'Bakpia' stands out as local snack favorite
'Bakpia' stands out as local snack favorite
Israr Ardiansyah, The Jakarta Post, Yogyakarta
Anytime a friend or relative returns from Yogyakarta, he or
she usually brings a box of Bakpia Pathuk, the city's most
popular traditional snack, as a gift.
It's not hard to find. When passing through Yogyakarta's
touristed streets, local residents -- from sidewalk traders to
pedicab drivers -- will happily offer to take you to buy this
round-shaped delicacy.
The history of bakpia, which originates from the Chinese word
bak (or pork) and pia (meaning cookie), starts at the 500-meter-
long street, Jl. Aipda K.S. Tubun -- better known as Jl. Pathuk,
a small street about 100 meters west of Jl. Malioboro.
The location becomes the mang beans-filled snack's most
frequently used name, Bakpia Pathuk.
The owner of one especially popular bakpia business, known as
Bakpia 75, Yenny Susanto, (better known as Bu, or Mrs. Yenny,)
said that the bakpia business has gone through a long
evolutionary process to become what it is today.
Once upon a time, the snack used pork as its filling, the 59-
year-old woman said.
However, "since there were many Muslims shopping here, we
changed its ingredients," to conform to the dietary needs of
followers of Islam, who shun pork, Yenny said.
Instead, her business has experimented with other types of
fillings, including chocolate and cheese. But in the end, "our
customers preferred the mang beans," she said.
The tradition of bakpia making was begun by a group of
Indonesians of Chinese descent living in Jl. Pathuk, who had been
making the traditional Chinese pork-filled snack for their own
consumption.
The late Liem Bok Sing, Yenny's mother-in-law, started the
mung bean-filled bakpia business in 1948 in her 150-square-meter
home under the brand name of Bakpia 75, an allusion to the number
of her street address.
Soon after, another company started up under its own brand
name of Bakpia 38.
Until the early 90s, both companies -- Bakpia 75 and Bakpia 38
-- dominated the business.
Competition grew fierce at the beginning of the 1990s,
however, when Bakpia 75 chef Sonder quit to set up his own
bakpia-making classes.
He taught people from Pathuk and surrounding areas like
Suryotarunan, Ngadiwinatan, Purwodiningratan, Mertolulutan, and
Ngampilan. He also offered to give lessons in bakpia-making to
people from other faraway places.
One bakpia maker, Titi Lestari, better known as Tari, recalled
that Sonder disclosed all the bakpia secrets at a cheap price.
"Regardless the number of participants, only paid Rp 25,000 in
1991 to attend his class. It was very cheap compared with what we
could earn later with our newfound knowledge," the 35-year-old
woman said.
Tari put her knowledge to use by opening her own bakpia
business when she moved to neighboring town of Klaten in 1996.
"I can earn a net profit up to Rp 20,000 per day from selling
bakpia," she said. For her, it was a pleasant surprise, since she
lives less than 40 kilometers east of Yogyakarta.
These days, Jl. Pathuk itself is always crowded with hungry
people looking for the snack -- especially on weekends.
At the Hyatt Regency in Yogyakarta, Public Relations Manager
Atik Wildan discovered that Bakpia Pathuk met her taste.
"I eat many kinds of bakpia, like those from East Java, but I
find bakpia from Pathuk more crunchy and tasty, especially when
it's fresh from the oven," she said.
Hundreds of bakpia makers from all over Yogyakarta prefer to
use numbers for their brand names, like Bakpia 25, 477 or 97, for
instance.
According to Darajat, the village chief of Ngampilan where Jl.
Pathuk is located, some 150 families of the village's 13,717
residents run bakpia businesses.
Each business, in turn, employs up to 20 workers.
Bakpia is now filled with mang beans, and some even carry a
Halal certificate (according to Muslim dietary requirements) from
the Indonesian Council of Ulemas (MUI).
To improve their sales, most bakpia makers give a 20 percent
commission to local guides, pedicab or taxi drivers that bring
customers to their businesses.
One taxi driver, Somad, said that one bakpia trader even gave
him Rp 4,000 for every purchase of Rp 10,000 by his passengers.
Tough competition, however, has not made any long time players
like Yenny desperate.
Yenny said that her business is not affected by tougher
competition stemming from the emergence of more players in the
area.
"We have our own loyal customers. I believe it's a lucky way
to earn a living -- not just for myself, but everyone," she said.
She said that doesn't even harbor a grudge against Sonder who,
after working for her from 1995 to 1998, left to teach others the
bakpia's secret recipe.