Dutch Influence, Indonesian Delights

Recently I watched an interview of Bobby Chinn by CNN Talk Asia’s Anjuli Rao.  Bobby lives in South East Asia and travels throughout the continent for his show World Cafe Asia.  The way he presented is quite refreshing and I managed to catch one of his episodes showcasing Indonesian food.  Well mainly what’s available in the capital city of Jakarta.

In between making some good bites, he interlaced the show with some historical background on the huge city and the fact that having been conquered among others, by a Sultanate in 1500s, the British Empire (pre 1600s) and lastly the Dutch before gaining independence, you would and should expect a glorious assortment of food influenced especially by the Dutch.  (As the Dutch ruled the longest).  At the same time retaining some of the traditional ways of the Indons.

Among the recipes shown were Semur Daging which is beef cooked in soy sauce infused with various herbs and spices, and Gado Gado – the local blanched vegetable salad with spicy peanut sauce for dressing/dipping.

Semur Daging

Use 1lb/600g of beef – knuckle and slice thickly.  Get 2 large potatoes sliced thickly and half-fried.  This is done to harden the potatoes and avoid crumbling when stewed later with the beef.  Finely slice 5 shallots and saute on about 2 tablespooon of oil.  Add in pounded ingredients – 1 candlenut, 1 inch fresh ginger, 4 cloves of garlic, 2 sticks of lemongrass until the mixture gets fragrant.   Then throw in 2 fresh bay leaves, about 2 tablespoons of coriander powder and the Indonesian thick soy sauce to taste, along with a pinch of grated nutmeg, a few cloves, an inch of galanga (bruised usually using the mortar and pestle), 1 cinnamon stick and the meat.

I was also glad that the episode had something on Rijkstaffel as some years back I had the pleasure of dining in such a manner in the Sheraton Hotel at Bandung, a high-ground resort city south of Jakarta.

And so the story goes, while under the Dutch ruling, Rijkstaffel – a way of serving dinner was invented, purportedly because the Dutch found the traditional way of the Indons eating together in groups, using hands from a huge platter, offensive.  Rijkstaffel is basically having let’s say 7 people lined up in waiting, each bearing dishes in pretty woven baskets, lined with banana leaves, to be served to the diners, one by one.  Usually the first person will carry cooked rice, followed by chicken curry, spicy sambal prawns, stir-fried veggies and so on.  Rijkstaffel is generally applicable for entrees.