Tabbouleh

ato
Tabbouleh is a lebaneese salad. It is one of my favourite salad. It was fun doing some experiments to find the real taste of tabbouleh since I never saw nor taste it. My reference was through some recipes on the internet and of course, Karim, as he is a lebaneese :-). You may find many variations of tabbouleh and yes I think you can make your own variations of it. But never do that in front of a true lebaneese for he/she will not like it! :-) The tabbouleh is using olive oil, lemon and salt for its sauce. It's typical medditeranean salad sauce, I think. You will find a similar taste in Italy too. Salt is used to balance the sour taste of the lemon, but it supposed to be... lemony (that's what Karim told me, so better listen to the old guy :P). Happy trying!

Ingredients:
Bulghur
Cucumber
Tomato
Mint leaves
Flat peterseli leaves
Lemon
Olive oil
Salt

How to make:
1. Chop cucumber and tomato, make them tiny cubicle ones. Put them on bulghur so the water from the cucumber and tomato will absorbed by the bulghur and they become soft and yummy to eat. Bulghur is very healthy. Basically, it's a chopped wheat seed. It's expensive in Indonesia, you can only find it in imported section or.. a middle east or south asian store (some said that there is a nice Indian store in Fatmawati, but I haven't found it yet).

2. Put the sauce. Put the salad in the refrigerator.

Indonesian Fried Chicken

There are so many ways of making Indonesian fried chicken. But basically, you boiled the chicken with some spices and then, fried them. The differences are on what kind of spices do you use. You can try the most simplest one (by using some garlics and ginger) or a complex one. And yes, there are different degrees of complexity, so there is a room for you to try something new? *devil mode*.

Ingredients
Half chicken or 2-3 large chicken breast or drumsticks
3-5 cloves of garlic
7 small red onions
Half of onion
2 cm of ginger. Crush it. Or 2 tea spoon of ginger powder.
1 lemon grass
2-3 indian bay leaves
20 ml of coconut milk
1 spoon of olive oil
1/3 tea spoon of salt


How to cook
1. Put in a blender: garlic, small red onions, onion, ginger.
2. Fry it with one spoon of olive oil in a medium cooking pan. Put the lemon grass and the indian bay leaves.
3. When you smell something nice from the spices (yes, this is a traditional way to see that the spices are cooked enough and to put the chicken :P). Put the chicken, add some water -1/3 cup- and leave it for 3 minutes or until it is boiled.
3. Pour the coconut milk, add some water again, around half to 1 cup, turn the stove to low heat, and leave it until it gets dried.
4. Fried the chicken.

Culinary Culture: Mediterranean

Since ancient times, settlers, colonizers, and empires spread out across the area, introducing new produce, utensils, and methods, and leaving their mark everywhere. The first wave of colonists -- the Phoenecians, Greeks, and Romans -- established the trinity of wheat, olives and vines. The Arabs, who were the dominant force beginning in the seventh century (they occupied part of Spain for 700 years and Sicily for 200), established new trading systems and spread the cultivation of foods such as rice, sugarcane, apricots, and oranges (bitter oranges and lemons were known to the Romans), pomegranates, dates, bananas, artichokes, spinach, and eggplants. Other important influences were the kingdom of Catalunya, which conquered Sicily, Sardinia and Naples and penetrated the south of France; and the crown of Aragon, which had possessions around the Mediterranean.

The Normans and the Republic of Venice, which had colonies as far away as Alezandria, also introduced their cooking styles to the Mediterranean shores. One of the greatest unifying forces was the Ottoman Empire, which lasted for 500 years until its collapse at the end of World War I. It spread a style of cooking, drawn from its conquered territories, to all the nations in the empire.

Apart from empires and colonists, movements of populations contributed to an interchange of cooking styles: the Moors returned to North Africa after their expulsion from Spain, Tunisians moved to Palermo to build the cathedral, Sicilian peasants were brought to Algeria by the French colonists to work the land, troubadours and jongleurs from southern France were seen in Italy and Catalonia, and spice merchants and itinerant traders were seen everywhere. More recently, the French pieds noirs, resettling in the south of France, and immigrant workers from North Africa, have had an enormous impact.

A surprisingly unified culinary culture was woven from these disparate threads: Andalusia, Provence, and southern Italy have more in common with their maritime neighbors than with the northern regions of their own countries. Throughout the Mediterranean cooks use the same clay pots, the same wood-burning ovens, mortars and pestles, skewers, and grills. You find similar dishes: cooked vegetables preserved in olive oil and eaten cold, stuffed vegetables, fluffy vegetable omelettes, rice dishes, creamy puddings, almond pastries and tomato sauce, the signature of Mediterranean cuisine.

