JULY/AUGUST 2001ISSUE NO. 74 ELECTRONIC EDITION

CookingSimple

Sussing out SatayThe satay can be made of pork or chicken, but turtle remains the favourite of the Balinese of Den Pasar. —M. Covarrubias, ISLAND OF BALI (1937). The Malays crouch over their portable stoves, fanning the embers below sticks of spicy broiled goat known as satay. —P. Anderson, SNAKE WINE (1955). One of the most famous Malay dishes is satay which is tenderized and spiced mutton, chicken, or beef barbecued over charcoal and dipped in a chilli-hot peanut sauce. They are served skewered. —Singapore Tourist Promotion Board, CARRY SINGAPORE IN YOUR POCKET (1971).

EVERY SPRING, when I freed our barbecue grill from its protective wrappings and ended its hibernation, I used to vow that this

would be the year that I’d begin grilling satay. But when autumn rolled in and I stowed it away again, there would be no charred remnants of spicy chicken or beef drippings to feed its winter sleep. The reason, although it took me a long time to grasp this, was my love-hate relationship with this particular grill food. More accurately, I was always stopped short by the invisible barrier that deflects my attention from dishes that I really like but that always seem to be doled out with a grudging hand. The Chinese claim satay as their own, on the strength of the fact that in Cantonese the words “sah tay” mean “three pieces.” Actually, food historians believe that satay was introduced to Southeast Asia by Arab traders, but it surely could be argued that Chinese restaurateurs use this semantic false friend as justification for rigorous portion control—sometimes to their own detriment. A few decades back, when I lived near Boston, a satay place appeared one day in that

CONTENTS[TOUCH ANY TITLE TO BE TAKEN TO THAT PAGE]

Sussing Out Satay.................. 1A search for the soul of satay leads to a voyage of discovery to the places where the art of grilling meat is pared right to the bone.

Hanging Out at the No-Name... 11Greg tells how he was called by a higher power to bring manna to the masses.

Table Talk.................................. 13W. Brian Overcast fondly recalls a cool operator in his grade-school cafeteria.

George Orick reports on satay today in Jakarta. We go deep into the vault for reviews of THE COOKING OF SINGAPORE and ASIAN GRILLS.

RECIPE INDEX

BEEF SATAY................................... 7

RATAMI’S LAMB SATAY ...................... 8

PORK SATAY................................... 8

CHICKEN SATAY .............................. 8

SATAY PENTUL ................................ 9

POTATO SATAY................................ 9

SATAY DIPPING SAUCES ...................10PEANUT SAUCE #1, PEANUT SAUCE #2, PEANUT SAUCE #3, PEANUT SAUCE #4, SAMBAL KECAP, TANGY LIME SAUCE

THAI CUCUMBER SALAD ...................16

WALDO’S SECRET ONION SAUCE ........17

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DITIONcity’s Chinatown. The satays were very good, but an order consisted of four skewers, each with a single flattened strip of meat, and cost as much as the far more generous entrées served at any of the nearby Chinese restaurants. The second and last time I was there, gnawing away at my miniscule repast, the proprietor was counting the day’s take with an impassive expression that somehow managed to fill the small dining room with gloom. I wanted to go over, seize him by both shoulders, and say with emphatic firmness: “Try doubling the portion size.” I didn’t, of course, and I found the place closed for good the next time I came by. Surely, this aura of stinginess was what prevented me from plunging wholeheartedly into satay making—as distinct, that is, from satay eating. I never had any trouble devouring it, but preparing it seemed altogether too complicated a business for what was essentially a snack. Over the years, I had accumulated a pile of recipes for the dish, but none of them dealt with the problem of how to transform this finger food into a satisfying meal. So, this spring, I lay my hand on my grill and swore I would sidestep the recipe pile and head off to the library to learn all I could about satay as it is made and eaten on its own turf. After all, what good were the recipes to me if I didn’t ever seem to want to make them? I was missing something important...and I hoped that immersion in some amateur culinary ethnography would provide a clue as to what that something was. Happily, I found a raft of books on Southeast Asia, some dating back to the beginning of the last century, and bits of prose here and there—sometimes a phrase, sometimes a paragraph—helped me find my way to the heart of traditional satay. Of course, what this also meant is that what I discovered was, except in the most isolated parts of Southeast Asia, completely out of date. That part of the world is in a state of rapid change, which has profoundly affected even the lowly outdoor seller of snacks. Singapore, once famous for its satay street vendors, has, for reasons of sanitation. relocated almost all of them to indoor food courts, thus relegating the vitality and variety of that world to the realm of memory. Reader George Orick reports that satay vendors in Jakarta no longer bother to marinate their

meat now that they can buy it fresh several times a day. However, perhaps the most telling signs of change are there in full view in our local Asian market: sagging shelves loaded with bottled Southeast Asian dips and mari-nades—even cellophane-wrapped blocks of ground peanuts seasoned with chile, garlic, onions, and spices for making instant peanut sauce. And these products were all strictly homegrown, quite distinct from the Bali-Hai-type stuff you find in American supermarkets. This means that my quest to touch the soul of satay has inevitably been a quixotic one. But doesn’t that adjective characterize the experience of all travelers, not only those who wander abroad through the dusty pages of old books? Without the romance of the different, why would anyone ever leave home at all?

When the sun goes down, tiny outdoor satay stalls open for business along busy thorough-fares, their flickering candles and gas lanterns inviting passers-by to sit down for an inexpensive treat. In any town the itinerant satay vendor, ringing his bell and shuffling through the streets with all his ingredients and his charcoal brazier slung from the ends of a pole across his shoulder, seems to stay up long after everyone else has gone to sleep. Throughout most of this pre– dominantly Muslim area, beef, goat, and chicken are the most common satay meats, but carabao [water buffalo] satay appears in Makasar, shrimp satay turns up wherever shellfish are available, and in Chinese areas one can find satay made from tender chunks of pork. The Balinese produce a satay from a paste of chopped-up turtle meat mixed with coconut milk and spices. The mixture, kneaded onto the end of a stick for grilling, comes off the coals as one of the most heavenly concoctions I have ever tasted.

—Rafael Steinberg, PACIFIC AND SOUTHEAST ASIAN COOKING (1970)

SATAY* IN ONE FORM OR ANOTHER has made itself at home in almost every country in Southeast Asia. And while the number of

different foodstuffs grilled on skewers there is nearly beyond count, no one would have a problem recognizing them as satay. Indeed, if simple cooking can be loosely defined as those dishes whose form is almost entirely shaped by function, satay is about as good an example as one could hope to find. It is a dish whose rigorous simplicity has been honed by the

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persistent ingenuity of appetite overcoming the immovable solidity of poverty. This is all the more impressive because it is usually made solely of a very luxurious ingredient: richly seasoned meat. How has this happened? Traveler after traveler to the region, if they mention satay at all, begin by describing its intoxicating aroma, one that can seek out and seize hold of your attention through all the cacophony of the Southeast Asian market street. The aroma of satay is essentially the same as that which drives the neighbors to distraction when the steaks hit the barbecue grill: meat juices vaporizing on glowing charcoal...but here this knee-jerk response is amplified by the additional nuances of caramelized palm sugar, soy sauce or some cousin of it, citrus, and spice. It’s hard to imagine a better way to get customers. You don’t need signage or even a strong pair of lungs to cry out the enticing particulars of your vendibles. You just squat there on the roadside and let the cooking smells reel in your clientele. On a busy street, you might have two dozen skewers on the grill. In places where business is slower, you might have just one. When a buyer stops, you pass him the first skewer. While he nibbles at that you put another on the flames, and so it goes until he is full and you reckon the bill by counting up the used skewers. There are no plates or bowls or eating utensils to deal with; the cooking implement is the eating implement and, after that, the bill...perhaps even the complimentary toothpick. Best of all, these skewers are made from the ribs of palm leaves that have been gathered for free by your children. Obviously, grilling small bits and pieces of meat on a skewer is an ideal way to get maximum mileage from any kind of carcass. As an anonymous satay seller—the account of whose typical day appeared last year in The Jakarta Post (15 October 2000)—explains:

At 8 a.m. I go to Tanah Abang market (in Central Jakarta) to buy three or four live young chickens and other needs. They cost me about Rp 200,000 ($17.45). I clean the chickens and make the satay myself. Almost all of the chicken parts can be used for the satay; I can even sell the heads and bones for Rp 700 (six cents) per chicken to a mie ayam (chicken noodle) vendor who will chop them up and cook them.

