Garuda Indonesia Colours Magazine October 2013 | Page 96
94
Explore | Flavours
Explore | Flavours
© Suzanty Sitorus
FEEDING THE NATION
‘Eating around Surabaya’
95
Photography by
Suzanty Sitorus
Surabaya is a short flight from Bali.
Board the plane, buckle up, read
a mag (this one!) and you’re there.
Indonesia’s second-largest city
is a thriving metropolis, but apart
from eating, the reason you should
book a ticket there right now is to
enjoy Surabaya’s new lease of life.
Surabaya dapat dicapai hanya
dengan penerbangan singkat dari
Bali. Baru sebentar membaca majalah
ini, tak terasa Anda sudah sampai
di kota tujuan. Selain daya tarik
kulinernya, Anda sebaiknya memesan
tiket dari sekarang, untuk menikmati
suasana baru Kota Surabaya.
Once upon a time, Surabaya was known for its high
crime rate, which often goes hand-in-hand with
a bustling port city, but with Surabaya’s first female
mayor, Tri Rismaharini, running the place with
a proverbial iron fist, Surabaya is now sparkling and
its citizens well behaved. The town is resplendent
with clean, well-swept roads, pristine rivers,
manicured, tree-lined boulevards, well-cared-for
government buildings and obvious affluence.
Business is booming.
Dahulu Surabaya terkenal dengan angka
kejahatannya yang tinggi, hal yang memang biasa
didapati pada kota dekat pelabuhan. Tetapi dengan
terpilihnya Wali Kota wanita pertama,
Tri Rismaharini, yang memerintah dengan tegas,
Surabaya tampil bersinar dengan angka kejahatan
yang menurun. Kota ini tampak indah dengan jalanan
dan sungainya yang bersih, deretan pohon dan
gedung-gedung pemerintahan yang terawat. Berbagai
bisnis pun mengalami kemajuan pesat.
Janet DeNeefe
In 2004 Janet created
the international Ubud
Writers & Readers
Festival. It has been
named by Harper’s
Bazaar, UK, as ‘one of
the top festivals in the
world’ and by ABC’s
Asia-Pacific network
as ‘the next Edinburgh
Festival of Asia’. In 2011,
her cookbook Bali:
The Food of My Island
Home was released
and includes her
favourite recipes.
Bali, Indonesia
I’m here for the business
of eating, and Surabaya
does this supremely well.
But I’m here for the business of eating, and
Surabaya does this supremely well. The streets are
lined with eateries, from swanky air-conditioned
establishments and cafés called ‘depots’, to food
carts and breezy makeshift roadside food stalls that
sell anything from bakso, tofu and martabak to
grilled fish, curries and rice porridge until the
wee hours. Let’s face it, part of the pleasure of
travelling is food, and I am here to eat as
much as my waistline will allow.
I arrive at dinnertime and head for Bon Ami
Restaurant in an area known as Surabaya’s golden
triangle. It is a spacious, old Dutch colonial-style
home-turned-restaurant where neat, uniformed
staff serve local specialities and European dishes
to a packed house. I feel like I am eating in someone’s
dining room, and if the walls could talk there would
be great stories to tell. The menu features a curious
mix of European and Indonesian classics along with
steak, ice cream and baked goods. It is here that my
gastronomic food tour begins, and we tuck into some
of my perennial favourites: urap, a healthy mix of
sprouts, vegetables and grated coconut with chilli
and lime leaves; lontong cap gomeh, compressed
rice cake lathered in galangal-scented chicken curry
with Siamese squash and trimmings; tahu gunting,
deep-fried scissor-sliced tofu; and pecel, a gado-gadostyle dish of blanched vegetables with homemade
peanut sauce; and chicken satay, Madura style.
Surprisingly delicious and a great way to
start a weekend of eating!
The town is resplendent with clean, well-swept roads,
pristine rivers, manicured, tree-lined boulevards, wellcared-for government buildings and obvious affluence.
The next day begins with a visit to the local
market, Pasar Turi. Before entering, I head for the
sticky-rice cake sellers perched outside for some
sweet sustenance to start the day, all drizzled with
palm sugar syrup. An abundance of different types
of fish paste and ready-made spice pastes marks
Surabaya’s culinary style. I buy the special paste for
wok-fried kangkung (water spinach) to test at home.
Our visit ends with a turmeric tonic from the herbal
tonic man outside. “I’ve been selling jamu, or herbal
tonics, for 40 years,” he tells me proudly, “and the
money I have made has helped me put all my
children through university.”
Bu Rudy is one of Surabaya’s great celebrity chefs.
Her sambal is claimed to be the best in the world
(according to Bu Rudy herself) and I’m here to verify
this fact. The entrance of this thriving restaurant is
filled with row upon row of packaged cakes, krupuk,
dried meats, rice snacks, candy and small packagedrice meals; you name it, they sell it.
Bu Rudy is proud of her achievements – there’s
no doubt about it. The restaurant walls are lined
with framed photos of Bu Rudy, in evening attire,
taken with well-known Indonesian movie stars,
rock stars, ambassadors and politicians. And if that’s
not enough, there is also a flat-screen TV projecting
large images of Bu Rudy rubbing shoulders with
even more celebrities, one after another after
another. And in case you somehow miss the photos,
a large banner with her smiling, earnest face hangs
inside and outside the restaurant. I can think of no
other country where a condiment is elevated to star
status, in this case, shrimp sambal. And the
place is packed, with constant turnover.
We manage to secure a table amidst the crowds
and dine on Bu Rudy’s tempe penyet, one of the best
I have eaten, along with a serving of her winning
sambal: a bold flavour with the elegant presence
of shrimp. I leave the establishment envious of Bu
Rudy’s astute marketing skills and business acumen
in cornering the national market to frenzied capacity.
Should I also hang my photo in my restaurants?
Grinding fresh peanut sauce.
Ikan bandeng asap – smoked milk fish
in coconut coating.
Fresh chili sambal.
Tahu gunting with sambal kecap.
Smoked milk fish, known as
Ikan Bandeng.