Roti Jala

I gather from my nieces that in recent years Malaysia has tried to claim credit from Java for the development of batik.  While I'll definitely side with Indonesia on this issue, I believe Malaysia gets the nod for roti jala.

A crepe-like bread to accompany curries, roti jala is not something I have actually come across in Malaysia or Indonesia.  I first became aware of it several years ago when I bought a copy of Authentic Recipes from Malaysia, which calls them lacy Indian pancakes.  Named for its fishnet resemblance, roti jala is traditionally made with a special funnel with four or five spouts to form the net-like pattern.  I was at a Sundanese restaurant last summer that had several varieties of the funnels as decoration on its walls, suggesting that, at least in the past,  roti jala was enjoyed in Java.  The funnel I use is an inexpensive plastic one that I picked up in Singapore.  One could get much the same effect with more effort using a plastic squeeze bottle.

The recipe here is adapted from Resep Klasik Jajanan Pasar (Classic Market Snack Recipes), which contains 270 recipes for snacks that are often sold in Indonesian markets.  As supermarkets supplant the traditional markets, some of these snacks will undoubtedly disappear. One of the interesting things about the book is that one of the co-authors is a Japanese woman, Tomomi Kimura, who was studying at UGM in Yogya.  She collaborated with a catering company in compiling the recipes.

 

Roti Jala

printable recipe

1/4 cup thick coconut milk
1 3/4 cup water
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
1 egg, beaten
pinch of turmeric (optional)
vegetable oil to grease the pan

In a bowl, whisk together the coconut milk, water, salt, turmeric (if using), and egg.  Gradually whisk in the flour until you have a smooth batter, about the consistency of whipping cream.  Strain the batter through a fine sieve to remove any possible lumps.  This is important if using a roti jala funnel because even the smallest lumps can clog the spouts.

Heat a large non-stick skillet over medium heat.  Pour in a splash of vegetable oil and rub it into the surface with a paper towel.  Ladle some batter into the funnel (if using), holding the funnel about a half-inch to an inch over the skillet.  Move the funnel in circular pattern to form a lacy, fishnet-like crepe.  Cook until the crepe is set and the edges begin to lift and curl from the pan.  Slide onto a clean plate.  Roll or fold into eighths.  Continue until all the batter is finished. 

This makes about 16-20 crepes.  Serve it with curries or other saucy dishes.  I served it here with an excellent Burmese shrimp curry from Naomi Duguid's Burma: Rivers of Flavor.  I'll be posting my take on this dish soon.

Rengginang--Fried Rice Crackers

When I made some sambal serai--lemongrass sambal--a few weeks back, I thought it needed something other than some grilled food to accompany it.  The sambal is great with a meal, but I wanted to be able to enjoy it as a snack.  Rengginang--which are a kind of rice cracker made from sticky rice--make a perfect accompaniment.  They are light and savory, easy to make, and store well.

Rengginang are nothing like the tasteless puffed rice crackers that were popular with dieters many years ago.  Who knows, maybe they are still popular.  Nutritionally, they were equivalent to eating styrofoam. Unfortunately, styrofoam probably tastes better.  Rengginang taste like toasted rice with a hint of garlic and shrimp.  In Indonesia you can also get a sweetened version, but I've always been partial to the savory ones.  While they are usually about 3 inches in diameter, you can find platter-sized ones that are 10 inches or more across. 

Making these is a multi-step process, but it is not difficult.  Soak, steam, mix, steam, dry, and fry.  There's also a little grinding of garlic, but those are the basic steps.  While I like a little sambal with mine, you could really use them with almost any dip, especially salsas.  The dried disks can be stored until you are ready to fry them.  The fried rengginang will keep for at least a week in an airtight container. 

Rengginang--Fried Rice Crackers

printable recipe

1 kilo glutinous rice (approximately 5 cups)
6--8 cloves of garlic, peeled, and pounded to a paste
2 tsp salt
1 tsp terasi (optional)
2 TBS ebi (dried shrimp) soaked in hot water for 10 minutes, drained, and pounded to a paste (optional)
400 ml (1 3/4 cups) water

Soak the rice in water for two to four hours.  Drain, then steam the rice for 15 minutes.  Remove the rice to a large bowl.

In a mortar, pound the garlic, salt, terasi, and ebi (if using) into a smooth paste. Stir this paste into the 400 ml of water.  Pour this into the partially steamed rice and mix well.  Allow the rice to absorb the seasoned water.

