Sambal Tumpang a.k.a Spicy 'Tempe'/ Fermented Soybeans with Coconut Milk Sauce

Tempe or fermented soybeans is a common food in Indonesia. Tempe is made by a natural culturing and controlled fermentation process that binds soybeans into a cake form (based on Wikipedia). If you are a vegetarian, this would be a perfect food for you. This food is originated from Indonesia especially from Java island. We eat tempe and tofu every single day as a staple food. The taste is unique and it is good for meat substitute. We created a lot of dishes with tempe as a main ingredient. Since I moved to Winnipeg, I found the Asian store which sells frozen tempe. They're not that great because it's tasted more like old tempe or over-fermented tempe (tempe semangit). In here they call it 'tempeh', I'm not sure why they spell and pronounce it like that.

Sliced tempe (picture from Wikipedia)

Anyway, I'm trying to make spicy 'tempe' with coconut milk sauce or Indonesian usually call it Sambal Tumpang (sambal means spicy chili sauce) and the tempe which is I found it in here and tasted like old tempe is the perfect ingredient for this dish. This dish is quite common in Indonesia. In some areas they add some 'krecek/ krupuk rambak (rambak crackers made from thick skin of cow or buffalo)'. But because I don't like that stuff so I didn't put any. Some people also like to eat it with pecel (Indonesian cooked vegetable salad). For me I just like to eat it with steamed rice and it's so yummy. In Javanese language we call it  nglawuhi. Let's check out the recipe:

Ingredients:

1 package of tempe (20 cm x 10 cm, I used old tempe/ tempe semangit)

150 gr beef (I used the sirloin)

500 ml water

6 kaffir lime leaves

1 galangal, bruised it

2 bay leaves

4 shallots

3 cloves of garlics

1 cm kaemferia galangal (kencur)

1 candlenut

1 tsp shrimp paste

3 red Thai chili peppers (cabe rawit)

3 red cayenne peppers (cabe merah keriting)

200 ml coconut milk

1 1/2 tsp of salt

1 tsp of sugar

1 tbs vegetable oil for sauteeing

Direction:

Boil the beef into 500 ml water to obtain the beef broth. In a halfway of boiling the beef (after 30 minutes) add tempe, shallot, garlic, red Thai chili peppers and red cayenne peppers to boil for around 10-15 minutes. Turn off the stove.

When shallot, garlic and all the peppers are tender enough, take them out and blend it with kaemferia galangal, candlenut, salt, sugar and shrimp paste.

Take the beef out and slice it.

In a skillet, saute the blended spices along with galangal and bay leaves until fragrant.

Transfer the sauted spices to the beef broth. Add sliced beef, coconut milk and kaffir lime leaves.

Bring it to boil and stir evenly. When the tempe become tender, you can crush it a little bit.

Let it boil it until the beef is tender. 

Serving 2 people