Many meals in Indonesia are incomplete without the addition of kecap manis or sweet soy sauce.

The ubiquitous, colorful bottles of the substance line the many bakso and fried rice carts being pushed along city streets, stand neatly arrayed on restaurant tables and linger amid cooking implements in kitchens throughout the country.

The sauce is a mix of fermented soybeans, various spices and sugar – a protein-rich addition to practically any food.

But, there is more to this uniquely Indonesian condiment than a mere combination of ingredients.

Aside from certain pervasive national brands, kecap manis comes in manifold and distinct varieties depending on the city or town where it is produced.

Andrew Mulianto, a food enthusiast and kecap manis collector, has 130 different brands and counting in his collection.

He said most places in Java have their own, local kecap manis that is uniquely suited to the distinctive foods of the area. “None are alike,” he said.

“Soto Kudus is a good example. My friend opened a soto Kudus restaurant in Jakarta using a recipe from Kudus. But, he added kecap Bango — the national brand — and it didn’t taste the same. Now, he
imports kecap every month from Kudus.”

Beyond the variety of flavors depending on if one is in Bogor or Purworejo or Jember, the history of this inimitable sauce reveals an expanse of interactions that extend beyond the Indonesian archipelago.

The existence of kecap manis in Indonesia can be traced back to the centuries-old journeys of Chinese traders who ventured south to Indonesia’s islands.

The word kecap is even believed to derive from the Amoy term for fish sauce — ketsiap.

The encounters between Chinese newcomers and the local women they married resulted in a unique blending of cultures, and the cuisine that emerged — replete with new ingredients and styles of cooking — was born from the kitchens of those women.

At some point in this hazy history, soybeans and the technique of producing soy sauce arrived. Yet,
what emerged to become the Indonesian condiment of choice little resembles the thin, salty soy sauce of the Chinese.

Kecap manis is generally thick and sweet, ever sweeter the closer one gets to Central Java. Flavors vary depending on the spices added, seasonings like cinnamon, star anise, ginger and cloves.

Andrew said family recipes for kecap manis are closely guarded secrets. And, although he has
found kecap manis in Palembang, Singkawang and Ternate, to name a few, they are all termed “kecap -jawa” as they are all adaptations of kecap from Java, where the sauce originated.

One of the important centers of kecap manis production in Indonesia is in Tangerang, where a Chinese community in the area, the Cina Benteng (Chinese of the Fort) are producing kecap manis near Tangerang’s Old Market like their parents and grandparents did before them.

The Cina Benteng are the descendants of Chinese believed to have fled the Dutch massacre of Batavia’s Chinese population in 1740, and are known for their assimilation after centuries of intermarriage with Sundanese and Betawis together with the preservation of certain Chinese traditions.

Benteng or fort refers to the Dutch forts in Tangerang during the early days of Dutch colonialism.

In an article from a guide to Jakarta restaurants, Kuliner, Andrew wrote that one Cina Benteng kecap factory in Tangerang has been producing kecap since 1882.

“SH kecap, the most famous kecap from Benteng, is [produced] only 200 meters from there. Even Bango kecap, which successfully entered the national arena … the factory is in the area near Tangerang’s Old ‘Benteng’ Market.”

The effect of the dominant presence of Bango and a handful of other large kecap manufacturers on Indonesia’s kecap manis market has not gone unnoticed.

Bango’s expansion has meant that it is in many warungs, restaurants and homes throughout Indonesia.

Ari Budiyanto, a Ph.D. student at Gajah Mada University in Yogyakarta, is currently researching the importance of the local kecap manis industry and the effect of large corporations on Indonesian tastes.

With ABC owned by Heinz and Bango by Unilever, Budi is studying how global capital has impacted Indonesia’s humble local sauces.

Ari said kecap brands like ABC and Bango, with their ability to advertise and expand exponentially, have impacted local kecap producers, many of which are closing down. As people become accustomed to Bango because that is what is readily available, the local flavors of kecap manis are in jeopardy,
he said.

Andrew expressed a similar sentiment, noting that one town in West Java, Majalengka, used to have over 300 different kecap manis producers. Now, there are only a handful left, he said.

Ari is interested in what this shift means for Indonesian tastes, especially in a sphere where, as
Andrew said, “everyone’s favorite kecap is always the one from their hometown.”

With the current decline in the varieties of kecap manis available as a result of a certain type of globalization, it is important to note that the sauce evolved out of an earlier — and alternate — form of the same impulse, with travelers sailing the South China Sea searching for new spices and products in foreign lands, resulting in greater variety rather than less and deeper encounters rather than fewer.

When perusing the many bottles of kecap manis in Andrew’s collection, one is struck by the artistry evident on each label: Elaborately wrought birds, colorful goldfish, a line drawing of a squid, the sketch of a woman poised with the bottle itself. The aesthetic is clearly of days gone by, harkening to a past when local industries operated in places like Bekasi, Pekalongan and Malang and thrived.

Andrew said at first kecap manis was not sold in bottles, instead people would bring their own containers to the market to be filled with the precious substance.

But, production on a larger scale eventually began, leading to bottling and kecap manis’ inimitable labeling.

These labels are a reminder that there is history bound up in this thick, black liquid, albeit a shadowy one like the family recipes for the sauces themselves.

Kecap manis — the requisite condiment — is a substance where sugar and spice, thick and thin, the Indonesian archipelago and China and local and global can no longer be separated, reminding the hungry consumer that this sauce is perhaps a symbol of so much more.

It is, after all, a sauce with history.

— Photos by JP/Deanna Ramsay

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