Rudy Choirudin shares secret recipe for success

Rudy Choirudin shares secret recipe for success

By Stevie Emilia

JAKARTA (JP): When one lays eyes on him, it is difficult to
figure him out as a cook. Don't expect too see his clothes
stained with cooking oil and spices, and don't assume he will
smell like the food he cooks.

With a smile never far from his youthful face, popular cook
Rudy Choirudin Soedarso smells good, and looks very much like a
celebrity clad in the latest fashion.

But when the 35-year-old cook gets down to business, he
becomes really serious.

With an apron covering his clothes, he carefully explains the
ingredients needed to make each dish, showing the prepared
ingredients to the audience before proceeding with the cooking.

Creativity is what makes his food different and tasty. In his
hands, simple traditional food becomes a delicious meal. He uses
his knowledge to mix various foods.

"I'm hoping that I can help popularize Indonesian food," said
Rudy, who specializes in Indonesian cuisine but is also a master
of European, Japanese and Chinese cooking.

"I wish that Indonesian food can be found abroad, too."

Cooking runs in his blood.

Rudy has had a love for cooking since he was a child, and
learnt the skills from his family, especially his mother. His
mother used to run a food stall, restaurant and catering service
to earn extra money to help her police officer husband raise
their seven children. Her children, including Rudy, would help
her in the business.

It's no wonder that by fifth grade, Rudy could already cook
himself macaroni schootel, his favorite food.

"For a fifth grader, macaroni was expensive. That's why I
changed it with instant noodles," giggled the single man.

But being a cook is not his real dream.

Rudy actually wanted to be a doctor. But he had to give up his
dream and swallow the bitter facts after he failed, for the
second time, the exam to enroll in Surabaya's Airlangga
University School of Medicine.

This was a real disappointment for him. But he rejected his
family's suggestion to study other subjects, such as law.

"At that time, I was telling myself, why shouldn't I do what I
really love to, cooking? From my mother, I saw that through her
cooking, she could help my father earn a living for the family,"
said the Surabaya native.

It was then that he decided to study food and beverage at the
Trisakti Tourism Academy in 1985.

Although his family love his cooking, they were not in favor
of his decision to study it seriously. They thought he would end
up a restaurant chef or owner, which are not as prestigious as
other professions, such as a lawyer.

"At that time, only my mother and one of my sisters supported
my decision," said the sixth child.

He proved to them that his decision was right.

Apart from pursuing the title, Rudy also used the academy to
further develop his talents and prove that he is a good cook.

His first break came when he was challenged by his lecturer to
take part in a national food competition. He sent two of his
original recipes to the Nila Chandra's food and cake competition
in 1987, and won second place. He also was placed second in two
other competitions in the same year.

The next year, he came first in three different food
competitions.

Since then, life has run smoothly for Rudy. Right after
graduation, he took up a position as a restaurant manager. But
with not so much to challenge him, he lasted only two-and-half
years in the job.

Rudy is a man who wants to try everything. He worked in the
food section of a women's magazine, and took up a teaching
position in an institute. In 1990, he became a member of the
judging panels of two international food festivals in Hong Kong:
the International Honey Food Festival and the Hong Kong Food
Festival.

But his real break came when he was offered to host private TV
station RCTI's Selera Nusantara cooking program in 1991. The
program was jointly organized with Kartini women's magazine.

The cooking program, which also offered entertainment, turned
out to be a favorite program of viewers. The show was even
considered one of the top-40 cooking programs in the world by a
French television station.

Until today, every Saturday morning, the station still runs
Rudy's cooking program, Resep Rudy Oke, now in cooperation with
Wanita Indonesia tabloid.

Besides hosting the TV show, Rudy also hosts cooking programs
on radio stations, writes best-selling recipe books -- the latest
aimed at busy career women -- holds cooking displays in various
cities, is a judge for cooking competitions and has appeared in
various advertisements.

In spite of all this fame, Rudy is still modest and fun.