After 15 to 20 minutes, when the rice has absorbed the added liquid, return the rice to the steamer and steam for another 30 minutes.  Remove the rice from the steamer and form into disks about 1/4 inch to 1/2 inch thick (.5 cm to 1 cm). 

If you live in a warm, sunny climate, place the disks in a single layer on some sort of rack or porous surface and allow them to dry.  This may take several days.  I hurried the process by putting them into an oven which I turned on to the lowest possible setting.  I meant to turn the oven off after five minutes, but forgot, so I dried them a little faster and at a higher temperature than was ideal.  Still, they fried up fine.  If you have a dehydrator, I would think that would be ideal for drying these.

Once dried, they are ready to be fried.  Heat oil in a wok or other pan to around 385º, maybe a little hotter.  Slide a disk into the hot oil.  It will sink to the bottom, but should rise almost immediately.  Cook in small batches.  Each only takes twenty seconds or less to cook.  The important thing is to have the oil hot enough so that the disks will rise to the surface almost immediately.  If the oil is too cool, the disks will remain on the bottom and you will have a hard, unpleasant cracker.

Gokar Kencana--Ayam Goreng-Bakar--Surabaya

Bantam chickens are a breed of chicken that originated in West Java.  A smaller breed of chicken, they are, according to Wikipedia, a popular breed for suburban homes in large part due to their decreased need for space.  That such a chicken should originate in Java is fitting as it is one of the world's most densely populated islands.  Not quite one third the size of California, Java has almost 4 times the number of people as California, just over 136,000,000.  Good luck getting lost on Java; travel half a mile from any spot and it seems there is another cluster of homes.

While tempe is probably the most readily available source of protein on Java as it is cheap enough for everyone except perhaps the most abject poor, chicken is the most common meat of the Javanese diet.  Ayam goreng, sate ayam, soto ayam, and ayam panggang or ayam bakar can be found on just about any street.  Go hiking to get away from the masses and you'll probably find a hawker who has carried his grill and chicken up the mountainside to cater to hungry hikers.  A cold beer is a rare find, but a piece of freshly cooked chicken is never more than a few minutes from wherever you might be.

In Surabaya this summer, Tjing and I enjoyed a lunch at Gokar Kencana, a family restaurant specializing in fried and grilled  chicken. Anyone familiar with Indonesians fondness for acronyms might suss out the restaurant's focus (ayam GOreng) and (ayam baKAR).  In addition to chicken, the restaurant also serves fried and grilled gurame.

The restaurant is located in a suburb near several of Surabaya's universities, Universitas Airlangga, ITS (Institute Technology Surabaya), and Universitas Muhammadiyah Surabaya.  A spacious patio covered by an arching roof, the restaurant would seem to be a great place to grab a meal before or after classes.  It's much more upscale than the typical warung or rumah makan, but the prices seemed very reasonable at around 1500 rp for a serving of a quarter of a chicken with rice.

The fried chicken is not the KFC style with a crisp crust that absorbs grease, but the Indonesian style of chicken that is first simmered in coconut water with a mix of spices before being fried.  This results in a flavorful piece of chicken that is moist but thoroughly cooked without being greasy.  The grilled chicken includes some honey in the mixture that it is basted with while being grilled.  It is grilled on a custom made grill that uses briquettes rather than the lump charcoal that is more commonly used in Indonesia.  Both the fried chicken and the grilled were extremely tasty, as was the fried gurame.  Although I enjoyed all the dishes, I preferred the grilled chicken and its accompanying sambal.

Tofu and Garlic Chive Turnovers

Garlic chives (kucai) appear in many dumpling recipes.  They are much more fragrant, some might say odorous, than regular chives although their flavor is not overpowering.  They are particularly nice when cooked with shrimp.  In this recipe from Andrea Nguyen's Asian Tofu, they are paired with tofu.  Nguyen's recipe actually calls for the use of seasoned pressed tofu, but I used some fresh tofu from a local tofu maker after first draining the tofu in a colander under weight and then wrapping the tofu in cheesecloth and wringing out every bit of moisture that I could. 

These are substantial, much larger than potstickers.  They are about the size of empanadas.  The dough is easy to make and work with, and it produces a chewy crust.  Although best served warm (and what fried food isn't?), they are not bad at room temperature. 

I am not someone who eats tofu as penitence.  While I would never choose to eat a tofu, lettuce and tomato sandwich instead of a BLT, I  certainly might opt for tahu lontong or tahu telor rather than a BLT.