You could devote an entire cookbook to satay making and not be wanting for recipes to fill its pages—in Indonesia alone, one guide book lists almost two dozen, described as so.satay ampla~chicken gizzards grilled on skewers. satay asam~manis kambing chunks of lamb or goat in sweet-sour sauce grilled on thin bamboo skewers. satay ayam~Pasuruan chicken grilled on skewers and served with peanut sauce. It is a specialty of the city of Pasuruan in East Java. satay ayam tusuk~grilled balls of minced chicken on skewers. satay babi kecil~small cubes of grilled pork served on toothpicks. satay Bali asam~a piquant paste of minced, spiced pork rolled around thick skewers and grilled. satay Bali empol~a paste of chopped meat, spices and coconut milk rolled around thick skewers and grilled. satay Bali kebelet~a paste of liver covered by a paste of chopped meat, spices and coconut milk, rolled around thick skewers and grilled. satay Bali limbat (lembat)~a paste of chopped meat, spices and grated coconut rolled around thick skewers and grilled. satay buntel~balls of minced lamb and onion wrapped in caul and grilled on skewers; a specialty of Surakarta, Central Java. satay empal ikan~fish balls grilled on skewers. satay ikan belida~balls of minced knifefish and sago flour steamed in a banana leaf, not skewered and grilled as the name satay suggests. satay kalong~pieces of beef pounded very flat and grilled on skewers. They are flavored with a sweet spice mixture and served with a special sauce. This specialty of Cirebon, West Java, is sold by vendors who begin selling in the early evening when the fruit bats (kalong) also make their appearance. satay kambing~skewered and grilled lamb. satay kelinci~rabbit meat grilled on skewers; it is a specialty of Tawangmangu, Central Java. satay kerang~clams grilled on bamboo skewers; it is a specialty of Surabaya, East Java. satay lilit ayam~spices and chicken meat pounded to a paste and wrapped around thick skewers and grilled. satay Manado~small pieces of marinated pork grilled on skewers; it is a specialty of Manado, North Sulawesi. satay manis~small pieces of meat marinated in sauce containing palm sugar and sweet soy sauce, then grilled on skewers. satay Padang~pieces of marinated offal grilled on skewers, a specialty of West Sumatra. satay panas~an assortment of foods hot from the grill. satay pentul balls of minced pork wrapped like drumsticks around skewers and grilled; this Balinese specialty is also called satay pusut. satay penyu~pieces of turtle meat grilled on skewers. This Balinese specialty is not as prevalent today because turtles are protected. satay udang~shrimp grilled on skewers.

SOURCE~EAT SMART IN INDONESIA, Joan and David Peterson (Ginkgo Press, 1997).

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DITION Even so, since he charges customers only about twenty-five cents per skewer, he can afford to leave no part of what he does to chance. The same marinade that provides the satay with its depth of flavor also keeps the meat from spoiling as it sits all day in a large recycled tin container by the vendor’s side. The marinade tenderizes the meat, which—in days past, at least—came from tough, cheap cuts of goat, water buffalo, and stringy old fowl, while the homemade peanut sauce that accompanies the dish—made by the vendor’s wife—provides the unctuous savor that, in more expensive meat, is supplied by the animal’s own fat. In sum, satay as made on its own turf is a dish with no rough edges, and it was a lack of such carefully considered fine tuning that made my own satay making so frustrating. Gradually, as I pored over pictures in various travel books and read such accounts of satay making as I could find, I began to feel the peculiar satisfaction that comes when problems at last come into focus and solutions start to slot themselves into place.

THE SATAY GRILL. The vernacular satay grill is simplicity itself—a narrow, rectangular, rolled-steel box with a grill rack on top whose bars run the length of the unit. Unlike home grills, this one has no air vent at the bottom. Consequently, between orders, only a minimal amount of oxygen reaches the coals—just enough to keep them smoldering. The only barbecue grill available in this country that even approaches this design is our old friend the Japanese hibachi, which, with its wobbly grills and miniscule cooking area, has confounded American outdoor cooks since its introduction back in the early sixties. However, most American-made units pose equally serious problems for satay grilling. Kettle grills, with

their curved sides, make it difficult to get the meat close to the charcoal. Gas grills don’t generate enough heat to caramelize the exterior without at the same time cooking the interior to the consistency of beef jerky. Fortunately, there was an obvious solution to all this. I headed down to the local discount warehouse and bought the cheapest grill in the store. Made in China, it was no more than a metal box with four little legs screwed onto the base, a grill rack, and a cover. True, the sides sloped down to the bottom, but they were so short that it was easy to heap the charcoal up them. The grill was flimsy, even junky—but for satay making, it felt just right.

THE skewers. One of the things you notice immediately in photographs of satay vendors is that the skewers they use are substantially longer than the ubiquitous 8-inch bamboo ones sold at most supermarkets. But because the latter were the very things on which I had eaten satay in Chinese restaurants, I had assumed that they were what one wanted for the job. And they are, if the job is that of serving up appetizers—or perhaps even cooking them, when that means searing them on the surface of a restaurant grill. This is why the meat on such skewers is often flat as a board; the chef has only to give it a quick sear on both sides and send it out. But over charcoal, the length of the harder-to-find 10-inch skewers (or the even harder-to-find 12-inch ones) gives you not only a necessary safety margin but leverage, making the satays easier to manipulate as they cook. The next decision is between metal and bamboo. Metal skewers heat up, cooking the interior of the meat and providing another threat to the fingers. I also like the way the slight texture of the wood helps keeps the skewered meat from slipping loose, which is not always true of metal skewers, even when they are flat. The main problem with bamboo skewers, of course, is that they burn. It doesn’t much matter if the tips flare up, but even insignificant charring at the butt end can cause the skewer to give way and send the meat tumbling onto the grill. To prevent this, cookbooks advise you to presoak the skewers for anything from half an hour to half a day. However, even if it works (which I doubt), I have come across no evidence

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that satay sellers do this. They have an even simpler secret: they don’t expose the skewers to the flame. Satay grills have a metal lip on both their front and back edges. This protects the exposed wood of the skewer at both ends, while fully exposing the meat to the flame. (See the top of the restaurant satay grill shown below.) Such a lip is easy enough to improvise on your own grill with a piece of scrap metal or a folded strip of aluminum foil.

THE fuel and the fan. Satays are traditionally cooked over the intense heat provided by the vigorous use of a palm-leaf fan to transform the smoldering charcoal into a fiercely glowing mass—not an easy job if you have to do it all day long. As the Jakarta satay vendor explains:

I found that dealing with this job was quite difficult in the beginning, especially when I had to manually fan the satay during the cooking process, which made my arms stiff and sore. I know that other vendors use electric fans instead, but I don’t do this because it affects the taste.

