Enthusiasts flock to Betawi food festival
Evi Mariani, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
"Wow, these look really lekker," a middle-aged woman uttered enthusiastically, while looking at nasi ulam and the side dishes served on a long table at the Heritage Food in Heritage City 2004 on Sunday. Lekker is the Dutch word for tasty or delicious.
On another table were some rarely seen fruits like breadfruit and gembili (a variety of potato), all served for free. Steven, 34, recalled how he used to eat gohok (sour grapelike fruit) taken from the trees around his elementary school in Central Jakarta.
"It has been ages ... now it is not easy to find the fruit around here," he said.
Dadi, a member of the event committee, said they found the fruit around Condet in East Jakarta, where some old Betawi (native Jakartan) families still live.
Thousands of Jakartans flocked to the National Archive building on Jl. Gadjah Mada in Central Jakarta, to experience Betawi culinary festival organized by the museum enthusiast club Sahabat Museum and food club Jalansutra.
Visitors could taste at least 12 dishes like soto tangkar and nasi kebuli, two traditional beverages and various snacks like kue ku and dodol Betawi (taffy).
There was also a display on how to prepare sweet, sticky taffy, by Nasir from Bogor, which involved many ingredients and a lot of muscle power.
"It is basically made of sticky rice, coconut milk and palm sugar. To have the best taste, I have to stir the dough for at least seven hours without stopping," he said, while continually stirring the dough in a large kettle over smoldering charcoal.
By noon, some 1,500 tickets had been sold for the event, which ended at about 9:30 p.m. Each visitor paid 30,000 (US$3.30) to enter the compound and get a complimentary roti buaya (crocodile- shaped bread).
"The number reached was way beyond our target of 1,500 total for the whole day. As of 4 p.m., we estimated 3,000 visitors had come," said Lisa Virgiano, one of the organizers.
She acknowledged that the "happy news" carried with it some consequences: There was a shortage of food and water for about an hour.
Many beverages like selendang mayang and bir plethok had been sold out by lunch. Even bottled water was sold out, and some visitors had to go out of the compound to get water.
To have a taste of the food, visitors had to buy coupons that could be refunded later.
A portion of lontong cap gomeh (white rice wrapped in leaf eaten with gravy of coconut milk) priced at Rp 17,000, while gurame kuah pecak (fried fish in thick coconut milk with peanuts, chili peppers and cashew nuts) was tagged at Rp 20,000.
To have nasi ulam, visitors had to pay Rp 5,000, but if they wanted side dishes like dendeng (thinly sliced fried meat) or salted squid, they had to pay more.
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Another committee member, Harry, said that the entrance fee was fair because the visitors got to see some interesting attractions.
In addition there were discussions about food featuring renowned food enthusiast Bondan Winarno, and there was a cooking demo as well as art performances.
Despite the scorching heat, visitors --mostly younger middle class families-- braved the open air, watching an Indian tabla (percussion performance) put on by the Nehru Cultural Center and a Chinese dragon dance and a lion dance.