There's no guide to make this dish, it depends on what you prefer at the point of making and what the available ingredients is. Each time can be different
This time, I cooked the coconut rice with crispy fried wings, tempe orek (stir fry chili tempe), fried crispy silver fish, omelette and sambal petai
What you need:
For the rice:
4cups of rice (the rice cup)
2 lemongrass, lightly bruised
2 pandan leaves, tied into knot
5 salam leaves (Indonesian bay leaves)
2.5tsp salt
enough coconut milk (I mixed about 150ml coconut cream and water)
For the tempe orek:
1 tempe, diced
8 shallots, peeled and halved
5 cloves of garlic, peeled and halved
5 red chilis, deseed and cut
2 red bird's eye chilis, deseed and cut
1 tomato, quartered
5 lime leaves, torn
salt, sugar, dark sweet soy sauce
cooking oil
For sambal petai:
1/2 pack of petai, halved
100g red chilis, deseed and cut
2 red bird eye's chilis, deseed and cut
50g shallots, peeled and halved
salt, sugar
1tbsp juice from sliced large lime
cooking oil
For omelette:
4 eggs
4 pinches of salt
cooking oil
For crispy silver fish:
a pack of silver fish
few tbsp of plain flour
cooking oil
For fried wings:
some chicken wings, cut into 2 (I separate the drumlettes)
crispy fried chicken premix flour
water
cooking oil
Method:
For coconut rice:
- Mix all ingredients into a rice cooker pan and cook just like cooking normal rice
For tempe orek:
- Heat oil in a pan and fry tempe until golden brown, dish out and set aside
- Blend shallot, garlic, chilis and tomato and some cooking oil to a smooth paste
- Sautee the paste until fragrant, adding the lime leaves
- Add salt, sugar, dark sweet soy sauce, mix well. Add a bit of water if it's too dry (I didn't add)
- Dish out and serve
For sambal petai:
- Blend shallot and chilis, cooking oil to a smooth paste
- Sautee the paste until fragrant, add in petai, salt and sugar, cook until petai softened, but not too soft either
- Drizzle lime juice, stir well and off fire
For omelette:
- 4 eggs, lightly beaten mix with 4 pinches of salt
For crispy silver fish:
- Wash silver fish and dry over kitchen towel, toss in plain flour to make a thin coating
- Heat oil (medium fire) and fry until golden brown and crispy
For crispy fried wings:
- I used lazy method this time by using premix flour for crispy chicken, just mix some part of that flour with water until become a thick liquid, dip chicken in, and coat with the remaining flour, deep fry until golden brown and crispy
Besides just assembling them on a plate, I did some Indonesians usually call 'Nasi Kucing', famous in Yogyakarta (Central Java), Indonesia
It's actually just plain rice with some dishes put together in a banana leaf, wrap them and serve, type of dishes is up to preference
Why it's called 'Nasi Kucing' (cat rice), cos usually the serving size is small. They call bigger portion as 'Nasi Singa' (lion rice)
Don't ask me what is the connection between cat and lion with the food serving size🤣
I used my coconut rice though, cos why not LOL, add in tempe orek and sambal petai
Added my yummy crispy silver fish and potato I bought from my talented friend
Placed them in 2 layers of banana leaf, wrapped and sealed with toothpick (please don't judge my wrapping skill, u know how my skill level in beautifying whatever I make 😅)
Somehow with the banana leaf wrap, the dish looks yummier, and the taste too😊
See, it looks much more appetizing using banana leaf, and it does enhance the taste too😋
See what I mean about my wrapping skill😅
If you want to split the work so it's not so tiring, you can cook tempe orek, sambal petai and crispy silver fish a day before
Lots of work, but it really is worth it! I will still make it again and again in the future, probably adding different dishes😀