Perkedel or Meat Dumpling (Indonesian style of Frikadeller)

In Indonesian culture, the term 'appetizer' is commonly not known or practiced. We may eat some type of food right before the meals but this situation is not every day thing and this Perkedel sometimes is eaten as 'appetizer' as well as 'company' to Nasi Kuning (Yellow Rice), kind of rice for a special celebration. We surly adapted this from the Dutch culture, but well-accepted and loved all around Indonesia.
So, here is the Indonesian version of "Frikadeller".


Ingredients:
-¼ lb Yukon Gold potato
-¼ ground beef or ground turkey, cooked and dry of the water excess.
- Celery leaves only, finely chop
- Green Onion 2 medium stems, finely slice
- Salt and pepper to taste
- ½ Tsp ground nutmeg
- Pinch of ground cinnamon
- 1 jumbo egg, well beaten
- bread crumbs

Directions:
- Wash clean the potatoes, peel off the skin and cut into small cubes.
- Some people fry the potato cubes, but I steam them or boil them, until soft (like when you make mash potato).
- Mash the potato with potato masher until it's all soft and mashed.
- Add ground meat/turkey, chopped celery leaves, sliced green onion, salt, pepper, ground nutmeg and ground cinnamon.
- Using two spoons, form balls of size 1.5 to 2 inches dia. Then squeeze flat the frikadel balls.
- Heat the deep fryer to 375 degree.
- Roll the frikadellers on the beaten egg, then immediately roll them on the bread crumb one by one, making sure they're not stuck to one another.
- Make sure same thing on the deep fryer.
- When the frikadeller are golden brownish, remove from the fryer and pat with paper towel to dry the oil excess.

Chicken Spring Rolls

I see that this type of appetizer is pretty famous down here. One of my favorite snacks or for evening tea (again: tea!). For busy mommies, making this is no fun since it has several steps to process, but if you do it in "installment" then it's fun! Healthier (no preservatives, or MSG no high-sodium content *on the ingredients*), more delicious and believe me; it's CHEAPER!

Ingredients:

SKIN - see risoles skin ingredients and process, except not using 'coating'

FILLING

- 1 C Bean sprout

- 1 C Shredded Carrot

- 1 C chopped young bamboo shoots (wash thoroughly before you chop it)

- 1 C finely chopped cooked chicken breast

- 1 Tbsp cooking oil

- 1 tsp chopped garlic and 1 Tbsp sliced red-pearl onion

- 1 Soy sauce

- 1 Tbsp sesame oil

- Sugar (1 tsp) and pepper to taste

Direction:

- For the filling: Heat the a medium size pan on a medium heat. Add the cooking oil and when it's hot enough, saute the garlic and the pearl onion until it brings delicious aroma.

- Add the chicken and toss around for a minute, then add sesame oil.

- Followed by the veggies, add soy sauce, sugar and pepper. Mix well. Cover and cook for about 2 minutes or until veggies are cooked.

- Taste it; adding sugar, pepper or soy-sauce if necessary.

- Remove from heat. Cool it.

Preparing the Spring Rolls:

- Get one skin layer; put it on a flat surface (cutting board or plate).

- Add 1 tbsp of the filling into the middle; fold the skin like an envelope style. Then roll.

- On the tip / end side of the skin, dab a little water (with your finger tip) to 'seal' the skin. Put aside

- When all the skin are used and you still have left over of the filling, you can use it for later making.

- Meanwhile, pour cooking oil into deep-fryer, setting it into 375 degree. When it's hot, put one by one of the spring rolls, allowing space in between them (so they won't get stuck to one another). When the skin is dry and golden colored, remove from the fryer. Dry with paper towel to remove the excess oil.

- Serve with peanut sauce and sambal ulek or hot sauce.

