Nasi Goreng Indonesian

Ingredients for 4 servings:

• 400 g rice
• 300 g chicken breast
• 4 large shallots
• n. B. shrimp paste
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1 chili pepper(s)
• 5 spring onions
• 200 g Chinese cabbage
• 10 g glutamate
• 10 ml fish sauce, or 30 g shrimp paste
• some soy sauce, sweet, (Ketjap Manis)
• some oil

Instructions

Working time approx. 30 minutes; Rest period approx. 1 day; Cooking/baking time approx. 1 hour; Total time approx. 1 day 1 hour 30 minutes

a recipe from my Indonesian colleague

First, cook the rice the day before until it’s just cooked through, but as grainy and dry as possible. Store the cooled rice in a sealed container in the refrigerator. This results in rice that’s easy to fry without becoming sticky. Finely dice the shallots, garlic, and 1-3 chilies, or roughly chop them in a blender. Sauté them with any amount of shrimp paste in plenty of hot oil in a large, deep pan or wok. It will smell strongly of fish. Add the finely sliced ​​chicken and fry briefly over moderate heat. Add 3-4 tablespoons of soy sauce and 2 tablespoons of MSG and add the cold rice to the pan. Fry this mixture at a good temperature, stirring occasionally. Don’t skimp on the oil during this phase. The rice should brown nicely on the bottom before each stirring. This takes about 15 minutes. Finely slice the spring onions and Chinese cabbage, stir in, and fry for another 2 minutes. Season everything with sweet Indonesian soy sauce, fish sauce, pepper, chili, and a dash of lemon juice. For an Indonesian version, you can add a fried egg to the rice. For the Chinese version, add 1-2 eggs stirred into the rice. I think it’s delicious without eggs too. Tip: In my experience, you should use as little water as possible when cooking the rice, but enough to cook it. Steaming has been very successful for me too. I also think the type of rice is crucial. I got the best results with rice from Indonesia; using Thai rice made a terrible mush. Shrimp paste gives it a wonderful flavor, but you can also replace it with fish sauce. Not everyone has MSG at home, but it can be replaced with soy sauce if necessary. Otherwise, all the ingredients are extremely versatile. As with paella, you can add all kinds of finely chopped meat and fish. You can also add pieces of tomato, cucumber, or other vegetables shortly before the end of the cooking time.