Chunks of real charcoal are ideal for cooking satay because they generate so much heat, especially when you fan them to keep them constantly aglow. The last time I saw a palm fan was when I bicycled past a funeral procession in New Orleans about twenty years ago; you may still be able to buy them today, but where? In any case, I’m not sure they’re such a good idea with an ordinary grill—their indiscriminate blast will send charcoal ashes flying everywhere. The best non-electric tool for this is probably something along the lines of a flour scoop or a garden trowel—anything that will generate a powerful but focused gust of air. Or you can do as I do and just lean over and blow. Finally, it’s worth noting that a very enjoyable way to make satays is to put the grill on the picnic table and let everyone manage their own, putting a new skewer on the fire each time one is taken off.

THE Sauce and the starch. Many see the dipping sauces as the whole point of satay—espe-cially peanut dipping sauce, which often combines the opulent richness of both peanut paste and coconut milk with the palate-tingling scorch of Southeast Asian chiles. However, if the meat is tender, flavorful, and juicy, such a sauce can easily take away as much pleasure as it gives, since it drowns out the taste of the flame-seared marinade, and sometimes even that of the meat. In fact, I was seriously tempted to dispense with it altogether, the way I have with sauce when eating my own barbecue. Fortunately, before I put peanut sauce on permanent hold, I discovered two important things. The first is simply that a little of it goes a long way—the trick is to dip, not dunk, each piece of meat and to vary the effect by alternating between that sauce and a different, more purely astringent one, such as the tangy lime sauce given on page 16. The second was bound up in a larger problem—what starch to have with this meal. This, it turns out, was the missing part of the satay equation, the secret to transforming a snack food into a meal. Barbecue has its side of cornbread; fajitas have their flour tortillas; jerked chicken has its grilled breadfruit slices; and satay has...what? If you only know it, as I did, in appetizer mode, the question will bring you up short. But in Southeast Asia, satays are commonly sold with ketupat—a cake of tightly compressed cold boiled rice. R. Talbot-Kelly, in BURMA PAINTED AND DESCRIBED (1905), gives a nice description of how this is made, at least at the outdoor market in the Burmese town of Taungdwingyi:

[I]n all corners of the bazaar are stalls for the sale of food. In one sausages and rice cakes simmer over a little charcoal fire, while from the next is wafted the delicious smell of sandalwood. There, roast meat, cut into small strips, is spitted on bamboo skewers, which are stuck all round the rim of a basket containing what appear to be candles of unusual size. These, however, prove to be “sticks” of rice prepared in a curious way. A special kind of rice called “kowknyin” is placed in a [length of] green bamboo, together with a little water, the bamboo then being closed with a plug and put into the fire; by the time the bamboo is dried and commences to burn the rice is cooked. The bamboo is then split, and the rice, beautifully cooked, is extracted.

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DITION Today, in rural Indonesia, roadside vendors still sell ketupat wrapped in square, woven coconut-leaf bundles. They must be a neat sight. Several Southeast Asian cookbooks tell you how to make the dish more simply—you put fully cooked short-grain rice into a greased pan, press it flat, cover it with banana leaves (if you have any) or foil (if you don’t), let it cool, then serve it cut into brownie-size squares. This is an especially appealing idea if the satay is to be part of a picnic. Skewer the meat, snipping off the pointed ends with kitchen shears, and seal these skewers and the marinade in a Ziploc plastic bag. Put that and your rice squares in the cooler and you’re ready to travel. Even so, there are other alternatives, including toast—an unlikely suggestion put forth by Nancie McDermott in REAL VEGETARIAN THAI. Yes, our old breakfast pal has been enthusiastically embraced by the Thai for just this purpose.

You will find this West-meets-East touch in upcountry Thailand, where toast is offered alongside meat kebabs as a means of soaking up every last bit of scrumptious sauce.

However, Matt and I prefer to cook up either a batch of boiled rice or a package of rice-stick noodles and portion one or the other into shallow soup bowls, serving the grilled satays directly on top. By the time you’ve finished eating those, the rice or rice noodles will be delicately flavored by the smoky juices of the meat. Stir it up with the remaining peanut sauce, the last of the cucumber wedges, and any other leftover vegetables. There you have it: two of my favorite Asian snacks—a brace of satay, a particularly delicious version of rice or noodles tossed with peanut sauce...and a made meal.

Ingredient GlossaryDark Soy Sauce. A thicker, somewhat sweeter soy sauce with a distinct taste of molasses. (When plain “soy sauce” is specified, use the familiar thinner version, such as Kikkoman.) Found in Asian groceries.Fish sauce. A potent seasoning made from pressing the juices from salted anchovies. Not easy to take straight, but a surprisingly subtle flavor enhancer when used in cooking. Available in any Asian grocery store and many supermarkets.Kecap manis (KET-CHAP MAH-NIECE). A condiment made from fermented soy beans and palm sugar. In its native Indonesia, it is used with the same abandon that we use...well, ketchup. The taste starts out like very salty blackstrap molasses and then moves into a riff of complex and unplaceable tangy notes. If you can’t find it, mix palm sugar (see below) with dark soy sauce until the salt is balanced by the sweet.Lemongrass. A tall, narrow grass with slender, razor-edged leaves. Its stalk has a distinct taste of lemon, without that fruit’s acidity. Peel off the leaves down to the pale and tightly coiled stalk. Cut away a 3-inch piece of this about an inch above the root end and discard the rest. This piece of stalk is very fibrous—if it is to be eaten, it must be minced or thinly sliced. When using it as a flavoring agent, though, simply flatten it a bit with the side of a knife and add it whole to the pot. Lemongrass can be found in supermarkets these days, but it is much cheaper in Asian groceries. Substitute strips of lemon peel. Palm sugar. A coarse-textured sugar made from the sap of the Palmyra palm, usually sold as a solid mass in a package or jar, from which one hacks chunks and grinds them into a moist powder. It is not as sweet as cane sugar and possesses a slightly sour tang and sappy taste. Substitute raw cane sugar—especially one made from evaporated sugar cane juice.Papaya Extract. I began my research wondering if satay sellers use papaya—which contains papain, an enzyme with meat-tenderizing properties—as a secret ingredient in their marinades. I failed to uncover a single mention of it. But by then I had already bought some tablets of pure papain at our local natural food store (sold as a digestive aid), so I gave it a try anyway—crushing two 7-mg. tablets and adding the powder to marinades for both lamb and beef. Potent stuff: overnight, it turned beef short rib into something like tenderloin. The lamb was noticeably more tender after an hour. Purely optional, but worth exploring.Sambal Oelek. A fiery, bright-red sauce made from ground chiles (including seeds), vinegar, and salt. Look for Huy Fong Foods Rooster brand with its gold foil label in a plastic 8-ounce jar with a green lid. When we buy a new jar, Matt removes the seeds by pushing the sauce through a sieve, which makes it much easier to use. Substitute fresh hot chiles, seeded and minced, or ground hot chile powder to taste. Tamarind Paste. This is made by drying and compacting the pulpy contents of the pods of the tamarind tree. Squares of this, looking like thick slabs of fruit leather and colored a deep rusty red, can be found in any Asian grocery. The plum-like flavor is mild and fruity; what makes it special is its distinctive bright acidity. The dried product contains fiber and seeds, so it is

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necessary to dissolve the paste in a little hot water, pressing the soluble pulp through a sieve and discarding the debris. Substitute lemon or lime juice if these are not already called for.Et cetera. Shallots are the universal substitute for the small, brown Bombay onions popular in Southeast Asian cooking. Small yellow onions may be substituted. Peanut oil is the cooking oil of choice in Southeast Asia—and for us, too—because of its clean, slightly nutty taste. Substitute the cooking oil of your choice. Unsweetened coconut milk—the coconut milk called for in the following recipes—is widely available in cans. Look for those containing no sweeteners or preservatives. We use Thai Kitchen brand. Unsweetened coconut flakes can usually be found for sale in bulk at natural food stores.