Tofu and Garlic Chive Turnovers

printable recipe

2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting
1/2 tsp salt
2/3 cup warm water
4 tsp vegetable oil

1 small bundle (they come eight to a package) cellophane noodles, soaked in hot water to soften, drained and chopped
2 blocks of fresh tofu, drained, squeezed in cheesecloth to drain all the moisture you can from it--or 4 to 5 ounces baked pressed tofu, finely chopped (about one cup)
1 1/2 cups garlic chives, chopped
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp white pepper
1/2 tsp sugar
1 TBS cornstarch
1 TBS sesame oil
1 large egg

vegetable oil for panfrying

In a large bowl or  food processor, mix together the flour and salt.  Combine the water and oil and add to the flour mixture.  Process in the food processor until the dough forms a ball and continue for another 30 seconds or so.  If mixing by hand, stir in the liquid until the dough comes together.  You should have a fairly soft, supple dough.

Knead the dough until it is smooth and elastic, maybe about ten minutes if doing the entire process by hand, less time if starting with the food processor.  Once the dough is smooth, wrap well with plastic and let rest at room temperature for at least 15 minutes and up to 2 hours.

While the dough is resting, make the filling.  In a medium-sized bowl mix together the noodles, tofu, and garlic chives.  Mix together the salt, pepper, sugar, and cornstarch in a small bowl.  Stir in the egg and sesame oil into the seasoning mixture and mix well.  Pour this into the tofu mixture and stir until well combined.

Make the turnovers in 2 batches.  Cut the rested dough in half.  Wrap the half you are not using in plastic.  Cut the half you are using into 4 equal size pieces about the size of golf balls.  Flatten each ball into a 3-inch wide disk.  Dust both sides of each disk with flour.  Use a rolling pin to roll the disks out to approximately 6 1/2-inch diameters.

Place approximately 1/4-cup of filling just off center of a rolled out piece of dough.  Bring over half of the circle and press to seal.  Lightly wetting the bottom edge of the circle helps ensure a secure seal.  Make sure the filling is distributed evenly within the closed turnover.

Dust the bottom of each filled turnover with flour and place on a parchment lined baking sheet.  Cover the filled turnovers with a dishtowel while rolling out and filling the others. 

When all have been rolled and filled, heat about 1/4 cup of oil in a large nonstick frying pan over medium to medium-high heat.

When the oil is shimmering, panfry the turnovers for 3 to 4 minutes on each side, frying 2 to 3 turnovers at a time.  Fry until they are brown and crispy on both sides.  Nguyen suggests using tongs to hold the turnovers upright and brown the spines.

Fried Fish Tacos with Young Papaya Slaw

Baja style fish tacos are one of my favorites.  They are not something I normally make as I don't really enjoy frying food all that much.  Especially when cooking for two, frying is something I prefer to leave to the professionals.  As I mentioned in my mini crab taco post, I did, however, agree to take part in the Alaskan sea food promotion and do some posts on fish tacos, so when there was a break in the spring rains and I could fry the fish outdoors, I got to work.  I managed to get my hands on some fresh Alaskan cod fillets, had some Anchor steam beer on hand that made a wonderfully crisp and light batter, put a Mexican slant on a Vietnamese papaya salad,  and I must say, these were some of the best fish tacos I've ever had.  Even better, I discovered the fried fish could be refrigerated/frozen and reheated in the oven and was still as good as you get at most restaurants.

Normally, fish tacos from Ensenada are served with shredded cabbage.  I thought goi du du--Vietnamese papaya salad--would be a good substitute, light and crisp with a sweet, tart dressing of nuoc cham.  I added thinly sliced red onions and used cilantro rather than rau ram, which is traditionally used in the salad.  The assembled taco, with slices of fried fish and avocado along with the papaya salad and a drizzle of mayo mixed with Lingham's Hot Sauce (a sweet chili sauce from Malaysia) was delicious.  This is a dish that will certainly be in my summer rotation.

Fish Tacos with Young Papaya Slaw

Alaskan cod fillets, sliced into pieces four to six inches long and several inches wide
1 12 oz bottle Anchor steam beer (although I'm sure another beer would be fine), chilled
2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
oil for frying

2 cups thinly julienned young papaya
1/2 red onion, peeled and thinly julienned
1/3 cup thinly julienned carrot
1/2 cup cilantro, chopped
nuoc cham

avocado
1/3 cup mayonnaise
2+ TBS (to taste) Lingham's Hot Sauce

flour or corn tortillas

In a large bowl, whisk the beer into the flour, baking powder and salt.  The batter will be fairly thick, similar to pancake batter. 

