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Take a leaf to wrap your food
Food wrapping methods have changed over the last 20 years
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ood wrapping methods have changed over the last 20 years. In the past, people made sure their kue-kue (traditional snacks) were wrapped in tender light-green banana leaves.
One favorite snack was lemper (steamed sticky rice with a beef or chicken filling). According to the old methods, the snack had to be served wrapped in banana leaf. Today, people wrap lemper in transparent plastic or paper sheets.
Today consumers can see right away what is inside — but the aroma of banana leaves that gives specific taste to lemper is gone. Plastic wrappers also mean lemper is no longer grilled after it is steamed, giving it a rather bland taste.
Plastic is also used to wrap tempeh. The tempeh wrapped in banana leaves, such as triangle-shaped tempeh from Yogyakarta or Malang, demands a much higher price.
The use of bamboo leaves in food wrapping has also decreased. Luckily, some traditional snacks such as bacang are still wrapped in leaves, making the meat-stuffed snack a perennial favorite.
For those living in Madura or using the Madurese method of food wrapping, the outer leaves of corn cobs are favorites. Whether sweet or savory, wrapping the snacks in corncob leaves will give food a distinctive flavor.
Various leaves are still used to wrap food, but often they are not popular in other regions since the source plants grow elsewhere. Daun laikit or daun nasi are examples. They are used to wrap kalupa, a ginger spiced rice preparation in North Sulawesi.
The plants is not widely known in West Java. It is planted only in the gardens of those from northern Sulawesi. Our tropical climate allows plants to thrive and so many leaves are still wait to be discovered to meet our culinary needs.
Several tree species growing in our tropical climate are multifunctional, with their leaves used in regional cuisine.
Some of the leaves are used almost daily, such as banana tree or coconut palm leaves. Other leaves are only known only regionally, such as teak tree or pohon jati leaves
Teak tree leaves are used in Central Java as a lid to cover clay pots when cooking a delicious regional jackfruit dish called gudeg. When heated, jati leaves produce a substance which will gives gudeg’s ingredients a reddish hue. Jackfruit, then, turns a dark brown-reddish color, which the hallmark of gudeg.
In Cirebon, on the border between Central Java and West Java, people use jati leaves to wrap the popular nasi jamblang dish. By doing so, rice becomes pinkish and gains an aromatic fragrance.
A tree which has many uses in northern and southern Sulawesi is the keluak tree (Pangium edule Reinw).
Locals call it pangi, or pongee. The nuts are known throughout Asia and are called black nuts in English.
The tree has never been cultivated in Indonesia. It grows wild in yards and in forests. The tree grows mainly in lowlands and laces at least a thousand meters above sea level.
The leaves grow from a long stem that is greenish white at the surface. The lower part of the leaves have distinctive fibrous veins. Keluak leaves resemble the leaves of the waru, or hibiscus.
Before using keluak leaves as a taste enhancer or as a wrapper, they must be precooked for about half hour and the cooking liquid thrown away to avoid poisoning.
The tender keluak leaves are then finely cut like tobacco leaves and cooked with meat and various spices. The meat and spiced keluak leaves are then put inside a piece of bamboo and grilled.
Other popular leaves, especially in rural areas, are the leaves of the mengkudu tree. This tree is also a tree of many uses. Its fruits and roots are often included in medicinal potions.
Mengkudu leaves contain vitamin A. For people in rural areas, the mengkudu tree is a source of some of the best traditional medicines for curing eye diseases.
Normally, mengkudu leaves have a poortaste and a rather distinctive smell. To add taste, clean and wash the tender mengkudu leaves. Then, cut finely and add to other more tasty foodstuffs.
In Greater Jakarta, mengkudu leaves are used to flavor nasi goreng betawi. They are fried together until the rice absorbs the spices fully so the mengkudu leaves lose their distinctive aroma but retains its value as a source of vitamin A.
Mengkudu leaves are also used to wrap more traditional foods, such as pepes ikan, or added to curries or a gulai kambing comprised of mutton or goat meat. Other preparations include a hot and spicy dressing of grated young coconut or sambal urap wrapped in boiled young mengkudu leaves.
In Central Java, some people eat young mengkudu leaves. They are steamed, cut finely and strewn over steamed white rice for breakfast. To enhance the taste, sambal is served with the rice, along with fried soy bean products such as tofu and tempeh.
The leaves can be harvested daily for that purpose since the mengkudu tree is a perennial and grows anywhere, even in gullies, without any special care.
The mengkudu tree is a large tree and can reach a height of about 10 meters. Its fruit is an ingredient of rujak, a typical fruit salad given zest by chili, brown sugar, salt — and a touch of sourness from the addition of tamarind.
When the mengkudu tree is still young, the aroma of its fruits is sharp. When it is ripens, its aroma may be unbearable for some!
Mengkudu actually grows throughout the archipelago and has several regional names. In Javanese speaking regions, it is called pace or bentis and in the Sundanese highlands it is cangkudu.
Less than 100 grams of finely cut young mengkudu leaves contain more than three times the daily recommended vitamin A allotment for a child below five years of age.
To cook mengkudu leaves and preserve its vitamin A, one has to add some fat, since vitamin A is fat soluble.
Kalupa: clean 1/2 kilogram of glutinous rice. Make a paste of 6 shallots, a slice of 15 grams of ginger, a slice of 15 grams turmeric and 2 teaspoons salt (or to taste). Cook the glutinous rice over a small fire with the spice paste. Add a stalk of lemon grass, a 2–centimeter screwpine leaf, and 400 milliliters of thick coconut milk. Cook until half done. Take two tablespoons of glutinous rice and wrap in 11-12 laikit leaves or banana leaves and steam until done.