Yellow Coconut Rice (Nasi Kuning)

A friend of mine asked me to put some pictures. Well, here is one of them. It's my first lunch in the Hague. It was yellow coconut rice with Indonesian fried chicken, steamed broccoli and fresh cucumber. I didn't bring my rice cooker at that time, so I just cooked it by a cooking technic which we call it "liwet". The same technic more or less is applied in making a plao, a vegetarian rice from Pakistan. My crazy flatmates, Zaka, taught me. Hope you enjoy this yummy yellow rice.



Ingredients:
1 cup of rice
2 cup of water (well, the amount of water depends on what kind of rice that you use)
half to 1 tea spoon of kunyit powder (I forget the english name for kunyit. I'll find it in the dictionary later :P)
1 lemon grass, crushed it.
1 indian bay leaf (daun salam)
20-30 ml of coconut milk
2-3 small red onions or half onion. Chopped it.
half tea spoon of salt

How to Cook:
1. Put some water to rice until it gets wet a little bit. Put half tea spoon of kunyit powder, mix it until the rice turns a little bit yellow. Add some more if you think it's not yellow enough :-) but not too much, otherwise the taste will be a little bit bitter.
2. Put everything, crushed lemon grass, chopped onion, indian bay leaf, water, coconut milk and half tea spoon of salt.
3. Put it on the stove. Medium heat. When the water is dried, turn to low heat, close the pan and leave it for 15-30 minutes. Or you can use rice cooker, that's easier! :-)

Basic Bouillon for Your Health

My mom has been sick since I was in high school. TBC, diabetes mellitus (DM), herpes, etc (yes, she's a collector :P). She has been a DM patient since I was born (that's why I was such a big cute baby :P). The DM was getting worse about 3-5 years ago. Everytime she has cold, it fells like she suffers from a dangerous disease. She is also becoming very sensitive to pain, because the DM also affected her nerve system. Well, every time her body is "not delicious" (This is actually a joke where we suppose to act like stupid Indonesians who are translating word by word literally from English to Indonesian. You should be able to speak bahasa to understand this joke :P). Anyway, here is my favourite recipe for my mom, everytime she is sick. This is a basic recipe to make bouillon. You can make different kind of foods by using this basic bouillon recipe from chicken soup and pourige to my version of nasi hainan. The bouillon is good to increase our immune system.

Ingredients:
1-2 pieces of chicken or 250gr chicken fillet
4 cm ginger or 4 tea spoons of ginger powder
10 cloves of Indonesian red onions or 1 clove of onion
3 cloves of garlic
Salt

How to cook:
1. Chop the onions, garlic. Chop or smash the ginger. It is better if you fried the ginger (without oil- how do you call frying without oil? hehehe... me and my terrible english!) first.
2. Boil half of pan of water.
3. Put the chicken. After 10 minutes, put the onions, garlic, ginger and salt. After 5 minutes, turn off the stove.
4. The bouillon is ready to be used for soup, pourige or nasi hainan.

Beef/bacon/chicken and Yummy Bread for Breakfast

There isn't much alternatives for the eggs in the morning. The "conventional" options are usually either you fry it, make a "telur mata sapi" egg, or boil it, or make a scramble egg or "telur dadar" (sorry for my english limitation :P). Booooring. On the other side, there isn't much alternatives for the bread in the morning. So, I combine these two, bread and egg with milk :-) Of course you can still eat it with a conventional (continental) breakfast, with beef/bacon/ham/chicken or any other fatty but yummy meat :-) A tribute for meat lovers in the morning! :-)

Ingredients:
4-8 slices of bread
2-4 eggs, stir it
Half cup of milk
Salt
Lots of Pepper (if you're a pepper person like me :P)
Cooking oil
Beef/bacon/ham/chicken or any other kind of meat that you like :)

How to cook:
1. Stir the eggs, mix it with half cup of milk. Add some salt and pepper. If you're an Indonesian, you will probably add some sugar too. Nope, just kidding :-) But you can put some chili or chili powder if you like. Put the bread in it so both sides of the bread are covered by it. Fried the bread, whether it is medium or well-done, it's your preference! As for me, I like it well-done :-)
2. Fried the beef/bacon/ham/chicken or any other kind of meat that you like.
3. If you're an Indonesian, you will probably eat it with chili sauce, even for breakfast :-)

Alternatives: you can also add some cheese either in the eggs and the milk or after it is fried.

