Cooking Without a Recipe

I love cooking on Saturday morning. Saturday is usually the one day of the week I can do whatever I want, so they’re pretty laid back and slow.


One Saturday, I didn’t want to go out and I didn’t feel like cooking anything in particular so I wandered into the kitchen and took stock of my resources. As I have the habit of shopping either on Saturday or Sunday afternoon, so by Saturday morning, my resources for the week are usually at the minimum level.

So I put on my adventuring mode and try off-road with what I have in my kitchen. Improvising is really the most natural way to cook. That’s how I develop my skill in cooking without a recipe or to cook from what I have, rather than get what I need to cook.

Cooking without a recipe gives me a chance to experiment with new spices, flavors, aromas, and really make my cooking unique and original.

‘Things from my Kitchen’ Dishes

These dishes were cooked with whatever I have left in my kitchen on one Saturday morning!

What did I find?

In my fridge I found a small bunch of choysum, white cabbage, green onion, carrots and bird-eye chilies; a small bowl of left-over beef rendang (Indonesian beef stew), around 300 grams of cold cooked rice ; 5 slices of bacon; some eggs and a bottle of oyster sauce.

Then I checked my kitchen cabinet and found 1 pack of dry noodles (300 grams), all purpose flour, some cloves of garlic, onions, standard cooking stuffs like salt, pepper, brown sugar, beef powder, chicken powder, cooking oil and a jar of ready-made fried shallots.

I even found a jar of Thai dry-chili-shrimp-paste which I got from my Thai friend (this is one of my magic ingredients for cooking fried rice).

One common thing in my family is all of us love chili. Half of the family members are noodle lovers and the other half are rice lovers. That’s why as long as I have stock of noodles, rice and chili in my kitchen, I think we can survive.

Now, what should I cook for our breakfast on one Saturday morning with all these ingredients?

First of all, what should I do with the noodles. The easiest way to cook noodles is fried noodle. OK, let’s make fried noodles.

My free style Fried Noodles

The ingredients are dry noodles, finely chopped garlic, finely sliced green onion, finely cut bird eye chilies, choysum cut into 2 cm length, finely sliced white cabbage, sliced button mushroom, finely chopped bacon, meat balls, 1 egg, 2 – 3 tablespoons of oyster sauce and cooking oil.

This is the process of making the fried noodles:

• Cook the noodles in boiling water for a few minutes until soft but still firm (in cooking pasta it is called al dente)

• Remove from the water and pour a little bit of cooking oil.
• Stir fry the garlic in a wok on high heat until fragrant
• Quickly add the chilies, white cabbage, mushroom and meat ball
• Add the egg, stir until the egg is well cooked and dry
• Add the noodle, then the choysum. Pour in the oyster sauce
• Continue to stir fry for a few minutes until all the ingredients mix well with the noodles
• Add the green onion and further stir fry for 30 seconds
• Remove from heat. Serve it warm.
  
  

The look of the fried noodle may not be that appealing but the taste was yummy and that’s all the matter.

One dish is done but I still have one little problem. Since the ingredients for fried noodle like the bacon, meat ball and the veggies were only available in small amount, I could not fried all the 300 gram noodles so I still have around 100 gram of cooked noodles left.

What should I do with these cooked noodles?

Hey, I got an idea.

How about Free Style Noodle Fritters?

The ingredients are 100 grams cooked noodles, coarsely grated carrot, finely sliced white cabbage, finely chopped bacon, chicken powder, 2 eggs, 3 tablespoons of all purpose flour, salt and pepper, cooking oil.

This is the process of making the Noodle Fritters

• Put the flour into a bowl. Add beaten eggs, beat the mix until smooth.
• Add the noodles, carrot, white cabbage, green onion and a little bit of sliced bacon
• Add chicken powder, salt and pepper, stir to combine
• Deep fry tablespoons of the mixtures in hot oil
• Turn fritters and cook on the other side
• Remove from heat and place on paper towel to absorb the excess oil
• Serve warm as appetizer or snack
  
  

Now, for the rice lovers in my family, the easiest way is to cook them fried rice. But I did not have any meat or chicken or bacon left, even no more chilies. How should I cook the fried rice?

Well, I still have the left over beef rendang (spicy beef stew) and Thai dry-chili-shrimp-paste, onion, garlic and ready-made fried shallots.

