What do people eat in Indonesia?
Indonesians eat rice at almost every meal, breakfast included, with a few side dishes and sambal, and they eat with a spoon and fork or with the right hand.
Typical dishes and their calories
Breakfast
Breakfast is rice or rice porridge, eaten early and often bought from a cart. Nasi uduk is rice cooked in coconut milk with egg, tempeh and sambal, and bubur ayam is rice porridge with shredded chicken and crackers. Yesterday's rice is fried into nasi goreng, about 610 kcal a plate. Many people add sweet tea or coffee and a fried snack.
Lunch
Lunch, around 12:00, is often nasi campur: a plate of rice with small portions of vegetables, tempeh, egg and meat. In a warung, a small family eatery, the dishes stand behind glass and you point at what you want. Gado gado, blanched vegetables, egg and tofu with peanut sauce, is a common lunch at about 420 kcal.
Dinner
Dinner is often between 18:00 and 20:00. In many homes the food is cooked once in the day and left covered on the table, so everyone eats when they are hungry. It is rice with a soup or curry, a vegetable dish, fried tempeh or tofu and sambal. Rendang, beef cooked slowly in coconut milk and spices from West Sumatra, is about 560 kcal with rice.
Starters
There are no real starters, everything comes to the table together. Krupuk, crisp crackers made from prawn or fish, are eaten at the start and with the meal. Satay, grilled skewers of chicken, goat or beef with peanut sauce, is about 400 kcal for five. In a Padang restaurant the waiter sets out a dozen small plates and you pay only for what you eat.
Desserts
After a meal Indonesians usually eat fruit, such as papaya, mango, salak or rambutan. Sweets are snacks: klepon are rice flour balls filled with palm sugar and rolled in coconut, es campur and es cendol are iced drinks with coconut milk, jelly and palm sugar, and martabak manis is a thick sweet pancake sold in the evening.
Drinks
Es teh manis, sweet iced tea, is the usual drink with a meal. Kopi tubruk is coarse ground coffee with hot water and sugar, drunk once the grounds settle at the bottom. Jamu, herbal drinks of turmeric, ginger and tamarind, are still sold by street sellers in the morning. Most Indonesians are Muslim, and many do not drink alcohol.
Street food
Street food comes from carts and stalls called kaki lima. Bakso, beef meatball soup at about 390 kcal a bowl, is pushed through neighbourhoods on carts. Soto ayam, a turmeric chicken soup, is about 440 kcal. Pisang goreng, fried banana at about 305 kcal for two, and martabak telur, a stuffed savoury pancake, are evening favourites.
Normal there, odd elsewhere
Many Indonesians feel they have not really eaten until they have had rice, so fried noodles can come with rice on the side. Eating with the right hand is normal in many places, and the left hand stays off the food. Avocado is a sweet drink here, jus alpukat, blended with sugar and topped with chocolate syrup. Tempeh was first written about in Java in 1815.