I'm well behind on posts - we've still lots to show and tell from Taiwan, Penang, and now Langkawi, where we've been parked since Sunday.
Today I haven't even a photo to share (the photographer's off somewhere in the mangroves as I type), but I do have a link - to our story, in today's Wall Street Journal Asia, on Jogjakarta's tasty take on fried bird.
More after we return to the big, bad city (that's Kuala Lumpur). Have a great weekend, folks!
Early tomorrow we head to Taiwan for two weeks of work, play, and - from what I've heard - fantastic food.
It will be strange to be in a primarily Mandarin-speaking environment again. Since leaving Shanghai in late 1998 I've returned to China only once, for a very brief visit (in 2001). China and I did not part on good terms (if you've lived there you might know what I mean), but long before I fell in love with Southeast Asia I was a 'China person'. Lately I've been feeling its pull.
I expect Taiwan to be nothing at all like greater China, but I see this trip as a means of easing back in - very, very slowly.
At any rate, here's a photo from our last visit to Bali, to tide you over until we resurface ... in Taipei!
In addition to the oft-overlooked stem, there's another part of the banana tree - one we never see - that's also edible.
Last March on Bali - between an impromptu gengong recital, Nyepi festivities, and a DIY-coconut oil lesson, we learned that the base of one variety of banana tree is used to make a type of tum. (Tum are steamed banana leaf packets of chopped meat or fish mixed with herbs and spices.)
The variety of banana tree harvested for the tum produces very small bananas that, because of their many hard, black seeds, are pretty much inedible (a similar variety grew in our old KL neighborhood, so it may be common around Asia). The part of the plant that goes into tum is the bulbous portion of the banana tree stem's base - from which grow its roots - that which sits right below the ground. The piece our hosts started with was about 12 inches (30 centimeters) in diameter; its flesh is heavy and dense, a bit like that of a coconut.
Much like our friend the banana stem this ingredient loses a lot of mass between harvest and preparation for cooking. After 'peeling' the chunk of stem by hacking away an inch or two on all sides and removing the dark inner core (which is bitter, we were told), the banana stem base was ready for grating. (Note that, like the stem, it discolors when exposed to air).
The flavor base of most Balinese dishes is a bumbu, or spice paste, and this tum is no different. Many of the same rhizomes, herbs, and other flavor-makers appear over and over again in Balinese bumbu. What distinguishes each dish is the proportions in which these ingredients are combined.
Here we have two types of chilies, ginger, galangal, kencur (aka lesser galangal), fresh turmeric root, white peppercorns, salt, garlic, shallots, and trassi (Indonesian shrimp paste). Turning it all to a paste is quick work if you've got a good heavy stone mortar and pestle.
This a pork tum, and a good handful of the stuff, roughly chopped and lightly sauteed, was ground into the finished bumbu. Finally, the bumbu'd pork was mixed with the grated banana stem base. (No banana stem base to hand? Use coconut instead - see the recipe below.)
For this dish the banana tree gives us not only a major ingredient but cooking vessels as well.
I have to admit a lack of proficiency when it comes to wrapping foods in banana leaf. From what I observed the process for these tum goes something like this:
Hold the banana leaf sort-of rectangle on your palm, and use your index finger to bring the middle of the edge of the leaf that's farthest from your body up and towards you.
Place a generous spoonful of tum in the middle-ish of the banana leaf, right where the fold created by your index finger ends. Bring one of the corners nearest your body in towards the center of the leaf, and follow with the other corner.
Secure each package with a strip of banana stem.If you know what you're doing (I didn't; the packets pictured above are not my handiwork) the tum packs turn out beautifully.
Twenty minutes in the steamer and the tum were ready to eat.
The banana base lent this tum a little toothsomeness, a hint of sweetness, and 'meatiness', without weighing it down. Each little packet was bursting with flavor and pretty substantial, yet felt light in the stomach. The seasonings came through in all their fragrant glory. They'd make great appetizers to accompany a rum cocktail.