Pour oil to the depth of several inches in a wok or some other vessel for frying.  Heat the oil to 360º F.  Try to maintain this temperature while frying the fish.

Dip the pieces of fish into the batter.  Carefully lower the battered pieces into the hot oil and fry for several minutes until golden brown.  Remove and drain on paper towels.  (Fried pieces may be cooled and frozen on a parchment lined baking sheet.  Reheat in 375º F oven for eight minutes.  Although not as good as when freshly fried, these were still remarkably good.  The fish used in the photos was reheated in this manner.)

To make the papaya slaw, mix together the papaya, onion, carrot and cilantro and dress with the nuoc cham.

Assemble the tacos by slicing the fried fish into pieces that fit nicely in the tortilla.  Add the papaya slaw and slices of avocado.  Drizzle the spicy mayonnaise mixture on top.  Enjoy with margaritas or beer.

 

As previously mentioned, I have received some gift cards to buy fish and tacos in exchange for doing some posts on fish tacos. 

Sambal Goreng Kering--Crispy Potato Sambal

When most Americans hear the word sambal, they immediately think of a chile sauce such as sambal ulek or sambal bajak.  In Indonesia there are several hundred varieties of sambal, and many of them are not sauces at all.  Instead, they are dishes which complement the "main" dish and rice.  A plate of nasi rames, for example, might contain rice, a piece of chicken, and several sambals, some with coconut milk, others dry like this one.  The result is a meal that is a balance of flavors and textures--sweet and savory, saucy and crispy. 

This particular sambal is very similar to tempeh kering.  The final steps are the same, the only difference is the ingredients.  While tempe is almost as cheap as potatoes in Indonesia, unless you make your own tempe in the US, you'll find this version is much cheaper with potatoes than with tempe.  You could also make this with kettle style potato chips; I'd suggest using the unsalted variety.  If you don't like your food looking back at you, you can eliminate the ikan teri (anchovies).  They provide an interesting crunch and flavor, but your sambal will be no less authentic without them.

Wandering Chopsticks, whose blog was one of the first to make me aware of food blogs and inspired me to start this blog, recently posted about enjoying this sambal at a food court in Southern California. In her post she mentioned she wanted to learn how to make it, so here it is as a small token of my appreciation for her assistance over the years.  While most Indonesians might enjoy this with rice, it is an excellent accompaniment to beer or cocktails.

Sambal Goreng Kering

printable recipe

6--8 potatoes (about 2 lbs.), peeled, julienned or thinly sliced with a mandoline
14 oz peanuts (if raw, fry in oil for five to six minutes until cooked)
60 -- 120 grams ikan teri, dried anchovies
oil for frying

2 TBS  oil
3--4 shallots, about 60 grams, peeled and minced
2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
3 fresh red chilies, stemmed, seeded, and chopped
6--9 TBS gula jawa (palm sugar)
2 TBS tamarind pulp dissolved in 3/4 cup water
3 daun salam (if you can't find them, leave them out)
4 slices fresh (or frozen) galangal
1 tsp salt

In batches, first fry the potatoes several minutes in oil around 300º F.  Drain and let cool.  Heat the oil to 375º and fry the potatoes a second time until crisp, about two minutes more.  It's important that the potatoes be very crisp before you put them in the sauce.  Drain on paper towels.

You also have to fry the ikan teri in oil.  Once you have done so, you will not want to use this oil for anything else.  So, you may want to pour off and reserve some of the oil used to fry the potatoes before frying the anchovies.  These should be fried around 350º F for just a minute or two.  Drain on paper towels.

With a food processor or mortar and pestle, process or grind the shallots, garlic, and chilies to a paste.  Stir fry the paste in the 2 TBS of oil until softened and fragrant.  Add 6 TBS of palm sugar and stir until melted.  Add in the tamarind water, daun salam, galangal, and salt.  Stir and cook over medium heat until this becomes the consistency of a thick syrup.  Taste and adjust sweetness to your preference.  Fold in the potatoes, peanuts and ikan teri until all are covered with and have absorbed the sauce.  If your potatoes were crisp, the sambal should remain crisp in an airtight container for several days. 

Karipap Ayam--Chicken Curry Puffs

My family has long enjoyed curry puffs as a special treat with cocktails and I had originally thought about including these curry puffs in our New Year's celebration.  Fortunately, I sometimes come to my senses.  These curry puffs are very rich and would have been too much with all the other food we had that night.  They are, however, great with cocktails.  These, a cocktail or two, some gỏi gà and you're set for an evening meal.