Here comes My Free Style Fried Rice

The ingredients are the cold rice, left over beef rendang (spicy beef stew), cut up the meat into small pieces, 2 table-spoons of Thai dry-chili-shrimp-paste, 1 onion, chopped, 2 cloves of garlic chopped, 1 egg, 2 tablespoons of ready-made fried shallots, cooking oil.

This is the process of making Free Style Fried Rice:

• In a wok, stir fry the onion and garlic until fragrant
• Add the Thai dry-chili-shrimp-paste
• Add the beef rendang
• Add the egg, stir until well cooked and dry
• Add the rice, keep on stirring until mix well
• Add salt and continue to fry for 10 minutes or so
• Remove the fried rice from the wok and place in a bowl
• Garnish with fried shallots

Cooking to Celebrate Independence Day

Last August 17th, Indonesia celebrated it’s 65th anniversary. The formal celebrations include military marches, military bands playing and hoisting the Indonesian national flag.


The celebration of the Indonesian Independence Day is usually observed by people of different ages, genders, status social economics and regions. They do many creative and unique games like sack races,

kerupuk-eating competition (kerupuk is traditional crackers made of flour),

pinang-climbing (pinang is tree of areca nut),

tug-of-war, recycle creativity, etc. In every province, the races were made based on their own traditional games.

Therefore, Indonesian people are waiting for and preparing to celebrate the Independence Day each year. No matter how old the games, how many people join the games, or how heavy the traffic jams are.

This year, the Independence day fell during fasting month (Ramadan) hence the celebration was not as crowded and full of excitement as in the previous years.

Although I was not fasting, I decided to stay at home and instead of watching traditional games, I cooked one of the Indonesian traditional dishes from East Java region to celebrate this year Independence Day.

Why East Java?

My mother was born in a small town in East Java and since I was a kid, I had been exposed to different typical dishes from East Java. The dish which came to my mind was Sambal Tumpang which my Mom often cooked for me but I have never tried to cook it.

‘Sambal’ means sauce or relish and ‘tumpang’ literally means join with others. This sauce is made of fermented tempeh (soy bean cake), chilies, spices and coconut milk and served on top of boiled vegetables like salad dressing – probably that’s why it’s called ‘sambal tumpang’ coz the sauce joins with others (vegetables).

In my recipes collection I have around 4 different versions of ”Sambal Tumpang’ recipes but I like my Mom’s recipe the most. So on Independence Day I tried out my Mom’s old recipe of Sambal Tumpang.

Ingredients

• Mix of boiled vegetables e.g. string beans, white cabbage, spinach etc

• 200 g Tempeh (fermented soybeans), a bit over-fermented tempeh would be better, sliced into medium chunks. For those who live outside Indonesia (or Asia), you can find tempeh in China town.

• 100 gram of beef (any part of the beef will do because this is just to give more flavor to the sauce) – this is optional. If without the beef this dish is suitable for vegetarian.
• 1 salam leaves
• 2 kaffir lime leaves
• 2 slices galangal root, crushed
• 200 ml coconut milk
• 5 bird eye chilies (only if you want it to be really hot)
• 5 red finger-length chilies
• 2 cloves garlic
• 5 shallots
• 1 cm of Kencur (lesser galangal or Kaempferia galangal)
• Pinch of salt
• Pinch of brown sugar
• 500 ml water
• Optional: some ’Kerupuk Rambak’ (deep fried of the thick skin of cow or buffalo) which looks like this:

This ‘kerupuk rambak’ is quite common in Indonesia but for non Indonesian, this probably can be grouped into  Andrew Zimmen’s bizzare food .

How to cook:

• Boil water in a sauce pan
• Add tempeh, the beef meat, shallots, garlic, salam leaves, kaffir lime leaves, galangal, lesser galangal, and the chilies.
• When the meat become tender, remove from the pan. Cut it into smaller pieces. Put it back into the pan. Turn off the heat.
• In a mortar, pound the tempeh, chilies, shallots, garlic, and kencur (lesser galangal). Put them back into the pan.
• Turn the heat on again at low heat.
• Pour the coconut milk, stir it well.
• Add salt and sugar.
• Cook for another 15 minutes
• Add the ‘kerupuk rambak’ (if used)
• Remove from heat

This is the look of the sauce:

And this is the look of the Sambal Tumpang on top of boiled vegetables:

Prawn Under the Blanket

There is an Indonesian idiom ‘Ada Udang di Balik Batu’ which literally means “There is a prawn under the rock’ while figuratively referring to a person who is saying one thing, but harbors hidden agenda behind their words.