Banana Stem Base (or Coconut) Tum
Makes 16-20 packets, or thereabouts
Ibu Nengah, our cooking teacher, suggests grated coconut as a substitute for the banana base. You might add a bit more lime juice to counter the coconut's added sweetness - or not. You can substitute foil for banana leaf but of course you'll be missing the fragrance the leaf lends to the tum. If you do use foil you might want to lightly oil it, and be sure not to wrap the packages too tight - the tum needs room to 'breathe' and steam.
Bumbu:
5 garlic cloves
1 slice fresh turmeric root (substitute scant 1/4 tsp ground turmeric)
4 hot chilies (such as Thai bird chili) - or less, to taste
1 long red or green mild chili, chopped
4 plump shallots, roughly cut
3/4-inch (2 cm) piece shrimp paste, Indonesian trassi preferably (toast it under the broiler or on a piece of foil placed over a gas flame if you
want to tone down the flavor)
2 slices of galangal
3 slices ginger
about 20 white peppercorns
2-3 small knobs of cencur (or omit or add 1 slice ginger in its place)
salt to taste
about 1 cup roughly chopped pork meat
cooking oil
2 cups grated banana stem base or fresh coconut
5 shallots, thinly sliced and fried in oil till golden, then removed and drained
1 small lime, halved
banana leaves or foil cut into approximately 7-inch (12-cm) squares
And this is his warung.
Welcome.
Koh Ati ('koh' for 'Elder Brother') cooks a mean kepala ikan (fish head). He's been doing so, in a miniscule shack tucked between a sundries store and a canal a short walk from Jakarta's Old Town, for over thirty-eight years. We find his warung by chance as we trace wider and wider circles out from Fatahillah Square, hunting architectural remnants of Dutch and Chinese influence on the city's past.
The sign, a plywood plank advertising three dishes in clear, no-nonsense lettering, speaks to us. So does the sight of Koh Ati laboring over a chunk of fish in his 'kitchen'.
Just inside the warung a helper stirs the burbling contents of a wok; we see cabe rawang - small green chilies guaranteed to leave a tingle on the tongue - and, in a nearby bowl, white tunafish heads and fillets. The fog wafting around the room smells of turmeric, coconut milk, galangal.
When our half a head arrives its eye socket is stuffed with chilies. Somehow, in Indonesia, this seems appropriate. The meat is firm, sweet, so fresh. The gravy is not as lemak (rich with coconut milk) as we thought it might be, but bright with lemon grass and that certain appealing galangal astringency, and tamarind-tart. We clean the bones of meat and finish every last drop of sauce.
And then, because we've seen other customers come, eat, and leave with smiles on their faces, and because Koh Ati is clearly serious about his food, we order more:
lao mie, chewy wheat noodles with sweet roasted pork, choy sum (Chinese mustard), and bean sprouts in a shallow pool of anise-flavored, soy sauce-enriched goo, and minced pork seasoned with five spice, wrapped tight in sheets of bean curd skin, deep-fried to order to a spectacular crisp. The latter reminds us of the Penang Nyonya dish lor bak.
We could, if we had the stamina, continue on; the two narrow metal counters in Koh Ati's warung that serve as dining areas hold bowls of crackly-skinned deep-fried chicken feet and steaming chunks of pork leg. Outside sits a plastic basket mounded with beautifully marbled pork belly. We could idle an hour or two, just to see what Koh Ati does with that belly.We could, but we just can't. Not today.
As we leave Koh Ati, finished chopping tuna heads in half, steps back in front of the wok. We get the impression he wants us to know that it's he, not his assistant, who does the cooking.
'Is this Chinese?' we ask, pointing to the contents of his wok.
Koh Ati has told us that his parents came to Jakarta from the southeastern Chinese town of Chaozhou. If he were in Malaysia he would certainly describe himself as Teochew. But the history of Chinese in Indonesia makes this all a bit more complicated.
'No, this is Indonesian food,' he replies. And the noodles and bean curd-wrapped pork? No, not Chinese - Indonesian as well.
We leave the parsing of origins and identification for another time. Right now, all we hope for is a chance to revisit Koh Ati and bear witness to his way with pork belly.
