Although nutmeg is native to Indonesia, it is not often used in cooking, except in beef, oxtail, or oxtongue soups or stews such as this semur lidah. Added by potato cubes into semur lidah, you can tell this dish was influenced by the Dutch.

Seeing a pack of fresh veal tongue at a halal store on Maryland street, made me happy. I finally could make semur lidah. This store supplies fresh meat (goat, lamb, beef, veal) every Thursday, I'm not too sure when the halal fresh chicken is coming to the store, but the store does have the frozen ones.

In the recipe, I supposed to use oxtongue, but I was curious how the veal tongue tasted. I browsed semur lidah recipe on internet and I chose to adapt Astri's recipe of Keluarga Nugraha. The semur lidah turned really great, the same tasted as what I recalled when I was in my family's house. Thanks, Astri! I just had to adjust a small numbers of some ingredients. Few recipes call for cinnamon, but I didn't add any as I prefer had a combination cloves and nutmeg fragrant.

To eliminate my guilty feeling, I had this semur lidah with steamed brown rice, not white rice :D

Semur Lidah
Recipe by Astri Nugraha, Adapted and translated by me

Ingredients:
2 L (8 cups) water
600 g (1 � lb) ox tongue (I used veal tongue), washed well
3 ea Indonesian bay leaves (salam leaves)
3 tbsp butter/margarine
1 tbsp olive oil
6 shallots, chopped
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 whole nutmeg, cracked or 1/4 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
7 ea cloves
5 cherry tomatoes (tomat sambal), halved
500 mL (2 cup) homemade beef stock
1/4 cup Indonesian sweet soy sauce (I use kecap manis sedang/medium sweet)
1 mushroom soy sauce
2 medium size potatoes , peeled and 2 cm cubed
1 large carrot, peeled and cut as desired
ground white pepper to taste
fried shallots and other green stuff to garnish

Methods:
1. In a heavy stockpot, bring to a boil water, veal tongue and salam leaves, reduce heat and simmer for approximately 1.5 -2 hours or until tongue is cooked and very tender. Ox-tongue will take a longer time to cook. If you use a pressure cooker, this process will be faster, around 20 minutes.
2. Plunge veal tongue into ice water and cool for 5 minutes. Peel skin off with a sharp knife. Slice veal tongue into 1 cm thick.
3. In a skillet/wok, combine butter and oilive oil, stir fry shallot, garlic, cloves, and nutmeg for 1 minute at medium-high temperature.
4. Add veal tongue slices, stir for 30 second.
5. Add beef stock/water, kecap manis, and mushroom soy sauce, stir.
6. Bring to boil, add potato and tomatoes reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.
7. Add carrot and season with ground white pepper as desired; continue to simmer until all is cooked.
8. Garnish with fried shallots or green onion.

Note: if you like salty taste, add salt as desired. In this case, I didn't add any, since mushroom soy sauce was pretty thick

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For some reason, it happens if you were born as an Indonesian, you would not need any recipe to make your own Nasi Goreng. Nasi means rice and Goreng means fried, so it is literally translated as Fried Rice. We grew up with it as we often have it for breakfast or supper. Ample versions of Nasi Goreng were developed. My family used to make Nasi Goreng from Sambal Terasi (Terasi/Belachan Sambal), shrimp and left over cold rice from the night before. We enjoyed it with fried egg or omelet, acar (pickled cucumber, shallot and chili), emping melinjo (melinjo nut crackers) and/or kerupuk udang (shrimp crackers).

I came up with Nasi Goreng Pedas, pedas can be translated as spicy/hot and it means we use chili either red chilies, bird eye's chilies or green chilies. In this version, I combined Indonesian chili paste, sambal oelek and Thai chili paste, nam prik-pao. My own preference, I don't really relish store-bought sambal ulek/oelek as it is too salty and vinegary, so I used a homemade sambal oelek that I keep in the freezer. If I want the store-bought version, I will buy Kokita sambal terasi.

Nasi Goreng

recipe by me

Ingredients

left over cold rice

shallot, sliced
homemade sambal ulek/oelek
nam prik-pao
Thai basil, chopped

eggs

ground white pepper

olive oil

Directions:

1. Put a half portion of sambal ulek/oelek and nam prik-pao on top the cold rice.

2. Beat the egg with nam prik-pao and ground white pepper. In a skillet, add a small amount of oil and heat it up to medium-high. Add beaten egg and make into scramble. Cook until done and set aside.

