JAKARTA - A hotel in Indonesia is dishing out a hamburger that costs more
than twice the monthly minimum wage in some parts of the country.
 A boy bites into a hamburger in a
2004 file photo. A hotel in Indonesia is dishing out a hamburger that
costs more than twice the monthly minimum wage in some parts of the
country. [Reuters]

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The US$110 hamburger offered
by the Four Seasons is made of Kobe beef with foie gras, Portobello mushrooms
and Korean pears -- served with french fries, of course.
They're not exactly selling like hotcakes yet, but the hotel says it has sold
20 of the 1.0 million rupiah (US$110.1) hamburgers since they were launched this
month.
"One burger has 225 grams of Kobe beef. It is so expensive because the flavor
is really different," said Erwan Ruswandi, the chief of the restaurant offering
the gourmet burger.
"The calves in Kobe get special treatment ... they drink beer mixed with
milk, vitamins and eat pesticide-free grass. We add foie gras and also some
Korean pears. We import all the materials, and they are high quality so it is so
expensive."
The minimum wage in most parts the country of 220 million is as low as around
US$40 a month.
A tiny number of Indonesians are among the richest people in Asia while
millions live in dire poverty in urban slums or shanty towns in the countryside.