The Dewi

For reasons unknown to me, though it hardly matters, I've been having ideas to make Japanese style food at home. Not because of any specific reason, it is just so happen I have the ingredients ready and this particular recipe is very simple to make. Least effort for the biggest punch, is my motto. Not to be lazy, it just makes sense! Lazy*coughs hard*. We have been enjoying cool weather in Singapore, so something soupy is often preferred. No day other than today is more perfect to enjoy Beef Udon. It takes maybe roughly 20 minutes to make, but the taste makes you think I have been slaving myself at least 4 hours in the kitchen, just for the broth alone. While in truth I have been slaving myself all over the house cleaning and disinfecting here and there all day. Is anyone else also doing this?  The broth has character yet it is refreshing. I hope I'm making sense. I don't sometimes when I reminisce about food I ate. It is a problem. Here I made 2 bowls: one for me and one f...

I am so passionate about this recipe, because it tastes so good, and the gravy is very very rich! The first time my mother in law taught me how to make this (it has been a special dish in her family for a long time now), I knew I was learning something special. And I was right. This recipe now has been a favorite among my family and friends. A memorable reaction from a colleague was when I saw her quietly eating the curry by herself, and I saw her opening and closing her eyes in response to the burst of flavors from the curry :D. She then shook her head (in amazement.....I hope).  I know that sounds exaggerated, but it was truly what happened! I mean, I cannot blame her.... If this does not look beautiful to you, I don't know what it is. Surprisingly, the recipe for making this is not at all complicated, but it is troublesome. The total cooking time for me was about 4 hours, to cook all the meat until it's tender, and the gravy to become like that :). But let me tell ...

What I want to share with you today is actually the missing part of what I have posted before which was the recipe for the chicken liver and gizzards . I should have shown the part where I cleaned the livers and gizzards because apparently, not many people know about it, especially as offal is not very popular as an ingredient in recipes. The process is actually pretty simple, but you have to remember to handle the livers with care because they are pretty delicate. The cleaning process itself is not hard, but it is time consuming, so make sure you plan ahead when you are working with these ingredients. I have made a video on how it is supposed to be done, I hope it helps. Chicken livers are often looked at as an undesirable part of a chicken, but in Asia (including Indonesia, where I'm from), this is not the case. They are considered as one of the most valued delicacies in poultry. You will find it often in Indonesian food. Although they are high in cholesterol, but ...

By now you should know why I love Indonesian food so much. Never mind that I was born and raised in Jakarta, Indonesia, or the fact that my basics in cooking anything is based on Indonesian food recipes.......What was I trying to say again?? Anyways, I love Indonesian food because it involves three top things that I love in food: chili, coconut milk, and chili. Wait, those are two things, but who's counting? So naturally, I love sambal goreng . And not just any sambal goreng, it has to be Indonesian sambal goreng , because it contains stink/ pete beans more often than not*big grin. So I guess I could say the number three ingredient that I like in Indonesian food is pete beans, except I don't eat them....for aesthetics purposes. I have shared with you my recipe for sambal goreng ati ampela . which is basically similar to this one, except in this recipe we work with shrimps instead of chicken innards. Some of the herbs are different, but not by a lot. Basically, we ...

I was planning to post another recipe for Meatless Monday, but I forgot and made black pepper chicken instead (oooppss!). So let's do Meatless Friday instead, well it doesn't have to be a thing, as long as my plan to cut down meat at least once a week is still on track. You can read more about Meatless Monday here . So, black pepper chicken, popular dish. Is it difficult to make? Not at all! The sauce is basically made with oyster sauce and black pepper. And the variations between one recipe to another, that is what you can include in your unique black pepper recipe, is left to the imagination. You can make it with whatever you want, as long as it tastes good and somebody would want to eat it :D. It was many years ago when I first learnt how to make a proper black pepper sauce. At that time I wanted to impress my family by cooking them black pepper crabs. But then later on, I found a kick a** recipe for cooking crabs that is just....beyond words. So, I no longer pair bl...

And so passed the Chinese New Year.  祝你在新的一年里龙马精神. I hope you are also full of energy and everything goes well for you in this new year. My family and I celebrated with a simple meesuah dish as it is the tradition in my husband's family to eat meesuah during Chinese New Year. So what'd happen is, we'd spend the entire day visiting relatives, eating bowls and bowls of meesuah from one place to another. It's hard to describe the sensation you feel after that. You can find my recipe for the mee suah that I made here . I post daily recipes on my Instagram account, so feel free to follow me here . I hope you'd do that :). Anyways, for this next recipe, in Indonesia you'd find this dish in any Chinese restaurant. But peculiarly enough, when you go to China, you will not find this dish (as conveyed by my husband who has visited many times). Even in Singapore, we don't find this dish in the Chinese restaurants also. So, I think it's save to say that t...

Boy, the sound of this dish sure is extreme when you translate it into English. Reminds me of Halloween somehow. But hearing it in Bahasa delivers a calming sensation to my nerves. ' Sambal goreng ati ampela ', I associate this with deliciousness, bursts of flavor, and family :D. But, still, basically this dish really is chicken liver and gizzards cooked in chili, and if you're not used to this type of eating, then this is extreme for you, while it's like candy to me :P. Indonesia has many varieties of sambal goreng , every region has their own take on it, this is only one of them. This is the sambal goreng I grew up with, even though nowadays my mother has altered her recipe, but this is the flavors that I recognize and will soon share with you (complete recipe in the bottom of this post). What I've done here is I've cleaned and cut up to bite size pieces all the liver, gizzards and hearts. I should have showed you how it is done, but I forgot to...

To keep inline with today's theme of Meatless Monday, I decided to post a  vegetarian  (turns out this recipe contains anchovies) veggie dish, that should be satisfying on its own without leaving me feeling something is amiss without the presence of meat. When I thought about filling, satisfying veggie dish, my mind always goes to anything involving coconut gravy. And what better combination with coconut milk if not the stink beans/ pete ??! I think these dynamic duo is the bomb, whenever they're together, they make magic, alleviate a dish to a whole new level, at least that's what I think. It's hard to go wrong if you use these two items together. So I decided to make a veggie dish based entirely off the basic combination between coconut milk and stink beans. To add to the complexity, I decided to throw in fried anchovies/ ikan teri . Just so the coconut milk doesn't taste too heavy, and gives the veggie another layer of flavor. What better veggie that ...