Roasted kebabs from Southeast Asia and delicious Satay
In the hot summer, the most representative food at night is barbecue and crayfish. The aroma of barbecue and the delicious crayfish make many people addicted to night markets and stalls. In fact, looking around the world, every country has its own favorite food in midsummer. Among them, in Southeast Asia, the most representative of this thing is the protagonist of today’s article, Satay.
1、 A century old delicacy
Satay, also known as Satay (Indonesian: sate; Malay: Satay), is a kind of barbecue skewer with unique flavor, mainly originated in Indonesia, and is also very common in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and other places. After the ingredients are pickled, they are put on bamboo sticks, and then baked with charcoal fire. When eating, they are matched with spicy sauces and side dishes, which are very popular with local people.
In Indonesia, where it originated, satay is an important part of local cuisine, whether it is a big city or a small village, a street stall or a high-end restaurant. This is mainly due to the mixed cooking art produced by Indonesia’s multi-ethnic culture and ethnic integration. It is similar to Chinese grilled string, Japanese baked string and European and American Kabo string. It even won the 14th place in the world’s most delicious food in 2011. For a street snack, this is quite a good achievement.
According to historical records, the prototype of Satay is a kind of barbecue kebab in India, and the latter was originally from western Asia. At the beginning of the 19th century, many Indians and Middle Eastern people came to the Dutch East India. They combined their national food habits with local ingredients, and finally created the delicious Satay. Soon after, satay cuisine with its own characteristics appeared on every island of the Dutch East India. In the late 19th century, satay began to spread from the Dutch East India to Thailand, Malaysia and other places, and eventually spread throughout Southeast Asia.
Influenced by religious customs, satay in Indonesia and Malaysia mainly focuses on beef, mutton and seafood. At the same time, the Dutch colonists in Indonesia also brought this Southeast Asian food back to Europe. Later, this delicious and cheap street food began to enter bars and restaurants and became the favorite food for local people.
The hardworking and brave Chinese people also brought the soul of this delicacy — satay sauce back to China after working in Nanyang. After continuous improvement and integration, another classic condiment, the soul dip of Chaoshan hotpot — Shacha sauce, was finally born. Beef and green vegetables made with sand tea sauce are also popular delicacies in Chaoshan area.
In the hot and humid Southeast Asia, in order to make the ingredients not perishable, many local dishes like to pickle the ingredients with spices and fruits before making. Satay is the best representative. Generally speaking, chicken, beef and mutton are the main ingredients of Satay. In non Muslim areas, pork is also used for cooking. In addition, game and seafood are also one of the ingredients of Satay.
A prepared satay, in addition to the meat string itself, will also be matched with a Malay zongzi (Malay: ketupat) made of rice, cut cucumber pieces and raw onion pieces; If it is pork satay, it is matched with satay sauce containing pineapple and pickled cucumber, in order to relieve the greasiness and improve the taste.
Although Satay tastes delicious, it uses a lot of spices as ingredients. Therefore, there is a saying among local Chinese: “a Satay makes a fire”. It means that eating too much Satay kebabs is easy to get angry; In addition, some unscrupulous businesses on the street will use inferior meat or synthetic meat to deceive consumers when making Satay. Such Satay not only has poor taste, but also poses a great threat to health. Therefore, great attention should be paid when tasting.
2、 Versatile Satay cuisine
If you want to eat satay, the best places are Indonesia and Malaysia, especially those who promote Satay as their own national cuisine. Different Satay can also be eaten everywhere in Indonesia, such as the famous sate Madura. The black dip made with sweet soy sauce, palm sugar, garlic, shrimp sauce and other ingredients is one of its characteristics; In contrast, sate Padang mainly uses the viscera of cattle and sheep, which is cooked with spicy soup and then roasted on the fire. Because a large amount of turmeric, curry powder, cumin and other ingredients are used, the whole of sate Padang is yellow.
In East Java province of Indonesia, the local Satay is called “ponorogo” (sate ponorogo), which mainly uses pickled chicken pieces. In particular, each meat string has a large piece of chicken. It is usually eaten with Malay zongzi and rice. The dipping material is satay sauce made of peanuts, peppers, lime juice and red onions.
Related: restoran pempek
In kudus, Central Java, in order to respect the Hindus, the local people choose to use water beef instead of yellow beef to make sate Kerbau. Generally, coconut sugar, coriander and cumin are used to cook it until it tastes delicious, and then it is baked by charcoal fire. When eating, it is mixed with the dip made of coconut milk and palm sugar; The local Satay in Yogyakarta is quite special. It actually uses horse meat (sate Kuda). It is usually eaten with fresh chopped red onions, peppers and sweet sauce oil. The taste is mainly sweet.
In Indonesia’s Banten Province, the local people who are rich in seafood will remove the fish bones from the lice, and then put them back into the fish skin. After they are strung with bamboo sticks, they will make the lice sadden; If you like to eat vegetarian food, sate Kere, a poor man in Thoreau, Central Java, uses vegetarian meat made of soybeans and can eat it with spicy peanut butter and pickled cucumber. In addition, there are dozens of dishes such as lamb satay, rabbit satay, chicken skin satay, and milk Satay (beef brisket cured with milk). It can be said that the Indonesian people have pushed satay to the highest level.
Malaysia, another Satay country, also promotes this snack. There are many restaurants selling Satay in kaying City, Selangor. The local Jiaying Satay provides chicken, beef, venison and other meat; In Malacca, Penang and other places, the local people will string the ingredients and put them into the hot satay sauce. This delicacy is called “satay celup” (Malay: satay celup), which is similar to the Malaysian version of “Chuan Chuan Xiang” or “bowl chicken”.
The Moro people of Luzon Island in the southern Philippines also like to eat satti (Tagalog: satti), a food similar to Satay. The only difference between satay and satay is that Satay needs to dip in a thick peanut juice. In addition to the main ingredients of peanuts, this peanut juice also includes garlic, ginger, Filipino fish sauce, pepper, coconut milk, etc. the main ingredients are usually beef, chicken and goat meat, which is also due to religious reasons.
In addition, Singapore, Thailand and other places also have their own unique Satay cuisine. Passengers on Singapore Airlines Flights can sometimes eat Satay as an appetizer; However, Thailand has widely promoted Thai Satay in the world, leading to a widespread misunderstanding in the world that Satay originated from Thailand and did not know that it originated from Indonesia. In the Netherlands, the former suzerainty of Indonesia, satay often appears as an appetizer in bars and restaurants, sometimes with Indonesian fried rice.
Epilogue
The delicious Satay has not only successfully entered the world as a national food, but also successfully promoted the food culture of a country. Such a win-win result may be unexpected to the creator of Satay. This also confirms the classic saying: “the national is the world”.