These spiral curry puffs originated in Malaysia.  They consist of a Chinese flaky pastry dough with an Indian/Malaysian curry filling.  They look impressive with their spiral layers, and they are not particularly difficult to make.  They are fried though, and that is probably the main reason I won't be making them more often.  While they should certainly be able to be baked (the dough is essentially the same as that used for char siu so bang), I don't know if the spiral effect would be as pronounced.
Frying them produced a very flaky, crispy shell that was not oily at all.

 

I made these following the recipe in Andrea Nguyen's Asian Dumplings. The filling was improvised from boneless, skinless chicken thighs, shallots, potatoes, Madras curry powder and curry paste, and a little coconut milk.  You want something that stands up to the richness of the pastry, that is not overpowered by it.  I served them with a cilantro chutney, tinkering slightly with the recipe Nguyen includes in her book.  Her instructions on how to braid the seal of the puffs were very easy to follow, and even I, with short, pudgy fingers, was able to produce an attractive braid.

The recipe for the dough can be found on my post for char siu so bang. The difference is that instead of rolling the final sheet out to a square, you want a rectangle.  You then roll the rectangle jelly-roll fashion into a log.  You slice the log to get circles of dough which you then roll out to somewhere between 1/8" and 1/4" thickness.  Fill each circle with several teaspoons of your filling, fold and seal.  Fry the puffs in oil around 340º to 350º F until golden brown.  (Nguyen recommends starting them off at around 300º for the first two minutes and then raising the temperature to 350º.  I found there wasn't that much difference keeping them in the higher range the whole time.)  Remove and drain on paper towels.  Serve hot or at room temperature.  They will stay crisp for at least a day.

The water dough is on the left, oil dough on the right.

The water dough encasing the oil dough.

Slices from the rolled log of dough ready to be rolled to form the puffs.

The rolled puff with some filling.

The first batch I made I failed to braid the edges as attractively as I would have liked.  I then did what teachers tell their students to do--I read the instructions on how to make a nice braid.  In the second batch the braid was much more professional looking, but I forgot to get a picture.  

I enjoyed the cilantro chutney with the puffs, but they are also excellent without any accompaniment, save perhaps for a gin and tonic, mojito, beer, or even a martini.

Terung Isi Udang--Shrimp Stuffed Baby Eggplant

This is a recipe that is derived from a dim sum favorite.  Dim sum restaurants make a similar dish using long Japanese eggplant sliced on a bias, sandwiching the shrimp stuffing between pieces of eggplant.  It's a dish that is both attractive and delectable.

One of the many benefits of the extensive and diverse population of immigrants in California is the impact it has had on local agriculture and markets.  Each immigrant community brings its own flavors and accents to the communal table.  Thirty-five years ago fish sauce was a rarity, found only in Filipino markets.  In Sacramento, we've seen each wave of immigrants, from Vietnam, Laos, Mexico, El Salvador and Soviet-block countries to Afghanistan and Iraq, open markets to serve the tastes of their communities.  The farmers markets offer produce that was unknown here ten years ago.  One such offering is baby eggplant.

Similar in taste to Japanese eggplant, baby eggplant may be dark purple, light purple, or variegated purple and white.  They range in size from that of a medium egg, sometimes smaller, to several inches in length.  They're great in Thai curries, in salads, or simply grilled.  Stuffing them with a shrimp mousse and frying them makes for a tasty and visually appealing main dish.  With a side of stir-fried greens and some steamed rice, you've got yourself a nice dinner.  

Terung Isi Udang

printable recipe

12 baby eggplants (if unavailable, use Japanese eggplant)
1 pound peeled, deveined shrimp
3 green onions, green part only, finely chopped
1 tsp salt (plus more for salting the eggplant)
1 TBS rice wine
2 1/2 tsp cornstarch

Peanut or vegetable oil for frying

Make 4 cuts in the eggplants from bottom to top, so each eggplant is essentially quartered lengthwise but is still intact near the stem and calyx.  Spread the eggplant open and sprinkle with salt.  Set aside for twenty minutes or so while you prepare the shrimp filling.

Place the shrimp in a food processor and pulse until the shrimp are coarsely chopped.  Add the chopped green onions, salt, rice wine and cornstarch.  Pulse several more times to mix the ingredients thoroughly.

Squeeze and wipe the eggplants with paper towels to remove the excess salt and moisture.  Holding them open, spoon in the shrimp mixture. 