After presenting his latest food creation, the world's longest
pepes tuna, a steamed 1.75-meter-long and 90-kilogram tuna
wrapped in banana leaves, which took him two-days to prepare and
was presented at Megamal Pluit in North Jakarta on Wednesday, he
wiped sweat from his face and talked to The Jakarta Post
backstage.

Here is an excerpt from the interview.

Question: You do many things. What do you say your profession
is?

Answer: I am a cook for entertainment. I do not cook for
restaurants or hotels. What I am doing is simply for educational
reasons. I want to share my knowledge with those who need it.

Q: Do you think you are successful?

A: Yes, thank God. My wish was not exactly like this, but God
gives me more. My wish is actually really simple ... but it turns
out that God has given me more, so I want to share my knowledge
with others.

Q: What is your wish, actually?

A: It's simple, really. I want to be useful and I want everything
I give to others to be useful too. The first thing is certainly
my knowledge. Simple, right.

Q: What's happened to your wish of becoming a doctor?

A: (He laughs hard) It has not come true, all right. But me and a
doctor are the same, you know. We both make resep. But a doctor's
patients are sick people, while my patients are beautiful people.

(In Indonesian, doctors give resep, or prescriptions, and a
cook also makes resep, or recipes)

Q: What's your key to success?

A: First, honesty, and then, discipline. I always try to be
disciplined, at least on myself. I can't ask others to be
disciplined if I'm not.

For me, it's better to spend more time doing something as long
as it makes you satisfied. And I thank my late parents for that.
They taught me about honesty and discipline although they did not
know what I would become then.

Q: Here, cooking is considered a woman's job. Is it OK with you
to do it?

A: I know that it's not a common thing for people here to see man
doing the cooking. Why? Because here, it is usually housewives
who do the cooking.

But in my opinion, cooking is art and art can belong to
everyone. So, I do not mind cooking although I am a man.

And I have no plans to take on a housewife's job. Instead, I'm
helping them to prepare food for their families in an easy but
fast way, so they can enjoy themselves too instead of spending
all their time cooking.

So cooking is an art, it can belong to either men, women, the
poor or the rich. It's for everyone to enjoy it.

Q: Does that mean you hate eating out?

A: Oh, don't get me wrong. I love eating out. I'm not picky about
food. Sometimes, I'm eating out not only to entertain myself, but
also to find something new. Whenever I eat something, I think of
the recipe needed to make the food.

But when I'm invited to eat out, I only keep my opinion, if
the food lacks something, deep in my heart. I won't say anything
unless I'm asked, 'What do you think of the food, Rud?'. Then, I
will say my opinion, then just don't feel offended.

Q: Why can't Indonesian food be as popular as Chinese and
Japanese food?

A: I have talked about the matter many times. In my opinion,
Indonesian food can be as popular as Chinese and Japanese food
if, in the first place, we can appreciate our food. If we can
appreciate our food, we won't like other people's food.

So, anytime there's foreign guests coming to the country, or
visiting your house, serve them Indonesian food, not foreign
food. They'll like it, because it's the country's specialty. And
with our promotion, Indonesian food can become popular. After it
becomes popular, there will be no problem opening franchises
abroad.

Q: Don't you ever want to run your own restaurant?

A: Not now. But I will consider it if there's an offer from
someone who has the same ideas as me, emphasizing Indonesian
food.

Q: With your tight schedule, do you have time for yourself?

A: No, I'm the kind of person who enjoys everything that I have.
If I'm in Jakarta and I don't have any activities scheduled for
me, I would rather not go anywhere, I stay at home most of the
time, taking care of my antiques or my birds.

Q: What do you really want to do in your life?

A: I want to be like my mother, selling nasi bungkus (rice boxes)
anywhere. So, don't be surprised if you see me one day selling
nasi bungkus... I remember that I used to help my mother prepare
it when I was a kid. I really enjoyed it. And it is not only
about the material gain, but I feel some kind of satisfaction.

I also want to keep sharing my knowledge with everyone through
my show... I received some letters thanking me, telling me that
my recipes that they saw on TV have helped them run their own
business. Such things really make me happy.