Food

Our first exposure to the Indonesian cuisine came with the canteen for employees: soto ayam soup, steamed rice wrapped in banana leaves, spicy vegetables, deep fried tofu, gado-gado vegetable mix with peanut sause, fish or prawn crackers made of tapioca flour (krupuk), fried fermented soy bean cakes (tempeh), various meats, roasted or stewed. Surprisingly for me, the common utensils at the canteen were not chopsticks, but a very familiar shining steel fork and a... spoon, rather than knife.

The fourth night into our stay, we were all invited to a team dinner at a lovely place featuring local cuisine. Discoveries included dried squid with sesame seeds and soy sauce, fried shrimp in salted egg, stir fried long beans, mushrooms and a multitude of other dishes.

In addition to daily meals, our workshop was lavishly supplied with very tasty snacks, deserts and fresh fruit, which also reminded me of our office in Istanbul. The snack discoveries included lemper (which I attempted to eat along with the banana leaf, but was luckily stopped in time to save me from an ambulance call) and Tahu Sumedang with green chili. The deserts were so overwhelmingly tasty, that my scale at home greeted me with a scream full of pain: “Ouch, that hurts, get off!”

And on Saturday I discovered a young coconut! It is served fresh with ice, with top barely cut off before serving. You drink it through the straw, sweet and transparent, smooth and luxuriously refreshing. And as you disappointingly suck out the last drop, you gratefully discover that the spoon is served so you could scrape off the delicate white flesh from the sides. Yammy!