Heat about 2 inches of oil to 350º F in a wok or fryer of your choice.  Fry the eggplant in three batches, frying four at each time and maintaining the temperature.  Each batch should take around four or five minutes.  Remove and drain on paper towels.  You may keep the first batches warm in a low oven (200º F) while cooking the remaining eggplant if you wish.

These may be served with a simple sauce of chicken stock with some ginger, green onions, and tausi (fermented black beans) slightly thickened with cornstarch, but they also taste good with nuoc cham, the sambal of your choice, or just on their own.

Fried Tofu with Flowering Chives

There are two places I like to go when I visit any city.  One is the bookstore, the other the supermarket.  Those two places give a good feel of the city and what the tastes of its population lean towards.  A city that only has a bookstore stocked almost entirely of popular generic fiction and spiritual/financial/home decorating self-help tomes is likely to have a supermarket that has preformed taco shells and rice in the "Ethnic" aisle.  A proper bookstore is a place one can lose oneself in, drifting from find to find, discovering books and authors scattered throughout the aisles, one discovery leading to the next.

While Indonesian bookstores (and really there is only one major chain that operates throughout the country--Gramedia) have limited offerings in the realm of fiction (the government having long suppressed critical voices--although it is now possible to buy copies of Pramoedya Ananta Toer's novels in Indonesia), the cookbook selection is fairly extensive.  A large number of the cookbooks have a slant towards home industry--collections of snacks and variations that can be sold for profit.  The rest of the cookbooks tend to be for the home cooks who wants to expand their familiarity with traditional Indonesian dishes.

As many Indonesian families employ maids to help with cooking and cleaning, a lot of Indonesians grow up not learning how to cook.  A maid from Central Java is going to cook soto ayam different from a maid from West Java.  My father-in-law (who is from East Java) is famous for complaining about the food when he stayed with his son in Bandung, West Java.  Nothing ever tasted right to him. The cookbooks with 30 variations on soto help the beleaguered housewife soothe her family's tastes.

One of the cookbooks I picked up during our stay in Indonesia this summer is 240 Resep Hindangan Sehari-Hari untuk 2 Bulan (240 Recipes of Dishes for Every Day for 2 Months).  The book presents four recipes for each day, one for breakfast and the other three for lunch/dinner, with photos.  It has a number of recipes that look promising and I'll be posting in the coming months.  The coconut milk used in this one gives the fried tofu a lushness that is not usually associated with tofu.  I served it with Lingham's Hot Sauce with Garlic, but a Thai sweet chili sauce would also work, and I think Vietnamese ginger-lime sauce (nuoc mam gung) would be really nice with this.

Fried Tofu with Flowering Chives

(Tahu Goreng Tepung)

1 large block of regular tofu cut into 1-inch cubes

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup rice flour (do not use glutinous rice flour)

1 tsp fine sea salt

1/2 tsp ground white pepper

1 1/4 cup coconut milk

1 large egg, beaten

10 flowering chives, cut into 1-inch lengths

oil for frying

In a large bowl mix the flours, salt, and pepper.  Whisk in the coconut milk and beaten egg until you have a fairly smooth batter.  Stir in the chives and about a third of the tofu cubes.

Heat the oil in a wok.  With a fork or slotted spoon remove pieces of tofu that have been covered in the coconut batter and carefully lower into the hot oil.  Gently fry until all the pieces are a golden brown.  Remove  and drain on paper towels.  Repeat until all of the tofu pieces have been battered and fried.  As with all fried foods, these are best served hot.

Vietnamese Crispy Fried Shrimp with Kumquat Salsa

 

Com dep, pounded glutinous rice flakes, make a wonderful covering for fried shrimp.  Paired with a kumquat salsa, they are a great appetizer.  Using Andrea Nguyen's Crispy Shrimp Coated with Green Rice as a jumping off point, this recipe is an amalgamation of ingredients and techniques.  It takes very little effort or time to pull together.

Andrea Nguyen has a nice description and history of com here.  For people interested in Vietnamese cooking, her cookbook, Into the Vietnamese Kitchen, is one of the best.

Vietnamese Crispy Fried Shrimp with Kumquat Salsa

12 large prawn, peeled (leaving on the tail and last segment) and deveined

1/2 cup of ginger, peeled

4 TBS water

1 tsp salt

2 tsp sugar

5 TBS tapioca starch

1 large egg

1 tsp fish sauce

com dep--green, glutinous rice flakes (available in Vietnamese supermarkets) 

oil for deep frying

6 kumquats, seeded, chopped

2 tsp rice vinegar

1 shallot, peeled and minced

2 tsp fish sauce

2 tsp sugar

1/3 to 1/2 cup Thai sweet chili sauce

In a blender, puree the ginger and water.  Press through a sieve, reserving liquid. Mix in the salt and 2 teaspoons sugar.  Marinate the shrimp in this mixture for half an hour or so.  Drain the shrimp.