Warung Koh Ati, two blocks west of Kali Besar, a couple blocks south of Hotel Batavia, alongside the canal, Jakarta.
We're in Jakarta this week, working on a story that has not a whit to do with food. But that doesn't mean we're not eating well!
We headed out rather than later than usual this morning, still befuddled from an unexpectedly grueling day of travel yesterday (nine hours to get from Kuala Lumpur to Jakarta? yes, it is possible, thanks to Air Asia). Hungry and bubble-headed, we didn't want to work too hard for lunch. So we made straight for a part of town where we knew we could find good grub with minimal effort. We weren't disappointed.
In the same Glodok (Jakarta's Chinatown) alley where we last supped on turtle soup (which we believed, during said supping, to be chicken soup) - crowded today with vendors, their mobile stalls, and plenty of enthusiastic eaters (Sunday's a good day to visit Glodok) - we found a spic-and-span corner coffeeshop flanked by stalls offering soto Betawi, gado-gado, nasi campur, and jus buah (various fruit juices).
'Santan (coconut milk)?' the soto Betawi vendor asked me when I held up one finger, indicating how many bowls of sotoa and how many dishes of rice we wanted. Soto Betawi is a beef and beef parts soto with a richly flavored broth that's made with warm spices and a blend of coconut and cow's milk. This stall offers the broth with or without the fruit-and-dairy richness.
We're not afraid of lemak (richness). Of course, we opted for milk.
Our first and, before today, pnly taste of soto Betawi was enjoyed at Kafe Betawi, a very good (really, honestly) chain that I included in the Jakarta recommendations that accompanied our WSJA 'street food off the street' article. We were glad to have the opportunity to try a true street version.
Though it isn't as opulently spiced as Kafe Betawi's soto, this one is no slouch, rich but not over-the-top with the two milks, boasting chunks of tender beef and perfectly delicious 'parts', even floating a few shards of wonderfully smoky dried beef. Rounding out our bowl were slices of sourish tomato, sweetly caramelized shallot and garlic bits, chopped coriander, and kerepok (crackers) that half-melted in the broth. A squeeze of kalamansi brought it all together.
A nice touch here: two types of acar (pickles) - one of sweet-sour shallots and the other a mix of cucumber, shredded carrot, and whole small, fiery cabe (chilies) - included on the tabletop condiment tray. They add texture, heat, and a bit of tartness (always a plus in our book) to the dish.
Accompanied by two glasses of fresh-squeezed orange juice, our bill came to Rp 40,000 (roughly $3.50). Warm welcome, wide smiles, and the reminder not to forget my umbrella on the house. Set straight, we hit the road and wandered up to Kota Tua (Jakarta's 'Old Town').
Jakarta catches so much trash talk from travellers. But we're happy to be looking at the rest of the week here.
Soto Betawi 'Afung', alley off of Jalan Pancong next to Pasar Glodok building.
We generally avoid malls and mall food like the plague. So it was a little disconcerting last year to find ourselves spending a lot of time in the region's shopping center food courts for a feature article in today's Wall Street Journal Asia 'Weekend Journal' (the annual Food Issue) on street foods cooked and served 'off the street' (a few out takes here).
I have to admit I accepted the assignment with some ambivalence. For me eating on the street is an integral part of travelling (where street food is available, anyway). It's such an easy and delightful way to connect with locals and immerse yourself in local culinary (and other) culture.
But I also realize that there are lots of travelers who, for whatever reason, just can't go there. And I do not turn my nose up at you. Street food is not just about the food, it's about the experience, and while the experience can't be recreated in a shopping mall food court or restaurant (though Saigon's Quan An Ngon comes pretty close), in the course of our research for this piece we found that - sometimes - the food can.
So I say, to those who just can't bring themselves to eat on the street or in a market: I'm glad that there are places like this, where you can find at least an approximation of the street's flavors. (I also say, put yourself in my hands for a day and I'll have you converted. But that's neither here nor there.)
