One of the things I love about Jakarta is the new foods we’ve been introduced to here. Before we moved here some people had told us that Indonesian food wasn’t that great, but after living here a while I really don’t understand that comment at all. There is just such a variety of foods here! We have only just barely scratched the surface. And more than just exploring Indonesian foods made by Indonesians, while staying home during the pandemic we’ve been exploring the various ingredients we can get here and learning new ways to use old favorites.
One new discovery of the last year are Barlotti beans. These pink speckled beauties are available all over, and are delicious as a mezza served with bread from the French bakery around the corner. We also love all the chilis! Recently I’ve gotten into making my own sambal to have with fried tempeh. It’s sooooo delicious!
Perhaps the best purchase we’ve made in the past year has been our outdoor burner and wok. Adam is becoming an expert at stir fry and fried rice. We’ve been making a version of Gordon Ramsay’s Indonesian fried rice recipe that uses galangal, garlic chives, and these big red not-too-spicy chilis. We also use a ton of locally-produced tofu and tempeh and green beans. So many good things to choose from!