3. Use the same skillet, add another small amount of oil, saute shallot for a minute, add the other half portions of sambal ulek and nam prik-pao; stir. Place mixed cold rice and scrambled egg in the skillet, combine and stir until all mixed. Add chopped basil and stir. Serving suggestion: transfer into a plate, put fried shallot over and ready to eat with kerupuk udang.

Don't forget to join (Almost) Forgotten Indonesian Culinary Herritage

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First of all, I apologized to Masak Bareng Yuuk event crews to use English which you know that English is the language that I use in this blog.

Yay! Finally, I can join with you all guys to cook together virtually. Masak Bareng Yuuk means Let's Cook Together. This event was developed by Ayin of AG's Food, Deetha of ...Mlebu Pawon..., and Shinta of Berkreasi di Dapur Mungil.

This month theme is Tom Yum Goong, the famous sour and spicy Thai prawn/shrimp soup. In this event, I enhanced the Tom Yum Goong with Freshwater Prawns (Indonesian: Udang Galah) as Bee of Rasa Malaysia suggested where she got the recipe from another foodie native Thai, Chez Pim. Followed her aunt recipe, Nam-prik Pao (Thai chili paste) has been added as well as Pak Chee Farang as the reference from Austin Bush, an American Photographer who currently resides in Thailand.

Pak Chee Farang is known as Sawtooth Coriander in English and Walangan or Daun Ketumbar Jawa in Indonesian. It is used for lalapan (fresh veggies) to company steamed rice, sambal and the protein source.

Tom Yam Goong
adapted from Chez Pim, Rasa Malaysia, and Austin Bush; modified by me

Ingredients:
1/2 kg freshwater prawns (Indonesian: udang galah), it's about 5 pieces
6 cups water
one big handful of kaffir lime leaves
2-3 lemongrass, discard the outer layers and cut to 2' pieces
4 cm long (2 cm diameter) galangal, peeled and thick sliced
1 cup sliced mushrooms, in this case I used King Oyster Mushroom and Shittake
juice from 3 limes, you may need more
� cup Nam Pla (Thai fish sauce)
2 tbsp of Nam-prik Pao
7 pak chee farang (sawtooth coriander)
a few bird eye chillies



Directions:
Preparation to make the stock:
1. Rinse all prawns.
2. Peel the heads and shells of 2 prawns, reserve them.
3. Squeeze the fat out from the heads and reserve in a separate bowl.
4. Combine 2 headless and skinless prawns with 3 other full body prawns in another separate bowl.

Make the Stock:
1. Heat the shells, heads, in a pot with the water.
2. Bruise the kaffir lime leaves and smash the lemongrass and galangal a bit and throw them into the pot.
3. Reserve a few kaffir lime leaves, a slice or two of galangal, and some lemongrass for the soup later.
4. After the water come to a full boil, lower the heat to simmer and continue to cook for about 5 minutes. Strain, crush the shells and heads well to squeeze all the delicious taste from them.





Tom Yum Goong:
1. Heat the stock to a boil, add king oyster mushroom and the full body prawns, cook for 10 minutes.
2. Add the headless and skinless prawns, prawn fat, shittake mushrooms, and the rest of the kaffir lime leaves and lemongrass.
3. When the prawns are just done (take care not to overcook the shrimps), turn the heat off. Season with fish sauce, lime juice, sliced bird eyes chilies, Nam-prik Pao, and sliced pak chee farang.

Note:
* Throw extra whole chillies, so you can smash them up if you like hotter taste. In case, you serve for other people, this way everyone can control the heat. The taste should be sour, salty, hot, with a slight sweetness at the end.
*Just like other Thais, I enjoyed this with steamed white rice.


Don't forget to join (Almost) Forgotten Indonesian Culinary Herritage

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To begin with, I was surprised that Rasa Malaysia has chosen me to be the guest writer of Indonesian cuisine on her blog. Rasa Malaysia is one of my inspired blogs among the Asian specialty blogs. We share the same passion for Asian food as we came from the same region, Malay Peninsula where Bahasa Indonesia and Bahasa Malaysia are from the same language root. Some of the food terms are the same, few are different.