For this article we visited malls and standalone restaurants in Bangkok, Jakarta, Saigon, and KL (we had help in Singapore) . And we found something interesting, a little tidbit that hasn't entered the debate about the desire of some regional municipal governments to sweep foods off the street: places like Jakarta's Kafe Betawi (a chain) or Tanah Abang food court may actually become repositories for some tastes of the street, as certain street foods disappear from their natural habitat.
The owner of Kafe Betawi, who is really very passionate about street foods, told me that she tries to conjure, in her restaurants, approximations of street foods she remembers from her childhood that are now nearly extinct on the street. And on the 8th floor of Tanah Abang, a massive textile market, we found a street specialty - kerak telur, a sort of rice and egg 'omelet' with coconut and palm sugar - that we'd been searching for in vain. It was even cooked old-style, over charcoal.
***
That said, for us the street is still where it's at. I mean, just have a look at that opening photo: com tam (broken rice) topped with grilled pork, sweet-tart cucumber-carrot-daikon pickle, a fried egg, and scallion greens (fish sauce-chili dipping sauce on the side) taken with a glass of inky iced coffee at a tiny, low-to-the-ground beaten metal table, at 7am on a Saturday in an alley in Saigon's District 1.
It's a dish we often overlook, common as it is to nearly every Saigon city block in the a.m., but it's so delicious. The broken rice is fluffy, light, almost couscous-like, the pork slightly sweet and smoky, the pickles a sharp counterpoint to the richness of the meat. The egg's yolk, broken to spill over the rice, pulls it all together. And the dipping sauce, with it's lightly sugared, fish-flavored chili punch, is the flavor of Vietnam itself. What a way to wake up. (That, and the coffee.)
But this meal isn't just about the deliciousness of what's on the plate in front of us. It's about being out and about when Saigon is at it's best, when the buildings still cast long shadows and the air is a bit cool and as close as it ever gets to clean; when the motorcycles, relatively thin on the street, speak a soothing purr instead of a deafening roar; and when locals, fresh from a night's sleep and not yet worn down from all the crap that a day in Saigon can throw at them, are at their friendliest.
(Smiles and nods also come from the sight of a couple of tall foreigners perched on kiddy stools hunkered down over a plate of com tam. Don't ever underestimate the power of partaking.)
It's about the aromas that waft about in that alley, the good ones: the comforting, enveloping smell of steamed rice, the hint of sourness rising from the vendor's jar of pickles, and the meaty smoke snaking up from the grill that taunts your growling belly while you're waiting for your plate of com tam and then, after it's delivered, stokes your hunger even as you're eating.
It's about the tinkle of bicycle bells and the honk of motorcycle horns (at the end of the alley sits an apartment building, and at 7am residents walk or ride by your table on their way to work, school, the market, breakfast, coffee), and the nods and high-fives sent your way by other eaters, many of whom probably breakfast here every single day. It's about the vendor's smile as she sets down your plate, the coffee lady's laugh at your pronunciation of 'cafe sua da', the privilege of watching your meal prepared right in front of you, and the pleasure of tucking into something so luscious yet so ridiculously cheap.
In short, this fantastic plate of com tam is about everything - the whole experience rolled into one tasty package.
And that's why, given the choice, the street is where we eat.
Com tam, alley behind the opera house, Saigon. Starts early, closes when she runs out.
In Malaysia there's laksa. In Indonesia there's soto.
Soto, generally speaking, is a dish of meat, meat broth, and rice, rice cakes, or noodles. It might be considered Indonesia's national dish, served as it is from Sumatra to Papua and in enough variations to fill an entire cookbook (say, there's an idea). It's said that the humble soto was once the food of sultans.
We'd never paid much attention to soto. Much like Vietnam's national dish, pho, soto is omnipresent, available in many an open-air eatery and on seemingly every other street corner. But really truly delicious soto - now, that's another story. If you've had one MSG-laden so-so soto, you've had them all - or so we thought.
Until in Jogjakarta, over the course of three bowls of soto, our friend Adzan opened our eyes to the possibilities inherent in a simple bowl of soup.