INDONESIAN FRIED RICE (CHINESE RESTAURANT VERSION) & WITH CHILI PICKLES (ACAR MENTAH)

For this particular fried rice, I am going to share the recipe as I guess - perhaps - not many know the way of cooking fried rice à la Chinese Restaurant in Indonesia. I got this little knowledge from a chef who worked for my mother in her Chinese Food Restaurant back in the mid 80's in Jakarta. Some of the ingredients might be a little 'new' - feel free to ask so I can share the pic of the bottles/container for you to search.

Ingredients:

Indonesia Fried Rice Ingredients:

- 3 cups of steamed rice

- 6 to 7 Tiger Shrimp, no shell and no head - deveined and wash, cut into 3 each.

- Fish meatball and Shrimp meatball, sliced into 4 each

- Chicken breast, slice thinly or diced (the smaller the nicer)

- 2 Green onion, chopped

- ¼ Onion, chopped

- 2-3 cloves garlic, chopped

- 2 eggs, beat well

- 2 tablespoon cooking oil (or pork oil if you prefer)

- 1 Teaspoon white pepper

- ½ Teaspoon oyster sauce

- 1 Teaspoon vinegar garlic sauce “Kecap Inggris” (some people replace this with Worchester Sauce - but I insist on using the original ingredients I'm familiar with in Indonesia)

- 1 Teaspoon Red Wine Vinegar (angciu)

- ½ Teaspoon Fish sauce

- 2 Teaspoon sesame oilSweet soy sauce “Kecap Bango”

- 2 tablespoon thick soy sauce (salted soy sauce)

Directions:

- Heat the cooking oil on medium high then add eggs (as you make scrambled eggs).

- When eggs is golden-ish, add chopped garlic and onion.

- Sautee until smells nice and golden brown.

- Add the meat, fish meatballs and shrimps into the wok, adding sesame oil, Fish Sauce, Red Wine Vinegar and vinegar garlic “Kecap Inggris“.

- Then add oyster sauce.

- Lower the heat into medium low and continue cook the fish/meat until well cooked (water usually comes out of the meat, cook until water is almost evaporated).

- Then add the green onion to the wok, followed with the rice.

- Spread white pepper and thick soy sauce into the rice then sweet soy sauce until the rice color turns into dark brown (because of the sweet soy sauce), stir well.

- Remove from the heat and serve with Fresh pickle (Acar Mentah).

For the pickle, it's even easy; just cut into very small cubes (about ½ inch) of 1 mediums size cucumber, 2-3 slices of medium size pineapple, 6 to 8 medium size red pearl onions (taste closest to "bawang merah"), 1 medium size carrot. Add a tablespoon sugar to ½ tablespoon white vinegar (cuka), a little salt (to taste) and 4 ounces water. Taste the dilution and you decide if it needs more sugar or water or a bit more vinegar. To finish it add some Thai chili (or bird-eye chili) as many as you like. Put in a sterilized, sealed jar and it will last for about 3 weeks.

Tempe (Tahu) Orak-Arik (Sauted Tempe and Tofu)

Through browsing on the net and talking to people at the grocery stores, I found out many people in this part of the world (USA) are more and more familiar with Tempeh - one of the most delicious vegetarian food option from Indonesia. But only a few know how to prepare it; in fact perhaps many have known and have been using Tempeh for quite sometime without knowing its origin, therefor not knowing where to ask on how to prepare it, delicious way, the way mostly Indonesian do. So, here is one of so many variation on preparing Tempeh that I'm going to share...