Well, I am not going to write about people who are having hidden agenda or ulterior motive here but it’s really and literally about PRAWN.

Prawn or shrimp?

First things first. What is a prawn and what is a shrimp? Are they the same or is there actually a difference between the two. Is a prawn a large shrimp or does the naming of this delicious crustacean just depend on where you live?

A prawn is sometimes called a prawn and a shrimp is called a prawn and a shrimp. Confused? You should be.

OK, let’s see what the experts say


The two words are used interchangeably in the markets and restaurants everywhere. Some people say the difference is size. In many parts of the country, small and medium shrimp are sold simply as shrimp, while large, extra-large, and jumbo shrimp are called prawns.

Believe it or not, there is actually a difference between prawns and shrimps. The difference lies in their gill structure. Prawns have a branching gill structure, whilst the gill structure of shrimps is lamellar.

There is also a difference in the way that the two brood their eggs. Prawns legs are longer than shrimps and the shrimp’s front pair of pincers is larger, whilst the prawns second pair of pincers is bigger.

Nutrional value of Prawns and shrimps

Prawns and shrimps are an extremely good source of protein, yet are very low in fat and calories, making them a very healthy choice of food.

Although shrimps and prawns have a high cholesterol content, they are low in saturated fat, which is the fat that raises cholesterol levels in the body and is bad for you. For this reason, there is no need to avoid eating shrimps or prawns, as the cholesterol in the food is not the same as the cholesterol in one’s blood.

Shrimps and prawns do contain a lot of omega-3 fatty acids, but these fatty acids are good for you and help prevent against heart disease, circulatory diseases and many other types of illnesses.


Prawns and shrimps also contains high levels of vitamin B12, zinc, iodine, phosphorous, potassium, selenium and iron and have smaller quantities of calcium, magnesium and sodium. Many of these vitamins are essential for healthy skin, bones and teeth.

Wow, for so long I thought it’s not healthy to eat prawns or shrimps as they have high cholesterol content. One of my favorite dishes is Spicy Prawns and Stinky Beans (please see my post Dangerously Delicious). Every time I eat this prawn dish, I always take Lipitor, a medicine for reducing high blood cholesterol. I should have known better.

Choosing and Buying Prawns and Shrimps

When buying fresh prawns or shrimps look for the following signs before making your choice:

• The shells should be firm and glossy and not broken or slippery.
• There should be no discolouration of the heads or the shells, as this is an indication that the meat is starting to go bad.
• They should smell fresh and salty. Avoid if there is any hint of a smell of ammonia.
• The eyes should be prominent and shiny and not shrunken inwards or missing.

If you are buying raw prawns or shrimps, do not be put off if they are translucent or a different colour than the typical pink prawn. Prawns and shrimp only turn this colour once they have been cooked.

Why under the Blanket?

My first encounter with ‘Prawn under the Blanket’ was a few months ago when I attended a meeting which was conducted in a Bistro near my home. During lunch we were served with a set menu. It started with the appetizer which was named “Udang Berselimut’, literally it means “Prawn wrapped in Blanket’. Yeah, indeed, the prawns were wrapped in blanket ….noodle blanket. It was such a unique and attractive dish and I loved it! I love the taste, the look, everything.

I was so curious on how to make the dish so I interviewed the staffs who served our lunch. One person seemed to know about the recipe and he described to me roughly how to make it.

Last week, I tried to cook this dish and I name it Prawn under the Blanket and here is my version of the recipe:

Ingredients

• 100 grams dried Noodle
• 10 big size prawns, peeled but leave the tail intact
• Pinch of salt and pepper
• 5 cloves garlic, finely sliced and fried.
• 2 eggs
• 2 spring onion, finely sliced

Preparation

• Cook the dried noodle in a boiling water for around 5 minutes, then set aside.
• Add pepper, salt, garlic and spring onion. Mix well.
• Add egg into the mixture, stir well and leave the mixture for a while
• Take one prawn, roll the seasoned noodles around it
• Put it on a tray and leave it for a while.
• Repeat this process for the remaining prawns.