Mix the tapioca starch, egg and fish sauce in bowl until smooth.  Place a quarter cup or so of the rice flakes on a plate.  Heat  1 to 2 inches of oil in a wok or pan to 350º F.

Dip shrimp into the egg batter and let excess batter drip off before rolling gently in the rice flakes.  Fry several shrimp at a time for a minute or two in the oil, flipping them so both sides are evenly cooked.  Drain on paper towels.  The cooking causes some of the flakes to brown slightly, but most of the covering will remain green.

To make the salsa (which is really more of a kumquat nuoc cham), stir together the fish sauce, vinegar and sugar until the sugar is dissolved.  Mix in the other ingredients.

Serve the fried shrimp with the kumquat salsa as an appetizer, or along with rice and vegetables for dinner.

I am submitting this to Delicious Vietnam #9, a monthly blogging event celebrating Vietnamese food.  Founded by Anh of A Food Lover's Journey, and Kim and Hong of Ravenous Couple, Delicious Vietnam welcomes submissions from bloggers around the world.  To learn how you might participate, click here.  The roundup for Delicious Vietnam #9 will be hosted by Pepy of Indonesia-Eats.  Check out the roundup to find the details on who will be hosting Delicious Vietnam #10.

Chinese Fried Turnip Cake--Lor Bok Goh Dzin

I and the rest of my family have to credit my wife for introducing us to the pleasure of lor bok goh dzin.  Although we had long been fond of going out for dim sum, these had never appealed to us, primarily because of their English name.  Turnips just don't have much appeal, at least in my family.  How these acquired their English name is a mystery, for they contain no turnip.  Their primary ingredient is daikon, a large, mild white radish.

The best lor bok goh are almost pudding-like in their consistency, firm enough to cut into rectangles to be fried, but still soft and gelatinous.  When fried, there is the contrast between the crisp crust and the silky interior.  We prefer to eat these with a generous amount of crushed chili in oil and soy sauce.

 

Erring on the side of caution, I steamed these a little too long, which produced a firm cake that was easy to slice and fry, but lacked the suppleness I was aiming for.  Next time I will cut back on the steaming time, removing the pan just when the edges of the cake begin to pull away from the sides.
The recipe is adapted from Eileen Yin-Fei Lo's The Dim Sum Book.

Lor Bok Goh Dzin

21 ounces (about four cups) fresh daikon radish, washed, peeled, and coarsely grated
25 ounced cold water
1 quarter-inch-thick slice of ginger, peeled and mashed
1 clove of garlic, peeled
2 TBS Shaoxing rice wine
pinch of white pepper

1 pound of rice flour (not glutinous rice flour)
2 cups cold water
2 TBS dried shrimp, soaked in water to soften, then diced
2/3 cup Chinese bacon (lop yuk), diced
3 dried shitakes, soaked to soften and diced
1/4 tsp white pepper
1 TBS salt
1/2 cup liquefied fork fat (or vegetable oil)

2 TBS dry-roasted sesame seeds
4 green onions, finely sliced
1 TBS cilantro, finely minced

Placed the grated radish, ginger, garlic, wine, pepper and water in a large pot.  Cover and bring to a boil over high heat.  When it comes to a boil, lower the heat and simmer, partially covered, for 20 minutes.  Remove from heat and allow to cool.  Discard garlic and ginger, drain.

Mix together flour and water in large mixing bowl.  Add shrimp, bacon, mushrooms, pepper, salt, and oil.  Stir to mix well.  Add the drained daikon and stir until everything is thoroughly mixed.

Pour into a greased 9-inch-square cake pan and steam until cooked, about 1 hour.  I would recommend steaming until the cake begins to pull away from the sides of the pan but the center is still slightly jiggly.

The cake can be served warm, cooled slightly after removing from the steamer and then sliced.  Sprinkle with the sesame seeds, green onions and cilantro.

To fry, refrigerate the cooled cake overnight and slice into 1/3-inch-thick rectangular slices.  Heat a pan over medium-high heat and add a tablespoon of peanut oil.  When it is almost smoking, plan fry the slices for about 3 minutes on one side until browned, then turn and brown on the other side.  Sprinkle with the garnishes and serve hot.