THE RECIPESMARINATING. The meat should be allowed to

marinate for 1 hour or so at room temperature or 2 hours or more in the refrigerator (covered, you can leave it there overnight).

SUBSTITUTING. Consult the glossary above for alternatives to ingredients that you can’t find or don’t see the point in purchasing. However, do note that these recipes have been crafted to show off the merits of those Southeast Asian ingredients Matt and I were particularly taken with—kecap manis, lemongrass, tamarind paste—and to by- pass those—like galangal (ginger on a bad hair day) and curry leaves (a flavor reminiscent of plant fertilizer)—that we weren’t. None are expensive and all should be easy to find in a decent Asian grocery.

SKEWERING. Cut the meat into 1-inch squares, a little less than 1/2 inch thick. Skewer them together like slices of bread being turned back into a loaf. This gives you bite-size pieces that are charred around the edges but juicy and moist in the center. The meat should take up a third of the skewer; add too much and you’ll find it hard to get everything evenly cooked—and plenty of handle makes them easier to manipulate.

GRILLING. All the following satays should be grilled directly over glowing charcoal or, a distant second choice, 2 inches below a preheated oven broiler. (In this instance, snip off any exposed bamboo and turn the skewers with tongs.) Turn the skewers so that each side is exposed for about 2 minutes to the flame. Check

for doneness by spreading two pieces apart with a knife blade: beef and lamb should be pink at the center; pork and chicken just past that point.

PORTIONING. Tailgaters may find that the skewers evaporate as fast as spilled ice on hot pavement, but served as the main course of a family meal (with plenty of peanut sauce to take up any slack), a pound and a half of meat should serve 4. If offering satay as an appetizer, put less meat on each skewer and calculate serving 6 to 8.

SERVING. As side dishes, we suggest rice or rice noodles and either a simple Thai cucumber salad (see page 16) or a variety of plainly prepared summer vegetables—cucumber wedges, sugarsnap peas, par-boiled green beans, etc. You might also have on hand a pitcher of iced tea or cold bottles of Singapore’s Tiger beer, Indonesia’s Bintang Pilsener, or Thailand’s Siam Ale (all top-rated brews), and, naturally, coconut and/or ginger ice cream for dessert.

BEEF SATAY(Adapted from Jackie Passmore’s ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ASIAN FOOD AND COOKING)

marinade

2 teaspoons coriander seed

1 small shallot, minced • 1 clove garlic, minced

1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger

2 tablespoons kecap manis

11/2 teaspoons minced lemongrass

1 teaspoon sambal oelek • 1 tablespoon palm sugar

2 tablespoons peanut oil 1/2 teaspoon salt (or to taste)

11/2 pounds beef, cut into bite-size pieces (see above)

peanut sauce #4 (see page 16)

Toast the coriander seeds in a hot, ungreased skillet until they release their aroma and begin to change color. When cool enough to handle, crush or process them into a coarse powder. Mix this with the remaining marinade ingredients in a bowl. Stir the meat into this so that all the pieces are coated and let marinate at room temperature for an hour or so. Thread

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DITIONmeat onto skewers and grill over charcoal as directed above. Serve immediately with peanut sauce for dipping.

RATAMI’S LAMB SATAY(Adapted from Rosemary Brissenden’s SOUTH EAST ASIAN FOOD)

MARINADE

1 teaspoon tamarind paste • 1 tablespoon hot water

2 cloves garlic, minced • 1/2 teaspoon salt (or to taste)

2 medium or 1 large shallot, grated

1 tablespoon palm sugar

11/2 tablespoons lemon juice

2 tablespoons kecap manis

11/2 pounds lamb, cut into bite-size pieces (see above)

peanut sauce #1 (see page 10)

•Dissolve the tamarind paste in the hot water and press the pulp through a sieve. Mix this with the remaining marinade ingredients in a bowl. Stir the meat into this so that all the pieces are coated and let marinate at room temperature for an hour or so. Thread meat onto skewers and grill over charcoal as directed above. Serve immediately with peanut sauce for dipping.

PORK SATAY(Adapted from Sri Owen’s INDONESIAN FOOD AND COOKERY)

Sri Owen says that Indonesians don’t often eat pork satay with peanut sauce, preferring to dip it into sambal kecap instead—which, as it turns out, is an excellent alternative dipping sauce for any satay.

MARINADE

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger

1 teaspoon Chinese five-spice powder

1 tablespoon honey •1 tablespoon peanut oil

1 tablespoon kecap manis • 2 teaspoons lemon juice

11/2 pounds pork tenderloin, cut into pieces (see above)

sambal kecap (see page 16)

• Combine the marinade ingredients in a bowl, stir in the pork, and let marinate for an hour or so at room temperature, stirring occasionally. Thread meat onto skewers and

grill over charcoal as directed above. Serve immediately with sambal kecap for dipping.

CHICKEN SATAYWe found two very similar marinades for chicken in Wandee Young and Byron Ayanoglu’s SIMPLY THAI COOKING and Bruce Cost’s ASIAN INGREDIENTS, each of which produced a very different but equally pleasing result. To try our adaptation of the Young/Ayanoglu version, add the ingredi-ents on the left of the bar to the rest in the list; to try our version of the Cost recipe, choose just the tamarind pulp on the right.

Marinade

1 teaspoon EACH coriander seeds, cumin seeds, black peppercorns

1 tablespoon palm sugar • 1/2 tablespoon fish sauce

2 large cloves garlic, minced •1 tablespoon peanut oil

11/2 pounds boneless chicken thighs,

cut into bite-size pieces (see above)

peanut sauce #2 (page 10) and tangy lime sauce (page 16)

•Toast the coriander and cumin seeds and black peppercorns together in a hot, ungreased skillet until they release their aroma and begin to change color. Pour them into a mortar or food processor and pulverize them into a powder. Combine with the other marinade ingredients in a bowl and mix thoroughly. Toss the chicken pieces into this and let marinate in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours. Thread meat onto skewers and grill over charcoal as directed above. Serve immediately with peanut sauce and tangy lime sauce for dipping.

1 tablespoon lime juice

1 tablespoon soy sauce1/2 teaspoon turmeric

1/2 tablespoon tamarind paste dissolved in 3 table-spoons of water, seeds and fiber strained out

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SATAY PENTUL(Adapted from David Burton’s SAVOURING THE EAST)

David Burton writes: “In the kitchen of a family compound in Bali, I watched the grandfather of the house spend two laborious hours pounding raw chicken meat to a paste. First the old man took a tomahawk and used the blunt end to bash the meat, handful after handful, for an hour, by which time you might have thought every fibre and tendon had been obliterated. But no, he transferred it to an oversized wooden mortar, took a pole which served as the pestle, and pummelled it for another full hour. After mixing in various spices and condiments, he then twirled the paste around large bamboo skewers and got his nephew to grill it, the result being a delicious Balinese variation on satay known as satay pentul.”

COOK’S NOTE. Ordinary bamboo skewers don’t have enough surface to hold the meat mixture fast. Look for stubbier skewers (about as thick as a pencil) or use chop- sticks. (The mixture can also be shaped into patties and grilled like hamburgers.)