Smoked Salmon Salad with Mushroom Sauce

I just loooove smoked salmon. And hey, eating vegetable is very healthy and has lots of benefits. This salad is a mix of steamed fresh or canned vegetables (brocoli, carrots, sweet corns, and beans), smoked salmon and with mushroom sauce. I used to make this everytime I was invited to a party during my study at ISS. I hope you can enjoy this!

Ingredients:
Carrots
Brocoli
Sweet corns
Beans
2 boxes of mushroom
250-500 gr of smoked salmon
Salt and pepper
1 spoon of olive oil
1 sache of instant mushroom creamy soup
1 glass of water
2 cloves of garlic
half or 1 clove of onion

How to cook:
1. Steam the brocoli and carrots. Put it in a medium/large salad bowl. Add canned veggies: sweet corns and beans. Add large chopped smoked salmon.
2. For the mushroom sauce: put a tea spoon of olive oil in a medium cooking pan, put garlic and onions wait for 30 seconds then put the mushrooms. Add salt, pepper and pour half cup of water. Wait for 1-2 minutes. Put 1 sache of instant mushroom creamy soup in half cup of cold water, stir it and pour it in the pan. Mix it for 1 minute and the creamy mushroom sauce is ready! You can add smoked cheese if you like.

My Version of Nasi Hainan

It is my simple version of nasi hainan. Very easy to cook. Just put everything in the rice cooker and let it cook for itself :-). I "invented" it when my mom went home from the hospital after all of her toes were operated. I cooked this yummy food for her in the morning and she can easily turn on the rice cooker, it is still hot when she's having it for lunch :-)

Ingredients:
1-2 pieces of chicken or 250gr of chopped chicken fillet
1-2 cups of rice
Chopped vegetables (carrots, beans, anything you like)
Mushrooms (if you like)
1-2 cloves garlic
1 cloves onion
2 cm ginger or 1 tea spoon of ginger powder
1 tea spoon of sesame oil
1 tea spoon vegetable oil
Salt and pepper

How to Cook:
1. Boil the chicken or the chicken fillet with garlic and add some salt, pepper and ginger or ginger powder to make a basic bouillon (or chicken stock).
2. Put the rice in the rice cooker and pour the bouillon. Add the vegetable and sesame oil. You can also add extra garlic, onion, pepper, ginger or ginger powder and salt. Turn on the rice cooker.
3. Five minutes before the rice is cooked, put all the vegetables and the mushrooms into the rice cooker.

My Version of Chicken Lemon with Mint

This is one of my favourites recipes. It is very easy to cook, using chicken fillet. It is more healthy because you leave out the chicken skin which contains all those unhealthy fat :-) Highly recommended for the beginners :-)

Ingredients:
500 gr chicken fillet, chopped it.
Mushroom
Vegetables (carrots, beans,anything you like)
1-2 cloves garlic
1 cloves onion
Chilies or paprika (if you like it spicy :P)
Mint leaves
1-2 lemon
vegetable oil or any kind of healthy cooking oil
salt and pepper

How to Cook:

1. Heat up the stove. Put two table spoon of oil, wait for 1 minutes.
2. Put garlic, wait for around 15 seconds and put the onions, wait for another 15 seconds.
3. Put the chopped chicken filled until it colours turn to white, and pour some water, wait for 10 minutes
   
4. Put the mushrooms, 15 seconds later the veggies, chilies (if you like), salt and pepper.
5. After another 5 minutes, put everything on the plate and pour squezeed lemon and mint leaves. Ready to be served.

Welcome to My Cooking Studio!

I arrived at The Hague, Netherlands, on September 1st, 2005. I took my master degree in developing studies at the Institute of Social Studies (ISS). Actually, there are many abreviations for ISS, other than Institute of Social Studies. It can be that cleaning service company in the hague :) or "Institute Sekolah Sinting" (according to Ery), or "Institute Senang Senang " (according to us :P)

Anyway, ISS is a great place to learn and to interact with other people from all around the world. Indeed, ISS is a micro world within Den Haag, with 185 students from at least 60 countries all over the world. Sure you would instantly feel the multiculturalism atmoshphere there. Different people, different cultures and traditions, including different taste of foods and drinks! What an experience!

With all those schedules, assignments, group works, essays, exams bla bla bla the boring stuffs of course :) still we must find some time to do some things that we really loveeeee to do for: cooking experiments! trying something new from my neighbours or making my own recipes. And this blog records those cooking experiments during my study in The Hague and when I got back to Indonesia.
Hope you will enjoy the recipes :-)

cheers,

Herni S. Nurbayanti