over the egg was smell n I think its already bad and the vegetable was bland. The only thing that worth to eat was rendang. It was delicious. I ordered also es cendol that I hope can cheer me up, turn out it was just whole of thick palm sugar with hardened tapioca(supposed to be soft and a little chewy). I drank only half way scared that my blood sugar will go up. Pay time, I was forced to buy another food coz paying with CC has a minimum $20. theres no other solution offered to me...other than buying another dish that I hope I don't hv to triw away. I was so mad, dissapointed and felt betrayed by this restaurant. But, I hope that owner read this review, and check against their kitchen staff so they can improve their food quality...