In Indonesia, Gado-gado is not a salad dish group, it is a one dish meal. With 17,000 islands and 300 ethnic groups in the country, it has impacts on food varieties; so does gado-gado. Varieties of Gado-gado were developed based on the region.

You can take the girl out of the country but not the country out of the girl. Follow my recalled to Classic Gado-Gado Surabaya recipe at Rasa Malaysia along with the glossaries.

Ps. Thank you, Bee for the opportunity.

Disclaimer: For the shot's purpose, Gado-gado Surabaya on this picture has less sauce than the normal one.
Don't forget to join (Almost) Forgotten Indonesian Culinary Herritage

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My foodie fellow, Rurie is inviting us to join a foodie event. It's not just foodie event, it's a contest too. Share your food knowledge and photo, and get the prizes. So, what are you waiting for? Come and join to "know your Indonesian culinary heritage".

The food that we have to share is Indonesian cuisine that is almost disappeared from the market and society. Let me make it clear here, you may notice when you were a kid, you had that food/beverage so often. You might eat them from your grandmother's kitchen. As you grew up, you barely see the dish or it is only seen once a while in a special/traditional feast or ceremonial. The dish can be rice, fish, meat, and vegetable. Dessert, snack and beverages are acceptable too. It doesn't have to be an extravagance dish, show us what you have got in your hometown (or used to have) or may be a childhood memory dish that your grandmother used to make but nobody hardly make it anymore.

Let's join and dig for more information (how to join and win)

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As I promised to mas Budi (mas is a polite form to refer to one guy and also meant brother in Javanese) to give a space on my blog to promote his new books. He is one of my foodie fellows who also a cookbook authors in Indonesia. The books were been published in Indonesia with title "Panduan Tepat untuk Diet Golongan Darah (A, B, AB dan O)".

For my Malaysian readers who interests to get one of these books, you may see already at book stores in Malaysia.

Title : Siri Panduan Diet Golongan Darah - PANDUAN DIET UNTUK GOLONGAN DARAH (A, B, AB dan O)

Publisher: Synergy Media - Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Authors: Budi Sutomo, S. Pd & Dr. Yoanita Ristyaningrum

Price: RM.14.90



Right pic: Indonesian edition. Left Pic: Malaysian edition.

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Homemade Vegetarian Stock is easy to make, especially if you are really concerned about your diet. By making your own stock, at least you know what the ingredients are. A number of store-bought stocks contain MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) which I have problem with.

I have followed this recipe twice. Just throw the vegetable you have in a roast pot. As you notice, most of my recipes are barely used store-bought stock or broth, I usually make my own stock and keep it the freezer.

This vegetarian stock is modified from Canadian Living magazine issued on October 2006. Great stock for your mushroom cream soup.

Homemade Vegetarian Stock
recipe by Canadian Living magazine, modified by me

Ingredients:
3 each carrots, onions and stalks celery, coarsely chopped
1 cup (250 mL) sliced shittake mushroom stems or caps
3 cloves garlic
2 tsp (10 mL) vegetable oil
3 sprigs thyme
2 sprigs rosemary
3 sprigs sage
10 peppercorns, cracked
2 Indonesian bay leaves (salam leaves)
8 cups (2 L) cold water
seasalt as desired


Rosemary and Wilted Sage

Directions:
In large roasting pan, stir together carrots, onions, celery, mushrooms, garlic and oil to coat. Roast in 450�F (230�C) oven, stirring halfway through , until softened and browned, about 40 minutes. Transfer to stockpot.

If you like, add 1 tsp (5 mL) crumbled dried mushrooms for even deeper flavour. Add thyme, sage, rosemary, peppercorns, Indonesian bay leaves, and all but 1 cup (250 mL) of the water to stockpot. Pour remaining water into roasting pan, stirring and scraping up any brown bits, over heat if necessary. Scrape into stockpot and bring to boil; skim off any foam. Reduce heat to medium; simmer for 40 minutes.

Strain through fine sieve, gently pressing vegetables. Stir in seasalt.


Notes:

• Servings: 5 cups (1.25 L)
• Make-ahead: Let cool for 30 minutes. Refrigerate, uncovered, in airtight container until cold. Cover and refrigerate for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 4 months.
• The original recipe used Bay Leaves which actually have different flavour with Indonesian Bay Leaves.
• Be Creative

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