• Heat cooking oil for frying. Fry the rolled shrimp until the noodle changes color into yellow-golden color. Remove and drain.
• Serve warm with sweet and sour sauce either home made or branded which can be purchased at supermarket.

The appearance of my “Prawn under the Blanket’ was not as good as the ones prepared by the Bistro but the taste was better and that’s all the matter.

References:

 Wikipedia

 theepicentre.com

 helpwithcooking.com

No Rattans, Roots Will Do

‘No rattans, roots will do’ is a literal translation of an authentic Indonesian proverb ‘Tak Ada Rotan, Akar pun jadi’. The meaning is more or less like this: ‘when you don’t have the originals at hand, go for the substitutes’.

We often try to find substitutes for everything in life, although somewhere in the back of our minds, we know that’s not really possible. Substituting everything in life is impossible!

When it comes to cooking, there are substitutes for almost every cooking ingredient. But, there is one thing that cannot be substituted for, it’s the taste. Why do similar recipes made by different people have different tastes? It is because the taste of a recipe does not depend only on its ingredients and method of preparation. It also depends on who cooks it. There can be substitutes for ingredients but there’s no substitute for the taste.

Why recipe substitutions?

In cooking, particularly when you enjoy free style cooking like I do, we need to practice the essense of this old Indonesian proverb when certain ingredients are unavailable at home or in the market. When we forget to buy the stuff we need, that is when we need to get hold of something that is handy. Using margarine as a substitute for butter and vice versa is a common example of the use of substitutes in cooking.

It’s common sense to use ingredients of similar flavor as alternatives for one another. Obviously, you won’t like the substitutes to bring about a radical change to how your recipe tastes. Or you will find yourself finding a substitute for what you have cooked!

Well, let’s park for a while the Roots (read substitutes) ……...…and focus on the ‘rattan’(read: original) intention I wrote this blog which is to share one of the authentic Indonesian Chicken Satay recipes named Sate Madura.

Why Sate Madura?

Indonesia has so many types of chicken satay but Sate Madura is the prima donna of all chicken satay in our country. And some of the ingredients of Sate Madura may not be available in countries outside Indonesia or Asia thus some of you may have to find substitutes for them.

The ‘Rattan’ (read: original) Ingredients

• 3 shallots
• 3 candle nuts
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 kg boneless, skinless chicken breast or thighs, cut into cubes
• 100 ml water
• Cooking Oil
• Pinch of Salt
• 100 ml Indonesian sweet soy sauce
• 2 red finger-length chilies
• 3 bird-eye chili (optional)
• 500 roasted peanuts (ground to a paste)
• 10 ml Lime juice
• Bamboo skewers (as needed)

And here is the list of the ’Roots’ (read: substitute) Ingredients:

• shallots (for the spice-mix) can be subsituted with onion
• candle nut can be substituted by almond
• ground the roasted peanut into a paste can be substituted with ready-made peanut butter
• the Indonesian sweet soy sauce is the authentic ingredient for Sate Madura. As a substitute, you may try adding palm sugar or brown sugar into Kikoman soy sauce until the soy sauce becomes sweet and a bit thicker.

Cooking Method

• Ground shallot, garlic, candle nut, red chilies, and bird-eye chilies to a fine paste.
• Heat oil in a saucepan then sauté the paste until fragrant.
• Add the ground peanuts or peanut butter, 50 ml of sweet soy sauce, salt and water.
• Mix well and slowly bring to a boil.
• Remove saucepan from heat and add lime juice.
• Cool to room temperature.
• Impale the chicken cubes on the bamboo skewers until 3/4 full.

Before grilling, marinate the chicken satay for at least 1 hours with a quarter of the sauce and the rest of the sweet soy sauce.

After half-cooked, dip again in the marinade and then grill again until completely cooked.

By dipping in the marinade repeatedly, the taste of the ingredients really permeate through the chicken meat.

Serve satay with peanut sauce mix and condiments (sliced onions or shallots, carrots, cucumber, chilies, limes). It goes well with rice or lontong (Indonesian rice cake wrapped in banana leaves).

To add flavor, garnish the chicken satay with fried shallots

More on ’Roots’

• The original grilling method, the charcoal grill, can be substituted with gas or electrical grill.
• Home-made fried shallots can be substituted with ready-made which you can buy in some supermarkets.