1/2 tablespoon tamarind paste

2 tablespoons hot water

1 teaspoon coriander seeds

2 garlic cloves, coarsely chopped

1 tablespoon finely minced fresh ginger1/2 tablespoon sambal oelek

1/4 teaspoon turmeric • 1/2 tablespoon palm sugar

1 tablespoon soy sauce • 1/2 teaspoon salt

2 or 3 tablespoons unsweetened coconut flakes

11/2 pounds ground chicken (or pork)

peanut sauce #3 and/or sambal kecap (see page 16)

•Steep the tamarind paste in the water for 5 minutes. Strain. Toast the coriander seeds in a hot, ungreased skillet. In a mortar or food processor, blend the garlic, coriander, ginger, and sambal oelek into a paste. Turn this into a bowl, add all the remaining ingredients, and blend every-thing thoroughly into a sticky mass. Put the bowl in the refrigerator and let the contents cool and firm for at least an hour.

•Form a golf-ball-size amount of the paste around each skewer in the shape of a miniature hot dog. Grill over hot coals, turning often, until satays are dotted all over with crusty brown spots. Serve them with peanut sauce #3 and/or sambal kecap.

POTATO SATAYAlthough Anya von Bremzen, author of—among several other interesting cook-books—TERRIFIC PACIFIC, told me that she remembered tasting a potato satay at an Indian hawker’s stall in Penang, I had no luck turning up a recipe for one. However, potatoes take so well to that area’s fla- vorings that I found it no problem to come up with a recipe of my own.Yellow-fleshed potatoes (like Yukon Gold) are ideal: calculate at least one large potato per person when this satay is the main course, half that when serving it with a meat satay.

4 large yellow-fleshed potatoes, cooked in their skins

1 teaspoon EACH coriander seeds and black peppercorns1/2 teaspoon curry powder

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 clove garlic, minced • 1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger

1 tablespoon kecap manis •1 teaspoon sambal oelek

peanut sauce of your choice

•Gently peel the potatoes and cut them into bite-size cubes. Toast the coriander and the peppercorns in a hot, ungreased skillet until the coriander seeds start to turn color. Pour them into a mortar or food processor bowl and process them into a powder. Mix this thoroughly with the other ingredients in a bowl. Stir in the potatoes and let everything marinate at room temperature for an hour or so. Then push the pieces gently onto thin skewers and grill until each side has lightly browned (don’t let them burn). Serve with any peanut sauce.

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DITIONdipping Sauces

Probably the most popular street food, found everywhere, and with a variety of flavors depending upon the region, satays can be made with mutton, chicken, or beef. Regardless of which meat you prefer, it is the peanut sauce that defines the ultimate taste of a satay, and on this rests the success of any satay. —Copeland

Marks, THE EXOTIC KITCHENS OF MALAYSIA

Roasting the Peanuts. Although many recipes these days simply substitute peanut butter for peanuts in peanut sauce recipes, the sauce will be distinctly better—fresher flavor, more appealing texture—if you take the trouble to buy dry-roasted peanuts and grind them up yourself—or, if you can find raw peanuts, to roast them as well. To do this, add 1 tablespoon of peanut oil for every 1/2 cup of peanuts to a small skillet, pour in the raw peanuts, and heat them over a medium-hot flame. Shake the pan gently while they cook so that the peanuts are fried on all sides. When they turn a light tan (they won’t have the golden sheen of deep-fried peanuts), turn them out onto a paper towel and let them cool. Then work them to a paste in a mortar (see illustration below) or in a food processor set with a steel blade. The result should be smooth but slightly mealy, with bits of peanut all through.

Mix and Match. Our linking of each satay to a sauce is meant only as a suggestion—feel free to follow your own taste instead.

PEANUT SAUCE #1(Adapted from Rosemary Brissenden’s SOUTH EAST ASIAN FOOD)1/2 cup roasted peanuts, ground to a paste

1 large or 2 small shallots, peeled and grated

1 cup coconut milk • 1 tablespoon palm sugar

1 teaspoon sambal oelek

1 stem lemongrass, sliced fine

salt and pepper to taste

• Combine all the ingredients in a small pot and heat over a medium flame, stirring constantly. When the mixture reaches a simmer, remove from the heat. Stir in a little water if a thinner consistency is desired. Serve warm or at room temperature.

PEANUT SAUCE #2(Adapted from Bruce Cost’s BIG BOWL NOODLES AND RICE)

1/2 cup roasted peanuts, ground to a paste

2 fresh hot chiles, cored, seeded, and minced

1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger

2 garlic cloves, minced1/3 cup coconut milk • 1 tablespoon peanut oil

1 teaspoon dark soy sauce • 1 tablespoon fish sauce

1 teaspoon palm sugar • 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice1/2 teaspoon salt • chopped fresh coriander to taste

•Put all the ingredients except the fresh coriander into a mortar or the bowl of a food processor and blend until smooth. Transfer to a small bowl and, when ready to serve, stir in the chopped fresh coriander leaves.

Peanut sauce #2 after the peanuts have been pulverized into a coarse paste. The red bits are the minced hot red chiles. Peanut sauce #2 after the coconut milk has been worked in.

[CONTINUED ON PAGE 16]

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freezer in winter. One more night there and I’d have woken up sealed in Cryovac. I’ll tell you about that some other time. Do you know what I just did?” It was my turn to shake my head. “I’ve been on the phone with Waldo, down in Florida,” he said. “I asked him if he wanted to sell me his cart.” He shot me a look as I sat there, momentarily speechless. “This is just between you and me, Alec—especially because I don’t know yet what’s going to come of it.” “Was Waldo interested?” I asked. “Yeah, sort of,” Greg replied. “The thing is, there’s a guy in Haydenville who’s already made him an offer. In fact, he’s supposed to pick it up in a few days at the lot where Waldo left it. If he takes it, I’m out of luck.” He groaned. “And I just know he will.” “Are you really serious about this?” I asked, alarm palpable in my voice. “The No-Name won’t be the same place without you.” “You’ve got to appoach this from a positive perspective,” Greg said. “Now you’ll have two places to eat lunch. And at mine, you can bring Sasha along whenever you want. After all, it’s a dog-eat-dog world out there, and it’s about time Sasha took advantage of that.” Sasha, hearing her name, jumped up again and began wildly wagging her tail, as if she expected him to deliver on his offer instantly. He shook his head at her. “Not yet, kiddo.” To me, he said, “Alec, you know I’ve been hanging on at the No-Name, working my butt off and collecting my monthly pittance without complaint. But today I heard the voice, and everything’s completely changed.” “You what?” I asked. Greg took on a faraway look and intoned, “Go thou and peddle thy weiners.” He glanced over at me again. “Really. I’ve found my calling. I know what I am; I’m a hot-dog man.” “Hmm,” I said. “I see the Professor’s anti-frank harangue touched a nerve. I thought he was being a little hard on the hot-dog trade.”

The Story So Far: On a run-down part of Water Street sits a tiny, brightly painted, nameless diner. Alec, our narrator, who owns a used-book store in the row of Victorian commercial buildings that loom beside it, has gradually become a regular, getting to know the Profes-sor—the burly, bearded proprietor and grill cook—and Greg—the Gen-X waitron-busboy- dishwasher. Recently, the town’s only hot-dog vendor, Waldo Lemay, tossed in the towel for good, leaving the No-Name to carry on the Waldo Dog tradition. But as far as the Professor is concerned, riding herd on a bunch of franks is no proper job for a real cook. Jokingly, he put Waldo’s secret topping recipe up for auction, and to his and Alec’s surprise, Greg bid for it—and carried it triumphantly away.