Our first stop: Soto Kadipiro, housed in a tile-roofed wooden structure and furnished with wood-and-glass display cases and old-style formica-topped tables, aged bird cages hanging from the ceiling. We fell in love with the place the moment we walked in the door.
The specialty here is chicken soto, saffron hued broth of chicken, turmeric, ginger, garlic, shallots, and daun salam (also known as 'Indonesian bay leaf' though it has no relationship whatsoever to Western bay leaf) packed with shreds of chicken meat, shredded cabbage, and barely sprouted soy beans, all crowned with carmelized shallots and chopped cilantro. (We asked for rice to be placed in our bowls, though it's possible to order it on the side.)
What's unusual at Kadipiro is the accompanying sambal, sliced tomatoes mixed with chopped fresh chilies and a bit of vinegar (behind the soto, above).
Kadipiro opened its doors in 1924 and is now overseen by the original owner's son, Bapa Widadi Dirojo Utomo. His brother prepares the soto according to the original recipe, using about 50 chickens a day; the place is so popular the soto's often sold out by noon.
At Kadipiro you can wash your soto down with Sarsaparilla, a refreshing, vaguely root beer-reminiscent beverage that's been produced in Jogja since at least the sixties. We love the bottle and its label, which just looks so right on one of Kadipiro's plastic-topped tables.
From white meat we moved to dark, at Soto Pak Sholeh Al Barokah, another oldy-but-goody soto establishment. The sign over Pak Sholeh's entrance translates to something along the lines of 'If you give good things good things will come back to you.'
Pak Sholeh does indeed give good things, in the form of a luscious beef soto. For a beef-based broth this soto's is surprisingly light on the palate, but completely satisfying. An order of soto also contains cabbage, sprouts, beef chunks, and the odd piece of tomato, chopped cilantro on top.
Diners can, if they wish, dip into the bowls on each table that are filled with with chunks of dried, smoked beef. Though it looks as if it might be tough as nails the meat is surprisingly tender (I wanted to carry a few pieces back to KL, slice them thin, and slap them between two pieces of good Dijon mustard-slathered bread. It's a plan for our next visit). The sambal on the side is hot as hell (a plus in our book).
Pak Sholeh entered the beef soto trade as an assistant to his uncle and began selling the dish on his own as an ambulatory street vendor in 1952. In 1984 he set up a small warung which, a decade or so later, assumed its current form: an airy, homey shop furnished with wooden chairs and tables and a bits and pieces of family memorabilia.
Shortly before the Asian tsunami (which he forsaw in his dreams, we're told), Pak Shohleh passed away suddenly. Now his wife, the warm and gracious Ibu Sholeh, cooks the soto. She starts every morning at 4am, simmering the beef in water for four hours before removing it, cutting it into small pieces, and frying it with palm sugar. The recipe for the soup, she says, is 'no secret, just shallots, garlic, white pepper, ginger, salt, and palm sugar.' For the savory sambal, she sautes fresh chilies with a bit of beef stock.
Daughter Siti runs the front of the house. Asked why Pak Sholeh's beef soto is so popular she replies, 'Thanks to God. People taste it, they love it, and they tell their friends.' Many clients, she says, are long-time regulars who've been eating soto made according to her father's recipe since he sold it door-to-door on the street.
Our last soto of the day was had at a shop specializing in a version from the Javanese town of Kudus. It's called, appropriately: Soto Kudus.
There's no nostalgic back story here; the shop was only opened in the last couple years. But Adzan claims it serves the best soto Kudus in Jogja, and for our purposes that's all that matters.
All in all it's a magnificent bowl of chicken broth with a strong cinammon presence; it's also, relative to the versions we downed before it, sweet. The usual suspects - bean sprouts, white and dark chicken shreds - were present, along with an appetizingly fragrant mound of fried garlic shards that scented the air around us as steam rose from the broth, around and through them. In spite of the fact that we were much too full for a third bowl of soto we slurped it right down. We would gladly return to Soto Kudus on emptier stomachs.
Call it an awakening of sorts; soto now occupies a prominent position on our Indonesian food radar.