Notes and Tips:

• The shallots used for fried shallots cannot be substituted by onions coz when deep-fried, the taste is different.
• Soak bamboo skewers in water for at least 1/2 hour so they don’t burn.
• Use chicken thighs for best flavor and texture.

Oprah's Suffocated Chicken

When I started my cooking journey, I began with cooking my mom’s authentic recipe of Bumbu Rujak Chicken Barbeque (see My First Post).


Why chicken?

My mom ever mentioned that every beginner in cooking should start with chicken. She did not explain why, it’s simply like an unwritten golden rule in the world of cooking.

One Sunday, after church, I went to a book store and found a cook book written by the famous writer and poet Maya Angelou titled ‘Hallelujah! The Welcome Table’.

What an amazing book written by an amazing woman! This is the kind of book I wish I could write one day.


I love all the stories and recipes she wrote in that cook book but one particular chicken recipe named ‘Smothered Chicken’ caught my special attention where she wrote a very interesting story about Oprah Winfrey, another amazing lady whom I admired.

Maya Angelou’s smothered chicken is delicious and quite easy to cook. It tastes yummy and creamy yet it’s sinless because the ingredients used are healthy stuffs. I give the full recipe here, and then add how I adapted it when I cooked for my family.

Smothered Chicken by Maya Angelou


Oprah calls this suffocated chicken!

Serves 8

Ingredients:

• 2 (3-pound) fryer chickens
• Juice of 2 lemons
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 2 medium onions , sliced
• 1 pound button mushrooms , sliced
• 1 clove garlic , minced
• 2 cups chicken broth

Preparations:


Wash and pat dry the chicken. Cut each chicken into pieces and place the pieces in a bowl with lemon juice and water to cover. Refrigerate for 1 hour.

Wash the lemon water off the chicken and season it with salt and pepper. Dredge the chicken pieces in 3/4 cup of the flour.

In a large skillet, heat the butter and 1/4 cup of the vegetable oil over high heat. Add the chicken pieces and fry until dark brown. Remove them from the skillet.

Add the remaining 1/4 cup flour and 1/4 cup vegetable oil to the skillet. Cook the flour until it’s brown.

Add the onions, mushrooms and garlic, stirring constantly.

Put the chicken back into the skillet. Add the chicken broth and water to cover. Turn the heat to medium and cook for 25 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through.

 
My version of ‘Oprah’s Suffocated Chicken’


I used 400 – 500 grams of boneless, skinless chicken breast instead of cut up from whole chicken because I usually stock up boneless chicken breasts in my freezer. I chopped the breast into small cubes and cooked it up per the directions, but with a little less time since the smaller chopped pieces would cook faster that a cut up chicken.

I substitute the chicken broth with chicken cubes diluted in water (it’s what I had) and reduced the amounts for the other remaining ingredients in half.

Maya Angelou suggests to serve the smothered chicken with Buttermilk Biscuits but I, as Indonesian, served it with rice. And the result was yummy saucy gravy…….

In Indonesia, we have hundreds if not thousands of chicken dishes but nothing tastes like Maya Angelou’s Smothered Chicken. The closest which I can relate is our famous “Opor Ayam” (Braised Chicken in Coconut Milk) or we can call it:

Indonesian Smothered Chicken

Ingredients:

Makes 6 servings, with other dishes

• One whole 3½-pound chicken
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• ¼ cup thin-sliced onion
• 1 clove garlic, sliced thin
• 1 teaspoon coriander
• ¼ teaspoon ground cumin
• 2 candle-nuts, crushed
• ¼ teaspoon pepper
• 2 cups coconut milk
• 1 tablespoon peanut or corn oil
• 1 teaspoon tamarind, dissolved in 1 tablespoon water
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 piece (aboud 2 cm) of galangal
• 1 piece or 1 square inch of lemon peel
• 2 pieces of salam leaves

Preparations:


Cut the whole chicken into eight pieces, discard the loose skin and fat and rub the pieces with the lemon juice. Broil for five minutes, turn the pieces over and broil for five minutes more. The chicken will be partially cooked and firm.

In a blender, prepare a smooth sauce-mix of the onion, garlic, coriander, cumin, candle-nuts, pepper and ½ cup of the coconut milk.

