Lombok Kethok by Indonesia Eats

I have quite a lot of recipes that involve kecap manis i.e. braised sweet soy sauce chicken, kecap manis fried rice; and if it's not the main player, I use it in a lot of marinades or add a bit in my cooking to sweeten most certain dishes. It is a type of sweet soy sauce made out of palm sugar and other ingredients, and has a thick, caramel-like consistency. It is one of my favourite sauces and I'm always on the look for ways to use it. Since it is an Indonesian product, I've invited Pepy from Indonesia Eats to share an Indonesian recipe that uses this sauce. Pepy is an Indonesian living in Canada. She's the author of Indonesia Eats, formerly known as "The Art and Science of Food". She's an amazing cook as well as a great photographer. Do check out her blog for more Indonesian recipes. There, you will learn a lot about new ingredients and interesting dishes. Now, please welcome Pepy to Pig Pig's Corner as she shares her Lombok Kethok recipe with us!

This is my second time to do a guest post for another Malaysian blogger. Thank you to Ann for the opportunity. Unfortunately, I kept postponing the write-up. Sorry Ann for postponing the write-up for so long.

Ann of Pigpigscorner is one of the bloggers who has made me drooled over her food pictures. I'm flattered when she asked me to be her blog's guest post. Then I asked her any suggestion for recipe that I should present. She was saying that she was thinking of Indonesian food with kecap manis. Great! Both of us love this ingredient. As we came from neighbouring countries in South East Asia, we share many same things in food.

I have explained about kecap manis on my blog before, the history of it. The food that I'm going to represent here is a Javanese dish. Many Javanese foods (especially the Central Java) include kecap manis since the people from this area typically like sweeter foods. Lombok Kethok is literally translated as Cabai Potong in Indonesian or Chili Cut in English. For the name is chili cut, surely this dish contains lots of chili. Basically this is a stir fried chilies. FYI, some people wrote the name as lombok ketok (without h in between t and o) which has a different meaning, visible chili.

In this recipe, I used green chilies only and beef. Some people add red chilies (or red cayenne peppers) as well. The beauty of this dish, you can make it straight vegan by adding tempeh or tofu. Or else you can pour the stir fried over your grilled/fried fish.

Ingredients:

• 3 tbsp oil (I use a mixof extra virgin coconut oil and olive oil), for stir frying
• 100 g shallots (about 4 shallots, you may use 8 for the smaller size)
• 12 g garlics (about 3 cloves)
• 250 g beef brisket
• 4 tbsp kecap manis
• 150 g green chilies (about 10 chilies, you can substitute for serano or jalapeno peppers)
• 1-cm long galangal - halved and bruised
• 3 salam (Indonesian bay) leaves
• 1 lemongrass (take the white part only) - halved and bruised
• 100 ml beef broth (this is a yield from boiling the brisket)
• Sea salt

Directions:

• Boil the brisket with water, halved lemongrass, 1/2 cm long galagal, and 1 salam leaf until tender. Leave and set aside 100 ml the beef boiling liquid. Then, cut the beef into slices or cubes.
• In a wok, heat the oil and stir fry shallots and garlic until fragrant.
• Add another halved of lemongrass, 1/2-cm long galangal, 2 salam leaves, green chilies after adding beef slices/cubes, kecap manis and beef broth. Cook until the liquid evaporates. Remove from the heat and serve with warmed cooked rice.

Note: To reduce the heat of chilies, steam them for 5 minutes before adding into stir fried.