When I messaged a friend who lives in Indonesia that we were going to Ubud in Bali he said, “Book a dinner at Locavore. Do it now.”

So ten days before we left I got on the Locavore website to find they were booked out for dinner for the next month, so I tried lunch and managed to book on our last day in Ubud.

To describe what we had as a meal would be to insult everything and everyone in the restaurant. What we had was a culinary experience so exquisite as to defy the laws that command the use of fire and knives.

From the moment I sipped my pre-lunch iced tea I knew we were on hallowed ground.

“It’s like you can taste all the individual flavours separately and together at the same time,” said Neville, after taking a sip. This summing up defined everything that followed.

The first “snack” came in a ceramic jug with a projection out the side like a tiny plate. In the small opening at the top sat a green betel leaf cone filled with flavours of peanut, ginger, coconut, lime, and chilli. On the projection at the side sat a tiny perfect garlic crisp. We were instructed to place this on top of the cone. The leaf had a slightly bitter but aromatic taste, something like a kaffir lime leaf that blended with the salty, garlicky crunch.

Next was a mushroom “fritter”, but to call it that would be another insult. On a large nest of twigs sat shreds of crisp mushroom formed into smaller nests. Inside each sat perfect dollops of mushroom mousse. Our waiter sprayed a vinegary topping over the nest and into our mouths exploded sweet, crunchy, mushroom flavours.

Two little “Oreos” then arrived, thin wafers of sweet potato with a mousse inside, followed by triangles of scorched pineapple topped with something salty.

Before the main event began, a palate-cleansing tomato sorbet arrived, one quenelle on a slice of tomato. Around this was poured a tomato consommé, a clear liquid with the merest hint of pink. What looked like hot water exploded with complex, tomatoey flavour. Where had they hidden those flavours?

Now began the meal proper. We had elected to have the five course meal (the alternative being seven) and I chose the accompanying mini cocktails tailored to each course.

After caffeinated fish sashimi (“coffee cured Himachi, ginger gel, kecap crème”) a large, grey plate was set in front of each of us upon which sat a lonely, crimson disc topped with crimson and green leaves and surrounded by a crimson powder. This was goat tartare surrounded by fermented cabbage powder.

Next came Triple C: crab, white corn, and coconut. A bowl of white foam was placed in front of each of us, then a plate with two small bites of puffed corn were placed in the middle. Under the foam of roasted coconut, lurked the crab meat.

After the waiter took these plates away she returned to supply us with two large daggers, announcing that the main course would be served next.

“I thought they’d have to serve something like a main course,” said my husband, “or people would go away feeling like they hadn’t been fed.”

I was skeptical. I looked out the window at people in a cafe opposite eating mere food. I couldn’t help but pity these poor philistines, ignorant of the fine art of eating, unconsciously pushing burgers into their faces, thinking about whether to get a massage after lunch or do some more shopping. In less than an hour I’d become a colossal food snob. Locavore, I was sure, would never stoop to serving (ahem) a plate of food.

What arrived next was a white plate decorated with bold swishes of brown, and tucked up against one edge was a disc of meat about two inches across, topped with little pieces of vegetables and green nasturtium leaves. I fell about laughing as my husband stared in confusion at his main course. It did need to be cut, but the wood-handled dagger was more theatrical flourish than necessary equipment. In less than a minute it was finished.

Now for dessert, but before that a pre-dessert of apple sorbet encircled by translucent wafers of apple. Actual dessert was a celebration of rosella and rambutan, “sorbet, creme, praline, gel, and spiced tea”, shades of red and crimson with dots of white and specks of black. The accompanying cocktail was “rosella infused vodka, frozen rambutan, berry shrub, and hibiscus soda”.

Would we like coffee? We would. But it must be taken black.

A wooden platter was placed on the table with a kettle, clay jug, grinder, ceramic filter holder, and a bowl of coffee beans. And so the beans were ground, the filter and jug warmed with hot water, the grounds added to the filter and more hot water delicately poured over before being strained into our cups. The platter was removed and in its place a long tray with indentations in the form of the ancient mancala game.

These were the copious petit fours, but again, to call them such seems blasphemous.

At each end a round, white delicacy on which had been piped a white cream sprinkled with green powder, called “Kemangi financier, fennel crème”. Then two by two beautiful sweet things: jackfruit gel, peanut and chocolate, rice cookie and coffee crème, miso and caramel, tamarind candy, pineapple and chocolate and chilli. Each dissolved in our mouths and was separated with sips of the smoothest coffee. Of course.

I felt like every meal I’d ever eaten up to this point had been a vulgar indulgence, where the aim of filling one’s stomach had been more important than the flavours, the textures, and the uniqueness of each ingredient. I vowed to never eat again.