Soto Kadipiro, Jalan Wates 33, Jogjakarta. 0274-618722.
Soto Pak Sholeh, Jalan Wiratama 84, Tegalrejo, Jogjakarta. 0274-560584.
Soto Kudus - sorry! Details to come.
We'd heard that folks in the vicinity of Jogjakarta like their food sweet. But our wildest imaginations could never have conjured the Sugar Burger.
This is jada, a fat tofu or tempeh 'patty' simmered in sweet soy sauce mixed with loads of palm sugar and sandwiched between two soft rice cakes. When you take a bite the bean curd oozes sticky, salty sweetness. It's a snack sold all around the area (but made most deliciously at a small shop on the road to the Ullen Sentalu Museum). Some call it the Java Burger but - for obvious reasons - we think Sugar Burger's the more accurately descriptive title.
Diners assemble their own burgers from a tray of rice cakes, tofu, and tempeh. Chilies are an optional but, we think, necessary burger condiment, offering as they do a welcome, shocking hit of spice that perks up the whole package. One Sugar Burger's our limit, but not because the three-bite treat isn't tasty. The tofu and tempeh are actually unexpectedly addictive, combining as they do an assertive beany-savoriness with the subtle bitter-sour-sweet notes characteristic of high-quality palm sugar (think of the way plum sauce 'works' with Peking roast duck). It's those rolly-polly rice cakes that prevent us from eating more; they're way filling.
Sugar Burgers, aka jada, shop uphill from Jogjakarta on the way to Ullen Sentalu Museum; it's on you're left heading uphill, about 5 minutes from the museum. Look for the sign ('Jada', not 'Sugar Burgers').
Pedicab in the old walled city
I'm facing down a couple deadlines so there'll be no story today. Here instead are a few of Dave's images from our January sojourn in Jogjakarta. Did we mention that Jogja really gets under your skin, in a good way? That has everything to do with the locals.
And if you're new to EatingAsia, follow the links to read about a local breakfast treat and how the famous Jogja specialty nasi gudeg is made.
A bird lover
At the market
Recess
The Sultan's shadow puppet maker
Hanging out mid-morning
Tourists photograph tourists at the Sultan's palace
Should you wake up one morning in Yogyakarta afflicted with a fierce hunger, find your way to the Pasar Burung (bird market) in the Kraton, the walled city within a city that's home to the Sultan's palace. You're not there for the bird market, but the wet market next door, a small covered maze of stalls selling everything from melinjo flowers, leaves, and nuts to prepared dishes.
Wander the aisles until you find, at one far corner, this vendor, who's been making and selling her baked apam (rice flour cakes) here for over 35 years. These aren't just any apam, but lovely spongy, light-as-air apam made with coconut milk and lots of fresh grated coconut.
If you're a coconut lover you'll want to order four, five, or more. They're only lightly sweetened, so the flavor of the coconut meat sits right at the fore. The vendor sells so many that there are always hot ones to hand. Ask for yours to be wrapped in banana leaf rather than paper; the heat of your rice cake will draw out the leaf's fragrance.
It's quite an ingenious set-up she's got here. A specially indented cast-iron apam tray is suspended over a metal box filled with hot charcoal. She spoons in the apam batter, and then places a metal lid over the tray. The apam bake just as if they were in a conventional oven.
Every once in a while she lift the oven lid to turn the apam, making sure that both sides crisp up and color golden brown. While the inside of the apam stays tender and fluffy the outside develops a very thin, lightly crunchy and chewy crust.
Did I mention that she makes two versions? One with egg, and one without. You'll want to try both, of course, for purposes of comparison. But the egg version possesses a certain extra something that pretty much makes it the coconut pancake of my dreams.
Rice flour cakes - are made all over Southeast and South Asia. Some are steamed, some are baked. Some are soft, some are crumbly, some are gummy. Some are eaten plain, others embellished with palm sugar. Some are plain, some flavored with pandan or coconut, or colored with ubi.
These Jogja baked apam are - so far - our favorite.
Apam vendor, wet market next to Pasar Burung, Kraton, Yogyakarta. 630am-noonish.