An hour later, I was back in the bookstore, checking off items in various dealer catalogs, Sasha snoring gently at my

feet. The bell jangled and someone came through the door. I looked up to see not a customer but Greg, bearing a paper bag in one hand and a glum expression on his face. He slumped into the armchair beside my desk. Sasha scrambled up and came around to offer him a consolatory wet nose. He leaned over, rumpled her ears, and sank back even lower into the seat. His T-shirt, appropriately, bore the logo

I WANT YOU

TO JUST

LEAVE ME ALONE “Glad you stopped by,” I said. “I’ve been worried about you. Are you still living in that trailer behind Randy’s Tire Barn?” Greg shook his head. “If I were, I’d be dead by now,” he said morosely. “That place! A convection oven in summer and a walk-in

Hanging Out at the No-Name

A Diner Story (with Recipes)

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DITION “A little hard?” Greg snorted. “How about totally, completely, wrong.” He leaned over to the paper sack he had put down at his feet and reached inside. His hand emerged with two soda bottles, their contents dark, their outsides moist with condensation. He handed one over to me. The bottle was label-free, but there was a legend impressed in the glass itself: IBC ROOT BEER. SINCE 1919. I unscrewed the cap and took a sniff. The aroma, a complex but soothing blend of vanilla, licorice, and penny candy swept me back what seemed a hundred years. I took a sip and let the flavor settle on my tongue, those mellow, grassy notes of roots and herbs that kept the sweetness in check, the astringent aftertaste of cinnamon. “Wow!” I said. “I don’t think I’ve had one of these since I was a kid.” Greg took a pull on his own bottle, then asked, “What do you think distinguishes this stuff from every other kind of soda?” My response presented itself involuntarily. “Aaaurp,” I said, and added, “It’s the only one of them guaranteed to make you burp.” Greg nodded sagely. “Besides that. Take another sip.” As I did, he went on. “Imagine that, a moment before, you had just swallowed a mouthful of hot dog and bun, mustard and relish and onion sauce. Your taste buds are quivering with violent emotion. What beverage are they crying out for? Coke? 7Up? Mountain Dew?” “Root beer, without question,” I answered. “I’m beginning to catch your drift.” “Dogs and suds,” Greg said. “Put them together and you have one of this country’s few great contributions to world cuisine. This isn’t about being a cook. It’s about serving a higher cause.” “You certainly provide a different perspective on old Waldo,” I said, warming to this thesis. “Suddenly, instead of a shiftless character selling warmed-over, prefab food to other shiftless characters, he becomes an avatar of the old religion, pushing his mobile altar through the streets, selflessly bringing manna to the people.” Greg regarded me suspiciously. “Seriously,” I said. “I buy it.” We both burst out laughing. “Okay,” Greg said, “but think about this. The Professor, at heart, is a hamburger person, and hamburger people look down at hot-dog

people. As the Professor himself likes to say, the burger is the bottom rung of a ladder that climbs straight up to a thick slab of steak.” I nodded. “The American meal as upward mobility. Whereas the hot dog is purely proletarian fare—no interest in or hope of advancement. And coming from a scrappy background that it doesn’t pay to examine too closely.” “Exactly,” Greg said. “And, at least before ginseng replaced ginger as the soda snob’s ingredient of choice, gingerale was the champagne and root beer the favorite of good old Joe Six-Pack...that is, when he wasn’t reaching for a brewski.” “The top and the bottom of the soda social scale,” I said, “separated from each other by a sloshing ocean of Coke.” Then, changing the subject, I asked, “So, if you do get the cart, will you still feature the Waldo Dog?” “No,” Greg said emphatically. “Everything’s going to change.” He leaned toward me conspiratorially. “Wanna know the name I came up with for this enterprise?” “You bet!” I said. “FRANK’N’STEIN,” Greg said, enunciating the apostrophes and watching me carefully to make sure I got the full effect. When he saw I had, he added, “Not too shabby, huh?” “A stroke of genius,” I said. Greg mimed abashed modesty. “I’d better get on the road,” he said. “I have things to do.” “Just one second,” I said. “Waldo’s secret onion sauce recipe....” I went on hesitantly, “I gather it’s not, strictly speaking, central to your business plan...?” Greg looked at me in puzzlement for a second. Then a grin crept across his face. “Hah,” he said. “I almost forgot who I was bidding against.” He reached into his pants pocket and pulled out the crumpled scrap of paper. “Here,” he said generously, “take a peek. Just swear you aren’t going to use it to go into competition with me.” “That,” I said, “is a very easy thing to promise.” I studied it carefully and passed it back. “Not that it would really matters if you did,” Greg said. “I’ve come up with an idea that is literally going to force passing cars to jam on their brakes and turn into the parking lot. It’s, like, frankfurter magnetism, man—and it’s going to

[CONCLUDED ON PAGE 17]

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A Lunchtime Go-BetweenW. Brian Overcast

IN MY MIDDLE SCHOOL, everything revolved around the lunch period. All of the gossip, smooching, playing, and fighting happened during lunch.

It was a time for eating, but—more important—it was thirty minutes of freedom. Our sixth-grade lunches were probably like those in most other American schools. The food was terrible. Salisbury steak was the worst; the meat they used called into question the very definition of “steak.” The most desired item was the Nutty Buddy, a sugar cone filled with vanilla ice cream and covered with chocolate and peanuts. There were three lunch lines. These were menacingly long, and kids giving back-cuts were merciless. The pecking order was strictly enforced. The bullies gave cuts only to bigger bullies and pretty girls, while the skinny kids...well, they stayed skinny. By the time the student at the end of the line had procured his repast and sat down, he would hardly have time to take his first bite before the bell rang, signaling the end of the lunch period. However, for wimpy twelve-year-old sixth-graders, there was an option that gave them access to the cornu-copia usually available only to those at the front of the lunch line. This option came in the form of a boy, a wise pre- teen by the name of Aaron Cunnings. Aaron could not afford to buy his meal, and he had too much pride to stand in the free-lunch line. So he used his talents to feed himself, coming up with a system by which he not only got his lunch but also left school each day with a silvery jingle in his pocket. Aaron knew that the skinny kids’ problem wasn’t a lack of money. They suffered from “Late-Bloomer Syndrome.” They had no clout; they’d back down from a push or take two for flinching. Another thing about Aaron: everybody liked him, and he liked everybody—especially the skinny kids. At lunch, Aaron would place himself strategically among a group of non-eating skinny students. After enough had gathered, he would

start taking orders from each kid. All right, who wants somethin’? What’s that, Jimmy? You want a milk and fries? You gonna buy me somethin’? Another fry? Okay—that’s 55 cents per fry and 35 cents for the milk. Oh, you want chocolate milk? Add another 10 cents. That’ll be a dollar fifty-five for Jimmy.... Who’s next? Mike—what you want? A Nutty Buddy? You gonna buy me one, too? All right, that’s a buck, man. Thank you, Mikey.... Steve wants a milk and sugar cookie? All right, Steve, that’s 70 cents. What you gonna buy me? All you got is a dollar? All right, man, I’ll just keep your change.... Any more? All right, I’m off—back in five minutes! Now, the fact that Aaron did all the math quickly in his head with only a partial sixth-grade education was impressive enough, but the talent I really want to highlight lay in the “be back in five minutes” part. Aside from the skinny kids, Aaron liked the third-period P.E. kids the best. He made sure that he was in good standing with them, because they were allowed to leave class early, thereby securing a position at the front of the lunch line. Aaron could often be seen joking and high-fiving with this group, even slipping them an extra sugar cookie from time to time. The result: Aaron got front-cuts more than haircuts. Even the lunch ladies liked Aaron, due to what he called his “lunch lady charm.” He never missed a new hairstyle or nail polish, and always complimented each lady accordingly. He buttered them up the same way they buttered their fresh rolls, and it paid off when he loaded up his tray. Aaron always got served from the new, hot pans of Salisbury straight out of the oven. And his wiles did not end there. He had the ability to hide a sugar cookie as large as his hand underneath his tray. The lunch ladies never caught on. When Aaron returned to the table with his bounty, it was like Christmas. He handed out the food quickly and inconspicuously, then joined the other boys who were already eating voraciously and breathing only when they burped. Aaron would sit and talk with

Simple Cooking 71

ELECTRONIC EDITIONSimple Cooking 74 © 2001 John Thorne and Matt Lewis Thorne. All rights reserved. SC is published every other month. A subscription to the electronic edition is $24 for six issues, worldwide. Unless stated otherwise, we assume letters to us are meant for publication and can be edited accordingly. P.O. Box 778, Northampton MA 01061.

