Stay Young and Juicy

An article in Jakarta Post caught my attention. Here is more or less what it said: “wake up with a cup of strong coffee to get a kick, instant noodle for breakfast, a pack of artificially seasoned chips for later of the day, thick lamb curry for lunch, a pack of cigarette all day long, drink till you drop on weekends and so it goes day after day, week after week”.

 

Sounds familiar?

In praise of Cassava, the Versatile Tuber

January – February is the most rainy period in Jakarta and irregular downpours can be expected at any time, particularly during  monsoon.  

The other day during a heavy rain, I was craving for my childhood favorite snack namely Sawut (Steamed Grated Cassava With Sugar), one of Javanese traditional cassava snacks. My mom used to cook me this cassava snack when I was a kid to keep me from catching cold during rainy season.

Why cassava? What is so special about it?

Sticky and Sweet

I can’t agree more with Devi Asmarani (one of my favorite writers) who wrote in one of her articles in Weekender (one of my favorite magazines) that ‘Food, like music, has a way of staying firmly in our memory, linking tastebuds and emotions’.

When I was still in elemetary school, there was a sticky and sweet snack I loved as a child. It is made of sweet potato mixed with sago flour (or tapioca) boiled in water and palm sugar and then served with coconut milk called ‘biji salak’ which literally means ‘the seed of snakeskin fruit’.

I have no idea why this snack is named ‘biji salak’ because it has nothing to do with the seed of snakeskin fruit whatsoever. Probably because the size and shape of the sweet potato ball looks like the seed of snakeskin fruit. 

 

Who Moved My Cheese?

Since December 17th I have been busy with Project Moving. Just 2 days before Christmas on December 23rd, we moved from the old house in the Northeast to the new house in the Southeast of Jakarta. The reason we moved house simply because we want to avoid the flood which usually comes around end of January each year.

So far we have experienced two big floods (water entered the house up to 1 meter high) and one small flood (water entered the house around 20 cm). After 3 flood experiences, it’s time for us to move. And so we moved to a new house which looks like Barbie house

 

 

Go tell it on the Mountain

One day there was an announcement in my office that this year we will go to Mount Bromo in East Java for our year-end gathering .

Mount Bromo is a convenient stop for travellers between Bali and Surabaya, and the most popular of all East Java’s travel destinations, this active 2,392-metre- (7,85 foot-) high volcano lies 112 kilometres (70 miles), about three hours, southeast of Surabaya. Enclosed by perpendicular walls 350 metres (1,150 feet) high, Bromo’s awesome 2,200-metre- (7,220-foot-) high ’sand sea’ caldera has three mountains within it, craters within one huge crater, the Bromo Semeru Massif. There are also three small crater lakes inside the larger crater.

The Unfortunate Fortune Cookies

My first ’encounter’ with Fortune Cookie was quite a long time ago when my family and I were eating at one of famous Chinese restaurants in Jakarta. After we payed the bill, the waiter came to our table and gave each of us a fortune cookie as a compliment.   

A fortune cookie is a crisp Asian American cookie usually made from flour, sugar, vanilla, and oil with a “fortune” wrapped inside. A “fortune” is a piece of paper with words of faux wisdom or a vague prophecy .

The non-Chinese origin of the fortune cookie is humorously illustrated in Amy Tan’s 1989 novel The Joy Luck Club, in which a pair of Chinese immigrant women find jobs at a fortune cookie factory in America. They are amused by the unfamiliar concept of a fortune cookie but, after several hilarious attempts at translating the fortunes into Chinese, come to the conclusion that the cookies contain not wisdom, but “bad instruction.”.

Fortune cookies have become an iconic symbol in American culture, inspiring many products. There is fortune cookie-shaped jewelry, a fortune cookie-shaped Magic 8 Ball, silver-plated fortune cookies..

Although many people do not take the message in a fortune cookie as a serious oracular device, many of them consider it part of the game that the entire cookie must be consumed in order for the fortune to come true.

How to make Fortune Cookies

How fortunes cookies are made is quite complex. It has to go through a painful process first, so unfortunate for the fortune cookies..

Talking Tex-Mex

Driven by my cooking passion and my habit of trying out new recipes, one day I bought one more cooking book from the Periplus Mini Cookbooks. I was intrigue by its title ‘Tex-Mex’.

The book says that the phrase ‘Tex-Mex’ is not a trendy term coined by some food writer or a funny name of a Mexican restaurant – it is a geographical fact. Tex-Mex is the border between Mexico and Texas which separates two different countries but where food is concerned, the line blurs. Tex-Mex relies heavily on traditional Mexican, therefore often Spanish ingredients and recipes but there is also a strong American influence.

Pasta Experimenta

As the famous saying goes Many roads lead to Rome – this is true for cooking. My mom had a natural gift in the kitchen and she never used recipes from books. She memorized some recipes inherited from her mom and invented some of her own while I learned cooking by following recipes from books or other sources.

When I started cooking, I did not dare to improvise. I simply followed a recipe to the letter, no substitutions no improvements. I started with my mom’s old recipe of chicken barbeque coz it was familiar, has simple list of ingredients and easy cooking method. And it worked! This first success story encouraged me to be more experimental.

Cooking With Love

When my children were still very young, I did not do regular cooking. For everyday meal, it was either our helper cooked or we ordered food from catering company. But from time to time I cooked them simple dishes like fried noodle or omelet for a change. 

Whenever I cooked, my children ate the meal enthusiastically and they seemed to enjoy the food so much. One day, my oldest daughter while enjoying the meal I cooked, asked: ‘Mom, why the meal you cook taste much better than the meal cooked by the helper or caterer? Not prepared by such question, I answered her lightly: ‘because mine is cooked with love’. As a young kid she truly believed whatever I said. She then told her friends proudly that her mom’s cooking is cooked with love (bless her!)

Back to my cooking, my study expanded to watching cooking programs on TV by famous Chefs such as Anthony Bourdain, Kylie Kwong, Jamie Oliver, Bob Blumer (Surreal Gourmet), Nigela Lawson, Bobby Chinn, Curtis Stone (Surfing the Menu, Take Home Chef), Iain Hewitson (Never Trust a Skinny Cook) etc.

Indonesian Cuisine, More Than a Meal

I re-post this article to commemorate the Indonesian Heroes’ Day on 10th November 2009

Indonesian cuisine is famous for its variety and taste.  Every region in Indonesia has its own special food and custom. In West Java – where Sundanese live most – they like to eat fresh vegetables and sambal. As such, there is a ridiculous joke that says you can leave them in the garden and they will be fine. And they like to drink tea without sugar. On the other hand, Javanese (Central and East Java) prefer something sweet. So, tea should be sweet while in Padang (West Sumatra), they like spicy food.