Ingredients:
- 2 packages of Organic Tempeh of "Turtle Island Food Inc.", dice about ¾ X ¾ inch.
- 2-3 Jalapeno pepper, slice thinly
- 8 to 10 Bird eye chili (or Thai chili), slice thinly. You can reduce the amount to reduce the hot flavor
- 4 red pearl onion, ground
- 2 cloves garlic, ground
- 1 ½ inch of fresh Galangal, slice thin or smashed/jerked
- 2 to 3 pieces of Indian Bay leaves (can be found in Viet Wah or Uwajimaya stores in Seattle)
- 1 big and fresh stem of Lemon Grass, smashed
- 3 to 4 tablespoon Kecap Manis (Indonesian sweet soy sauce)
- salt to taste

Direction:
- Prepare all the spices according to the ingredients order, set aside.
- There are two ways on preparing the Tempeh; you can either bake it first until it's cooked enough; for this way then you need to wrap it in aluminum foil to avoid burn or over cooked. Bake at 350 degree for about 15-20 minutes.
- If you choose to saute it; then you enough cooking oil to saute; either with Olive oil or Canola Oil. Saute until all look evenly golden brown. Remove from the heat and set aside.
- Heat about 2 tablespoon of cooking oil on the pot/wok on medium heat.
- Add ground red pearl onion and ground garlic until it produces nice smell, then add Daun Salam, jerked galangal and lemon grass. Toss for about a minute.
- Add jalapeno and Thai chili, toss for a bit then add Tempeh; followed by Kecap Manis and salt.
- Stir and toss for another few minutes until the food is brown (Kecap Manis will add darker brown color to the food) and you will see that the chili and jalapeno is cooked.
- Remove from the heat, remove Daun Salam, Galangal and lemon grass from the food and serve.

RISOLES (INDONESIAN SPRING ROLLS WITH RAGOUT FILLING)

Type of pastry that possibly we adapted from western culture (Dutch) and getting a lot of adaptations and additions to the ingredients of skin and the contents (filling). This one is the "dutchy" style rather than the "lumpia type". Honestly, I think in Indonesia alone there are tons of confusion regarding to which one is "Risol", "Risoles" or "spring rolls" as there is only one particular type of "lumpia" which is commonly known from Semarang only. Anyway - that's why I put the title "with ragout filling", to define the kind. This one is the one which skin is soft instead of 'crispy-fried' one.
Ingredients:
SKIN:
- 2 eggs
- 150 gr flour
- 450 to 500 ml milk
- ½ teaspoon salt (enough to taste)

FILLING (RAGOUT):
- 1 Onion, chopped
- 2 big stems green onion, chopped
- 1 stem celery, chopped small
- 250 gr cooked chopped chicken
- 100 gr carrot (or about 1 big size) chopped
- 100 ml milk or can be replaced with chicken stock (sodium-free is my choice)
- 2 Tablespoon canola/olive oil
- ¾ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1 Tsp flour
- ½ teaspoon ground pepper
- sugar and salt to taste
- water
- 1 egg, beat well
- 100 gr bread crumbs

Directions:
FILLING (RAGOUT):
- Sauté the onions until cooked and brings nice aroma on low-medium heat.
- Add chicken and carrot, stir well and let sit for about 3 minutes.
- Dissolve the flour with a little water/milk, ready to be used.
- Add green onion and celery, milk or stock, salt and pepper, sugar, nutmeg and the dissolved flour into the pan.
- Cook until it forms thick sauce. Remove from the heat.

SKIN:
- Mix well eggs, milk and salt. Then add the flour slowly and gradually.
- Mix well and ready to cook.
- Heat the omelet pan, brush a little cooking oil on the surface.
- Pour about 1 and half tablespoon of the skin-mix to the pan. Spread evenly throughout the pan by tilting the pan around. As soon as the liquid turns solid (transparent look) remove immediately from the pan, into a flat and wide surfaced plate.
- Repeat the same procedure until all mixture is out and separate each spring rolls skin with parchment paper to avoid sticking to one another.

ASSEMBLY:
- Take one skin, add 1 tablespoon (or less depends on how big you want the spring roll is) on to the skin, fold.
- Roll the spring rolls on the well-beaten egg, then into the bread crumbs.
- Heat a frying pan and add cooking oil enough for deep frying the spring rolls.
- Fry the rolls until golden in color and remove, pat with paper towel to absorb the oil.
- Serve with bird-eye chili (Thai chili), hot sauce or peanut sauce!