Soft-Shell Crab--Cua Lot Chien Bot

As a child, I had heard of soft-shell crabs from my parents, who were both originally from the East Coast.  Although I don't remember being fond of any kind of seafood before our family lived in Malaysia for a year in 1966, the concept of a soft-shell crab always fascinated me.  It seemed so brutal and perverse to wait until the animal was at its most vulnerable stage to harvest and devour it.  That there was this small window of time when the crab's exoskeleton was defenseless against a predator's appetite always held some allure for me.  This was not an everyday dish.  This was special.

Still, for all their appeal, I didn't get the chance to try soft-shell crab until 1994 while living in Saigon.  By the time the Gastronomer discovered the crab shack in 2008, prices had risen considerably from what they were in 1994, but the food there is still worth every dong.  I believe the cha gio were 5,000 dong (about 35 cents) when we first ate there and the soft-shell crabs were similarly priced.  I know the beer bill was always higher than the food bill when it came time to pay. And beer was cheap.

When I was picking up some ahi from Sunh Fish on Broadway, I noticed they had some boxes of soft-shelled crabs in their freezer.  The crabs come five to the box,  have already been cleaned,  and are ready to cook once they thaw.  Although they couldn't really compare to the ones in Saigon, at a little under $2 a piece they were worth a try.

I was tempted to make a sort of soft-shell crab po' boy sandwich, or with a tamarind sauce, but in the end decided to go with a crispy fried version served on top of a meatless yum woon sen containing several types of mushrooms.   Although I was pleased with how the crabs tasted, I think fried food never tastes as good when you are the one doing the frying.  More importantly, they were a hit with Tjing, who has a particularly unpleasant memory associated with Quan 94 in Saigon.

 

The recipe is adapted from Authentic Recipes from Vietnam.  The use of soy sauce results in a dark batter; replacing the soy sauce with a tablespoon of fish sauce would probably produce a lighter, more attractive batter.

Crispy Soft-shell Crab

1 tsp sesame oil

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 tsp grated ginger

2 tsp gound white pepper

1 tsp salt

1 cup all-purpose wheat flour

1 cup rice flour

1 cup water

1 TBS rice vinegar

2 TBS soy sauce (see note above)

1 tsp oil

1 tsp sugar

soft-shell crabs

flour for dusting the crabs

oil for frying

Mix the first five ingredients together and marinate the crabs in this mixture for 30--45 minutes.

Mix the ingredients for the batter, aiming for a thin, pancake-like batter.  

Dust the marinated crabs in flour, then dip in batter before frying in oil at 360º--375º.  The crabs will have a lot of moisture and may spatter while frying, so be careful.  I found I could comfortably fry two crabs at a time in a wok.  

Serve with Thai sweet chili sauce, nuoc cham, or tamarind-ginger dipping sauce.

Fried Tofu with Shrimp Paste Sambal--Tahu Goreng Sambal Petis

I came across Kecap Manis Cap Nonya while staying at a small hotel just outside of my wife's hometown of Kediri.  We were there because her brothers and their families had come from Jakarta and Bandung to celebrate my father-in-law's 80th birthday.  Needing a place to sleep, we all headed up the hill towards Pohsarang, a place of pilgrimage for Catholics in Java.  On weekends buses from across Java fill the narrow roads and the hotel fills up, but it is quiet during the middle of the week.  In fact, there were no other guests the two nights we stayed there.

In the morning the hotel cooked up some delicious tahu goreng with sambal petis.  This is a simple dish that relies on good ingredients.  Cap Nonya provided a nice smoky sweetness to balance the funk of the petis (a fermented shrimp paste used in a number of East Javanese dishes). 

Tahu Goreng Sambal Petis

Five blocks of fresh tofu (sold in plastic bags with water in Asian markets)
Oil for deep frying the tofu

1 TBS petis, or more, to taste (don't substitute Vietnamese mam ruoc--which is more pungent)
1 clove of garlic, crushed to a paste in a mortar
chilies, stemmed, seeded, to taste, I recommend starting with one or two, ground to a paste with the garlic in the mortar
1 to 2 TBS kecap manis
2 TBS water
1 TBS natural, crunchy peanut butter (optional--make with and without to give your guests a choice)

Quarter the blocks of tofu into cubes or triangles.  Fry in hot oil until crisp and golden.

Mix all of the sambal ingredients in a mortar.  Serve with the warm tofu.

Vegetarians can omit the petis and substitute the juice of half a lime.  You might also experiment by substituting a teaspoon or so of fermented tofu.