Heat the oil in a saucepan or wok, and pour the sauce-mix. Stir fry for two minutes; then add the remaining coconut milk, the tamarind juice, salt, sugar, salam leaves, galangal and lemon peel. Add the pieces of precooked chicken, and bring to a boil over medium heat. Cook for five minutes, basting frequently; then continue to cook for thirty minutes more. The liquid will have to reduce to a rather thick sauce, and the chicken will be tender but still firm.

The taste of ‘the Indonesian Smothered Chicken’ is also yummy and creamy but it has different creaminess from Maya Angelou’s as it has different source of  gravy sauce  – coconut milk Vs butter.

Usually people in Indonesia eat ’Opor Ayam’ with other dishes such as ’Gudeg’ and ‘Sambal Goreng Krecek’ (see my post ‘Hit the Road Jack Fruit’).

POTATO INSIDE OUT

What’s so special about potato?


Potato is an important staple food and the number one vegetable crop in the world. Potatoes are available year-round as they are harvested somewhere every month of the year.

The potato belongs to the Solanaceae or nightshade family whose other members include tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, and tomatillos. They are the swollen portion of the underground stem which is called a tuber and is designed to provide food for the green leafy portion of the plant. If allowed to flower and fruit, the potato plant will bear an inedible fruit resembling a tomato.

Although potato is a humble, lumpy, bland, familiar and unglamorous staple but I love cooking as well as eating it. It brings satiety and I love the fluffy taste of potato. Could be that is why potato is considered as comfort food.

What is it that such a humble little vegetable can make me so excited about?

A few weeks ago I learned a potato recipe from one of the Asian Food Channel programs named ‘Chef at Home’. This recipe makes potatoes that are crispy on the outside and fluffy in the inside. The name of the dish is Stuff Baked Potato. What I really like about Michael Smith (the Chef of this program) is that he encourages his viewers to improvise.

I really agree with what he said: “A recipe is merely words on paper; a guideline, a starting point from which to improvise. It cannot pretend to replace the practiced hand and telling glance of a watchful cook. For that reason feel free to stir your own ideas into this dish. When you cook it once, it becomes yours, so personalize it a bit. Add more of an ingredient you like or less of something you don’t like. Try substituting one ingredient for another. Remember words have no flavour, you have to add your own!”

Following what Michael Smith said, I tried the recipe, stirring down my own idea into this dish and …………love the result.

Here is my version and name of the dish - ‘Potato Inside Out ’

Ingredients

• 8 potatoes
• 4 slices of bacon, fry until crispy, cut into small pieces
• 4 green onions, sliced thinly
• 50 gram of Cheddar cheese, grated
• Salt and pepper

Method

• Steam the potatoes for around 45 minutes or until tender when pierced with a fork. Let them cool.
• Slice the top, lengthwise, off of each potato

• Scoop out the flesh

Note: the original recipe is to bake the potatoes before they are scooped instead of steam them. You may choose whichever you like. I prefer to steam coz it’s easier to scoop

• Add the grated cheese, fried bacon, green onion, salt and pepper to the potato flesh. Mash well and then stuff back into potato shells. You can even carve a face on this stuff potato as you can see on this picture

• Place on a baking pan and bake for 30 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and potatoes are heated through.

And these are the results……..so yummy

GASTRONOMIC DELIGHTS ON THE STREET OF JAKARTA

As the capital of Indonesia, Jakarta attracts scores of international and domestic immigrants. Along with the migration, these people brought their different backgrounds, cultures, dialects, and cuisines into this city. Thus, unsurprisingly hundreds of different dishes from all over Indonesia and all over the world can be found in Jakarta. This makes Jakarta a perfect heaven for food lovers to spoil their taste buds.


No need to worry about feeling hungry in Jakarta. Thousands of eating spots ranging from upscale restaurants to street food stalls and hawker centers are all here in Jakarta!

But, if you desire for more authentic food, the best way is to venture to street hawkers. The taste of hawker’s food is so much better than in the restaurants. I often wonder why less hygienic, easy to go foods are the more delicious?

Yes, you can find some of the best of Indonesia’s culinary creations on the streets, very inexpensive (around one US dollar or less per serving), throughout the day from very early morning till very late evening….

