Steamed Tofu, Anchovy Fish and Shrimp Wrapped with Banana Leaves a.k.a Botok Tahu, Teri dan Udang

Botok (not a 'botox' treatment) is one of Javanese food made from shredded coconut flesh wrapped with banana leaves and we steam it. When I was young, my mom pretty often make this meal for us as a companion for Tamarind Soup (Sayur Asem). Actually this is one of her favorite dish. She also made Shrimp paste sambal (Sambal Terasi) as a condiment. To be honest, I don't like when my mom making this meal. I found that it's boring. As I grew up, I don't mind with this meal but not quite often. Since I moved to Winnipeg, somehow I miss this meal and want to make it so badly. My favorite one is with dried anchovy fish and white leadtree a.k.a jumbay; white popinac; (Leucaena leuchocepala (petai cina in Indonesia; lamtoro or pèthèt in Javanese). Unfortunately I haven't found white leadtree in here yet. The main ingredient for this dish is shredded coconut flesh, usually we use the young one. Why? It's because the young coconut flesh is more juicy which will enrich the taste. In here because we don't have fresh coconut so I just use the frozen one. Hence, I couldn't choose the young coconut to use so I just used whatever I got, life must go on...Unfortunately I just have a little bit of shredded coconut flesh left over from last time I made Cooked Vegetable Salad (Urap sayur) so I decided to add tofu. Here it is the recipe:

Ingredients:

200 gr shredded coconut flesh

1 block of tofu, mashed

100 gr of dried anchovy fish

10 shrimps, peel of the skin

10 bilimbi (belimbing wuluh/ belimbing keris), cut into angle

5 red Thai chili peppers, cut into angle

5 bay leaves

5 galangal

banana leaves

toothpicks

Spices to blend:

3 shallots

2 cloves of garlic

2 cm of kaemferia galangal/ great galangal (kencur)

1 red Thai chili pepper

1 tsp shrimp paste

1 1/2 tsp sea salt

1 tsp sugar

Direction:

Steam/ pan fry/ boil the shallots, garlic and chili pepper before you blend it. It will make it easier to blend. After you're done then blend it altogether with kaemferia galangal, shrimp paste, sugar and salt.

Combine the blended spices, shredded coconut flesh, mashed tofu, dried anchovy fish, shrimps, bilimbi and red Thai chili peppers.

Place one bay leaf and galangal on a banana leaf then put 2 tbs of  the mixed ingredients (from step 3) on top of it.Wrap and pin it with toothpick.

Steam it in a steamer for about 45 minutes.

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Garang Asem Ayam (Chicken in Sour Coconut Milk Sauce)

One day I got so confused what I have to cook for the day. Suddenly I remember Garang Asem Ayam (Chicken in Sour Coconut Milk Sauce) that I used to eat when I was in Pati, Kudus and Semarang. There is a restaurant in Pati calls Surya Baru which is offer some good foods and Garang Asem is one of their menu. I and my family used to eat there. The owner is a Chinese descendant, no wonder they cook very well.  So, I looked at my freezer, oh I still have some attached back chicken legs, so I'm going to use that. The sourness suppose to come either from 'belimbing wuluh/ belimbing keris' ('bilimbi' in English), tamarind or green tomatoes. Because I don't have any bilimbi and coincidentally I have to pick some of my green tomatoes in my garden (due to cooler weather which is start to approaching lately), so I just used green tomato instead.

Now, here it is the ingredients:

1 attached back leg chicken

2 pieces of galangal

4 pieces of bay leaves

1 egg

150 ml coconut milk

3 fresh red Thai chilies, cut in angle

1 medium green tomato, cut into wedges

1 medium red tomato, cut into wedges

1 tsp tamarind, mix in 100 ml lukewarm water

some banana leaves

some plastic wraps

2 pieces of toothpicks

Spices to blend:

2 shallots

2 small cloves of garlic

2 tsp coriander

2 tsp white pepper

3/4 tsp salt

1 cm of ginger

1 candle nut

1 tbs vegetable oil

1/2 tsp sugar

Direction:

1. Blend all the spices.
2. Cut chicken into 3 pieces.
3. Sauté the blend of spices with oil until fragrant.
4. Add coconut milk, let it shimmer then add egg and tamarind water. Stir it evenly until boil.
5. Take banana leaves, put plastic wrap on top of it then arrange galangal, bay leaf and chicken. Sprinkle with some cut tomatoes and fresh chili peppers. Wrap with banana leaves and pinned with toothpick.
6. Steam it for 60 minutes ( I used the electric steamer).

Serving 2 people

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