Pride of place

I once wrote a book about Indonesian regional food. Researching it gave me plenty of excuses to visit parts of Indonesia I had never been to and, better still, to return to my own birthplace and childhood home in West Sumatra, which I had not seen for half a century.

At the start of the trip, I was in Jakarta and called in at the offices of one of the monthly magazines devoted to food – they were something quite new then. I was quite surprised when I told one of the staff writers about the book I was planning, and she said, “Regional food’s mostly pretty awful. Why don’t you stay in Jakarta and do your research here?”

But I went anyway – from Medan down to Jambi, from Pontianak to Balikpapan and Samarinda, to Ujung Pandang, Tana Toraja and Manado, then to Ambon and Banda; finally to more familiar scenes in Bali, Lombok, Madura and Yogya, Bandung and finally Jakarta itself. By that time I had been on the road, or in the air, for almost four months, and had learned a great deal about my own country. I had also eaten many excellent meals, and probably not lost any weight. My baggage was certainly heavier, with piles of notes and bundles of books, magazines, newspapers, catalogues and menus – always my favorite souvenirs from any trip.

But memories and impressions are the real treasures any traveler accumulates, and one of my strongest impressions from that journey was the eagerness of local food producers and cooks to share their knowledge, and make me feel their pride in the traditional foods and dishes of their neighborhood. Back in London I had a lot more fun recreating the dishes they had taught me and working out precisely how each recipe should work and how I should write it. (This is another vital element in any cookery writer’s unending process of self-education.)

The hours I spent in my kitchen gave me leisure to think about regional patriotism and why it so often expresses itself in food habits, even in a small country like Britain, where a simple baked batter pudding, always served with roast beef, is called Yorkshire pudding, so you don’t forget where it came from.

Among the dishes that were put before me, and some of which I later cooked alongside my hosts in their kitchens, were several that were included in the book and are still, 15 years later, part of my regular repertoire: bebek betutu (slow-cooked Balinese duck), asinan Jakarta (a fruit and vegetable salad) and tinutuan from Manado (a nourishing vegetable soup, said to have been a former president’s favorite breakfast), are just three examples. All three are identified specifically with particular islands, provinces or cities, not because they demand ingredients that are unavailable elsewhere, but because they combine common ingredients in ways that have evolved among families and neighborhoods over many generations; they are part of the inheritance, the pusaka, by which the group identifies itself.

Of course their tastes and textures are part of everyone’s childhood memories. You often hear people say, “So-and-so is our country’s national dish, no one else can make it like we do.” But to my mind the idea of a “national dish” is a bit suspect. A nation, even a small one, is too big to be represented by just one recipe. True pride in cooking is a household matter. Nowadays the house may be a restaurant or a hotel, or even a town: Think of all the great cooks from Tegal who developed the warteg, the warung Tegal, which plays such a big part in Jakarta street food today.

In one of the leading hotels in Ambon town, I was introduced to kohu-kohu, a salad of greenstuff and bean sprouts, preferably the short-stemmed type made from soya beans, rather than mung beans, though mung beans are a good substitute. But these are just a setting for the region’s jewel, its smoked tuna (pictured above). Kenari nuts, the principal ingredient of the dressing, are also very typical of Maluku. I love them; unfortunately, they are not easily available outside Nusa Tenggara, certainly not in London.

Similar nuts in the Philippines are called pili; pili and kenari are both members of the genus Canarium, which includes many other nutritious and tasty nuts. But if you live beyond reach of kenari, the most appropriate substitute, with a very similar taste, is almonds, though they are not even distant cousins of Canarium. If you can’t even find those, use freshly grated coconut. In my most recent book, I suggest smoked salmon and smoked eel as a substitute for tuna. The lettuce I use is cos lettuce, finely shredded, with some mung bean sprouts.

The dressing for this kohu-kohu is made by simply mixing together the following:

4 tbsp freshly ground kenari, or ground almonds

½ – 1 tsp crushed chilies or sambal ulek

1 shallot, finely sliced

1 clove garlic, very finely sliced

1 tbsp freshly chopped chives

2 – 4 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon or lime juice

Salt to taste

The real purpose of this extremely simple dish in its place of origin is of course to show off the magnificent tuna that are still caught, though alas in ever-decreasing numbers, in the seas off Ambon, Banda and the Moluccas, waters that are much deeper than those that surround western Indonesian islands, and are therefore able to support big fish, the aristocrats at the top of the marine food chain. We know that eating prestige food confers prestige on the eater: At the Toraja funeral feast, the best cuts of buffalo go to the senior men, in strict order of rank. At a less formal level, the fish head, or the fish’s eye, is offered to the most honored guest, who will not refuse it.

Today we are taught to value the health-giving properties of food above their supposed spiritual powers, and I think we have to rank kohu-kohu pretty high on this count as well. It is a healthy recipe, quite low in calories, and also very easy to make – I’ve been serving kohu-kohu at many of my dinner parties since my new book was published last September, and I keep hearing from friends who tasted it that they have been making it too, for their families and friends.

Clearly, my next article for the WEEKENDER must focus on herbs and spices that have medicinal properties: among others, galangal and turmeric. Also fresh chilies, because they contain lots of vitamin C, and people like to boast about how many they can eat. I once got into a chili-eating contest with a Scotsman ... + Sri Owen

Back to The top page