In the morning


The common menu for breakfast are bubur ayam and ketupat sayur

Bubur ayam (chicken porridge)

Pondering where to eat in the wee hours of the morning? No worry! Bubur Ayam is one of the right meals. The Indonesian style chicken porridge is similar to the Chinese porridge. The ingredients used are chicken broth, with the flavor mainly attained from soy sauce, pepper and green onion. The thick porridge is then topped with shreds of fried chicken, cha-kuay (salty, fluffy fried dough) and kerupuk (crispy crackers)

Every morning, the street hawkers pass by to let the customers know they are there, they hit the bowl using the spoon to make noise.

Ketupat sayur


“Ketupat” is rice cake that boiled in a rhombus-shaped packet of plaited young coconut leaves. “Sayur” is a kind of creamy soup. “Ketupat sayur” has many kinds of variant. It depends on where it is from.

The one that passes my house in the morning is from Jakarta. The vegetable used for the soup is young papaya. So, it is a fruit actually. In the soup, there are also tofu and boiled egg. Ketupat sayur is always accompanied by “kerupuk”, a kind of crispy crackers. The price of one portion of Ketupat Sayur is IDR 5000 if only with tofu. If you want the boiled egg, the price becomes IDR 6000.

 

 
During the day…..


You may see other foods like gado-gado, ketoprak, soto mie, mie ayam or mie bakso, gorengan, rujak, siomay, and many more.

Gado-gado

‘Gado Gado’ literally means mixture. This dish is a mixture of boiled veggies, tofu, egg, corn, and shrimp crackers with peanut sauce

Ketoprak

Ketoprak is one of traditional food mostly sold by street vendors. Ketoprak offer’s delicious taste and it is quite filling, too. Usually it is eaten with steamed rice cake or lontong which made of rice stuffed into banana leaves shaped into a tube, then boiled until it’s ready to eat. Ketoprak is a mix of beansprouts, fried tofu, and boiled and rice-noodle in peanut sauce.

Soto Mie

Need something nice and warm… and I think a bowl of hot Soto Mie (noodle in beef soup). It is just the perfect comforting meal on a rainy day.

Mie Ayam

Indonesian Mie Ayam (chicken noodle soup) comprising a bowl of chicken stock, boiled choy sum, diced chicken cooked with sweet soy sauce and often added with tomato ketchup on top.

Or you can have meat balls on your noodle and it is called Mie Baso

Gorengan

Gorengan, literally means “fried things.” The golden offerings of this gorengan street hawkers included tahu (tofu), tempeh (bean curd), pisang (bananas), singkong (cassava), and ubi (sweet potato).

Es Campur

Es campur (mix shaved ice dessert) is a favourite Indonesian drink. At festivals, markets and other places where locals gather, you might see a stall selling es campur. The drink is made by placing shaved ice into a cup together with multi-colored jelly items, coconut, chocolate sauce and other items. Locals love the drink, tourists find it rather strange, but its worth a try.

In the evening…..

If you wish to have supper but no meals available in your fridge, no worries; there are also food hawkers in the evening! The choices may vary in other areas; sate ayam/kambing, tongseng, nasi goreng tek-tek, martabak etc.

Sate

Different regions in Indonesia have their different versions of sate. The famous Sate Ayam is from the island of Madura, off the coast of the central island, Java. It’s also very common to find this sate peddled on the streets as well as in five-star hotels in Jakarta. The lovely combination of lime juice, ground peanuts, chilies, and the sweet soy sauce makes it perfect. You have to try it at least once.

Tongseng

Tongseng Kambing, a kind of lamb curry from Solo, Central Java. This is one of my favorite dishes ever. You would find it sold on street vendors often together with Sate Kambing or lamb satay. Yes, it’s a typical street food, quite a famous one

Nasi Goreng Tek Tek

The fried rice street vendors are known as Tukang Nasi Goreng Tek – Tek (Tek – Tek Fried Rice man) because when they are selling around the neighborhood with their carts, instead of shouting, they always make a sound… “tek – tek – tek – tek” by tapping a wood.

Martabak Telor

Have you ever been in a moment when you are very really hungry in the middle of the night?? And potato chips or other snack just won’t fill your hunger for food? Don’t worry. Martabak telor is the perfect food for such situation. The name Martabak comes from the Arabic “muttabaq” meaning “folded” and telor means it contains egg.

Martabak Manis

This is the sweet version of martabak. It is filled with sugar, nuts and/or chocolate and topped with condensed milk.

How can you resist Jakarta?