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Simple Cooking 74 page fourteen

them, complain about homework, and if he was still hungry go on another run. The thing was, not one student resented Aaron for using them to buy his lunch. Aaron provided a service, and all involved benefited. The skinny kids ate, and Aaron was able to stay clear of the free-lunch line. Everybody liked Aaron. I loved him, though he rarely paid any attention to me. In fact, I was one of the only skinny kids that he didn’t talk to. You see, I bagged my lunch.

W. BRIAN OVERCAST just received an MA in creative writing from FSU and will be attending The New School this fall. His favorite cafeteria item remains the Nutty Buddy.

Letter from JakartaGeorge Orick

Satay. The word is always singular here—no satays, just satay, generic. Some chi-chi restaurants in Jakarta serve satay as a

first course. Nearly all Indonesian restaurants serve satay as one of several main courses. But where satay is mostly consumed is on the street—not on the main streets, but on the other, secondary ones. These rarely have sidewalks, so the stalls encroach on the narrow dirt strip between buildings and street. People step around them. These satay stalls are three-sided affairs, wood and canvas, with open fronts in which there are charcoal or wood fireboxes on metal legs, with grills on which the satay is cooked on skewers, smoking always, twenty or twenty-five at a time, a mess. But a good smell. Satay here in Jakarta is never pork (Muslim country), always chicken, beef, or goat. I like the goat satay; it tends be more tender than the beef, and I can get chicken anyplace. Skewers are either split bamboo or metal. If metal, you’ll get the satay on a section of banana leaf or piece of paper, so the vendor can retain the skewer. If bamboo, you get the whole thing. The sauce for satay in Jakarta is made with sweet soy sauce, chile peppers (ground), and small green lemons—not really limes, but the size of small limes. Jakarta satay is not marinated. You can have it with sauce or not. You can have a kind of salad with it, served on the banana leaf or waxed paper (only one side

is waxed), made with finely diced cucumber, diced carrots, and shallots (which serve as onions here), marinated in water, vinegar, salt, and normal soy sauce. I associate satay with smoke; stepping carefully into the street to avoid being hit by passing bajajs (three-wheeled motorcycles with cabs); good smells; and vendors who manage to be wheedling and arrogant simultaneously. Hard to estimate, but I would say there must be at least fifty thousand satay stalls, maybe more, in Jakarta, a city of twelve million people. My wife, Gigi, thinks my estimate is low. In the Philippines, Gigi’s homeland, satay is always called barbecue. It is usually pork and is always marinated and basted while it grills. At the moment, Gigi is doing relief work on the Indonesian island of Ambon. There, satay is made of beef, chicken, goat, or pork (this last, of course, only in the Christian zone). Ambon satay is marinated in sweet soy sauce, salt, cinnamon, garlic, and pepper, as well as being basted as it cooks. You can have a sauce on it, too: peanut sauce sprinkled with finely cut shallots. Indonesia is a vast country, and satay there is as various as the different regions. In central Java, for instance, satay is heavily sugared. All food in central Java is sugared. You order toast at breakfast in a hotel, and you have to tell them NO SUGAR, and if you forget to tell them no sugar in the butter, you get sugar in the butter. Central Java is the home of the wayang shadow plays. Central Java life is shadow play and sugar coating.

George Orick, retired from ABC News, has a house in Provence but these days is more often found in Indonesia, where his wife, Gigi, helps co-ordinate humanitarian aid for the strife-torn Malukus (Spice Islands).

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For a brief stint in the early 1990s, Matt and I wrote and edited a separate review of cookbooks. The following two reviews are especially pertinent to the feature essay in this issue.

THE COOKING OF SINGAPORECHRIS YEO & JOYCE JUE

(Harlow & Ratner, 1993, 174 pp.).

Singapore cooking is a fascinating composite that embraces the several cuisines of that small country’s ethnic

mix: Chinese, Malay-Indonesian, and Indian, plus that of a unique subculture that is itself a merging of Chinese and Malay, and is locally known as Straits Chinese. The central pivot of the cuisine is rempah, which serves the same purpose as the Latin American sofrito, a powerful flavor base of herbs, aromatics, and seasonings, pounded together in a mortar to a thick, smooth paste. Freshly concocted for each dish out of a wide and always changing list of ingredients—fresh ginger, lemongrass, shrimp paste, garlic, herbs and spices—rempah provides the harmony, intensifies the drama, and furnishes the continuity for curries, sauces, and marinades. It is to Singapore cooking what the Supremes were to Diana Ross. Holding to that metaphor, you might well say that Straits Chinese cooking is Singapore’s soul food:

The Malay wife taught her Chinese husband to enjoy curries and slow simmered preparations. She introduced him to the aromatic tastes of fresh screwpine, fragrant lime, lemongrass, the herbal overtones of galangal and turmeric, the intriguing sweet and citrus flavor of tamarind, the pungent and savory taste of shrimp paste, and the richness and thickening characteristic of candlenuts. She used coconut milk...to mellow the rich spicy edges of her food and bind together her mixtures....

The intrepid culinary explorer with access to the cuisine’s basic ingredients—lemongrass, coconut milk, dried shrimp paste, tamarind, and so on—will find waiting in this book a heady mélange of Chinese cooking techniques, tropical Asian ingredients, and Indian curries, spices, and breads...and dishes like spicy meat-stuffed griddle bread, dry-style noodles with lemon and

toasted coconut, and an astonishing Chinese-Indian whole-cooked chili crab.

ASIAN GRILLSAlexandra Greeley

(Doubleday, 1993, 335 pp.).

This book is a habachi-stoker’s dream. The author, former food editor of Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post, has

traveled the whole of Asia seeking out the ultimate grill food: Indian Sikandari Raan, a specially prepared leg of lamb that the author describes as “the single most exquisite dish I have ever eaten”; a grilled steak so fiery with chiles that Thais say it will wring tears from a tiger; Japanese salt-grilled whole mackerel, skewered as if still swimming in the sea...and countless other smoke-cooked foods, much of them straight from Asian roadside stands. Reading this book, we also discover that the simple charcoal-fired brazier is a conduit of an Asian Tao of cooking—fresh food cooked instantaneously and devoured on the spot, redolent of smoke and spice. Asians argue the merits of hard and soft coals, special woods, charcoal, sawdust, leaves, even cow dung. In Laos, for example, cooks distinguish between:

yang (food is suspended in a latticework grill over the fire); mok (wrapped food is set to the side of the fire); ping (food is skewered and held over the fire; it is turned as with a rotisserie or held stationary); nung (food is steamed over the fire); and tom (food is boiled...in a coal-burning container). Phao and chi are similar techniques—for the former, the foods are put directly in the fire, and for the latter, the foods are put on the fire....

The author credits her sources, and these often have interesting things to say about the recipes and the cuisines from which they come. ASIAN GRILLS will awaken unexpected potential in even the humblest of backyard barbecue grills.

