The “Spice Island”
As with other South-East Asian cuisines, Indonesian dishes weave together sweet, salty, spicy and sour elements in each dish. It is often known as the “Spice Island ” as chillis are found in almost every meal! A common use of chillis is in sambal, a traditional chilli sauce used to accompany a meal. Over 300 varieties of sambal can be found across Indonesia featuring peanuts, shrimp paste or even pineapple. Here is a recipe for the most basic sambal.
From tangy kaffir limes to the sweet-salty kecap Manis (sweet soy sauce), the Indonesian pantry can seem very exotic and a bit unfamiliar. Well-stocked supermarkets and Asian stores provide each of these Indonesian pantry basics:
Kecap Manis (sweet soy sauce) is a syrupy sauce made from soy sauce and coconut sugar. It has a very different flavour to the salty light soy sauce commonly used in Chinese cooking.
It also uses Herbs and Spice like Lemongrass, Limes, Shallots, and coconut sugar made from the buds of coconut tree flowers, adding a flavour and colour similar to that of raw cane sugar. Coconut sugar is used to create that all-important sweet balance against the salty and sour elements in Indonesian cooking.
Coconut milk – is traditionally made by grating fresh coconuts and squeezing the pulp with water. Thankfully good coconut milk can be bought from our local supermarkets for use in curries, rice dishes and drinks.
White Pepper – is the seed of the pepper plant with the dark husky outer layer removed. White pepper has a smoother, subtler flavour compared to black pepper.
Kaffir Lime Leaves – are the ovular shaped leaves of the kaffir lime tree. They are widely used across South-East Asia both in the spice mix and added whole to soups and curries.
ABC Sweet Soy Sauce
A trusted and well-famed household brand in Indonesia, ABC Sweet Soy Sauce is the No. 1 selling Indonesian sweet soy sauce in Australia. Made from quality yellow soybeans and naturally sweetened with sun-dried coconut sugar, it has a distinct and intense combination of sweet, savoury, slightly smoky, malty and toffee-like flavours that is bursting with gurih (in Indonesian) or umami (in Japanese), the ‘fifth taste’ that makes a dish utterly delicious. It emits a fragrant, salty-sweet aroma with deep caramelly and butterscotch undertones, whether in cooking or on its own that is simply irresistible.
The perfect sidekick
ABC Sweet Soy Sauce is the perfect sidekick for any household endeavouring Indonesian dishes but its ability to add an element of smoky-sweet, rich and caramelised depth of flavour to dishes has brought its usage across Southeast Asian cuisines too. After all, Southeast Asian cuisines are all about FLAVOURS! A swirl of ABC Sweet Soy Sauce into Malaysian Spicy Prawn Noodles (Char Kway Teow) will bring out its smoky-sweet, caramelised flavours whilst a glug into Filipino Chicken Adobo creates that sweet savoury glaze. You can use it for stir-fries, soups, barbecue sauces, glazes, marinades or simply on its own as a dressing or dipping sauce. It’s that versatile!
Feeling inspired to try out some Southeast Asian recipes using ABC Sweet Soy Sauce? Check these out!