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DITIONPEANUT SAUCE #3

(Adapted from Copeland Marks’ THE EXOTIC KITCHENS OF MALAYSIA)

1 tablespoon peanut oil

2 or 3 shallots, peeled and minced • 3 garlic cloves, minced

1 tablespoon tamarind paste • 1/2 cup boiling water

2 to 3 tablespoons sambal oelek

1 stalk lemongrass

1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger

1/2 teaspoon salt • 1 tablespoon palm sugar1/2 cup roasted peanuts, ground to a paste as

directed above

•Heat the oil in a small pot. Add the minced shallots and garlic and cook over low heat for 2 minutes, or until they are translucent.

•Meanwhile, dissolve the tamarind paste in the boiling water, straining the result through a sieve. Prepare the lemongrass for use as a flavoring agent (see ingredient glosssary, page 3) but instead of flattening it, cut in half lengthwise. Add this, the ginger, salt, and palm sugar to the pot with the sautéed shallots and garlic. Bring to a boil and simmer over low heat for 10 minutes.

•Stir the peanut paste into the pot at the end of the cooking time and remove it from the heat. Fish out and discard the lemongrass and let the sauce rest at least 15 minutes before serving.

PEANUT SAUCE #4(Adapted from Jackie Passmore’s ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ASIAN FOOD AND COOKING)

About peanut sauces the author writes: “In Malaysia the sauce is spiced coconut milk with ground peanuts; in Indonesia sauces based on kecap manis (sweet soy sauce) are generally preferred. In Thailand, the peanut-based sauce is creamy and richly spiced. Variations on this theme are found in menus throughout Asia.”

11/2 tablespoons coriander seeds2/3 cup roasted peanuts, ground to a paste as

directed above

3 tablespoons kecap manis

[CONTINUED FROM PAGE 10] 1/2 teaspoon turmeric • 2 teaspoons sambal oelek

1 teaspoon minced garlic • 3/4 cup coconut milk

2 teaspoons palm sugar • 1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon lemon juice

•Toast the coriander seeds in a hot, ungreased skillet, let cool, and crush to a powder. Combine this with the rest of the ingredients except the salt and lemon juice in a small pan and simmer for 3 minutes. Cool and stir in the reserved items.

SAMBAL KECAP1 tablespoon kecap manis

2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon or lime juice

1 garlic clove, very finely minced (optional)

1 shallot, peeled and grated

1 to 2 teaspoons sambal oelek • pinch of salt

•Blend everything together and serve.

TANGY LIME SAUCE(Adapted from Jeffrey Alford & Naomi Duguid’s SEDUCTIONS OF RICE)

2 tablespoons lime juice • 1 to 2 teaspoons fish sauce

1 tablespoon soy sauce •1 teaspoon sambal oelek

1 tablespoon palm sugar

4 sprigs fresh coriander, chopped

•Place all the ingredients except the coriander in a small bowl and mix well. If necessary, adjust the balance of lime juice, fish sauce, sambal oelek, and sugar to taste. Do not mix in the chopped coriander until the sauce is to be served. (Without them it can be kept for a week in the fridge.)

THAI CUCUMBER SALAD[SERVES 4]

3 cucumbers, peeled • 2 shallots, peeled

2 tablespoons coarse salt 1/2 cup sugar • 1/2 cup rice wine vinegar

2 hot chiles, stemmed, seeded, and diced

2 or 3 sprigs minced fresh coriander leaves

1/2 cup roasted peanuts, chopped (optional)

•Cut the cucumbers in half lengthwise and spoon out their seeds. Slice into crescent-shaped pieces about 1/4 inch thick. Slice the peeled shallots into the thinnest possible rings. Put the cucumber pieces

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SATAY BIBLIOGRAPHY In Kuala Lumpur I used to enjoy eating sticks of satay grilled by hawkers that set up around dusk in a car park across the Klang River from the fairytale domes and moorish minarets of the Jame mosque. Smoldering charcoal fires and kerosene lanterns lit the Jalan Benteng parking lot as it turned into a huge outdoor restaurant. Satay men sweated over coals waving palm leaf fans over skewers of basted meats and shrimp. —Linda Bladholm, THE ASIAN GROCERY

STORE DEMYSTIFIED.

SURVEYS OF SOUTHEAST ASIAN COOKINGAlford, Jeffrey, and Naomi Duguid. Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet: A Culinary

Journey Through Southeast Asia (Artisan, 2000).Moe, Rosalind (ed.). Southeast Asian Specialties: A Culinary

Journey (Könemann, 1998).Steinberg, Rafael, and the Editors of Time-Life. Pacific and

Southeast Asian Cooking (Time-Life, 1970).REFERENCE WORKS

Bladholm, Linda. The Asian Grocery Store Demystified (Renaissance Books, 1999).

Cost, Bruce. Asian Ingredients (Quill, 2000).Passmore, Jacki. The Encyclopedia of Asian Food and Cooking

(Hearst Books, 1991).Solomon, Charmaine. Encyclopedia of Asian Food (Periplus, 1996).Wright, Jeni (ed.). The Encyclopedia of Asian Cooking (Octopus,

1980).INTERESTING SATAY RECIPES

Alford, Jeffrey, and Naomi Duguid.. Seductions of Rice

(Artisan, 1998).Bhumichitr, Vatcharin, Vatch’s South East Asian Cookbook

(St. Martin’s Press, 1997).Brissenden, Rosemary. South East Asia Food (Harmondsworth:

Penguin, 1979).Burton, David, Savouring the East (London: Faber & Faber, 1996).Cost, Bruce, with Matt McMillin. Big Bowl Noodles and Rice

(HarperCollins, 2000).Greeley, Alexandra. Asian Grills (Doubleday, 1993).Hansen, Barbara. Taste of Southest Asia(HPBooks, 1987).Hutton, Wendy (ed.). The Food of Malaysia (Periplus Editions,

1995).—. The Food of Singapore (Periplus Editions, 1995). Marks, Copeland. The Exotic Kitchens of Malaysia (Donald

Fine, 1997).Owen, Sri. Classic Asian Cookbook (Dorling Kindersley, 1998).—. Indonesian Food and Cookery. (Prospect Books, 1989).Sterling, Richard. Dining with Headhunters (Crossing Press,

1995).von Bremzen, Anya, and John Welchman . Terrific Pacific Cook-

book (Workman, 1995).Young, Wandee, and Byron Ayanoglu. Simply Thai Cooking

(Robert Rose, 1996).ALSO MENTIONED

McDermott, Nancie, Real Vegetarian Thai (Chronicle Books, 1996).

Peterson, Jean and David. Eat Smart in Indonesia (Ginkgo, 1997).

Talbot-Kelly, R. Burma, Painted and Described (Adam & Charles Black, 1905).

and the shallot rings into two separate bowls. Toss each of them in a tablespoon of coarse salt and let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes, stirring them occasionally.

•Meanwhile, bring the rice vinegar to a boil. Remove from the heat and stir in the sugar until it has completely dissolved. Put this into the refrigerator to cool.

•Wring out as much moisture as possible from the cucumbers and then the shallots in an old but clean dish towel. Mix everything together in the sweetened vinegar and serve at once. Add the chopped peanuts if not serving peanut sauce.

revolutionize the dog-cart industry.” He lifted the hand holding the bag of empties and pointed a finger at me. “You just wait and see.”

Waldo’s Secret Onion Sauce[MAKES ABOUT 1 CUP]

1 medium yellow onion • 1 tablespoon butter1/2 tablespoon curry powder • 1/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup each ketchup and half-and-half

generous squeeze of fresh lemon juice

•Mince the onion and sauté it in the butter until lightly browned at the edges. Add the curry powder, salt, ketchup, and half-and-half. Cook for another 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Remove from the heat and stir in lemon juice to taste. Serve warm or at room temperature.

TO BE CONTINUED

[CONTINUED FROM PAGE 12]

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