Agnez Mo at the table

The Indonesian meal is not divided into starter-main-dessert: everything arrives at once around a large mound of steamed white rice (nasi), the immutable heart of the table. Around it gravitate the lauk-pauk, a constellation of small dishes — stewed meat, soup, vegetables, condiments — and the indispensable spicy sambal. Each person serves themselves as they wish, mixes a bit of everything onto their rice, and traditionally eats with the right hand or with a spoon and fork. Drinks (jamu, tea) and fried snacks (gorengan) punctuate the day outside of meals.

At the foundation of almost every Indonesian dish: the bumbu, a paste of aromatics pounded in a mortar (shallot, garlic, ginger, galangal, lemongrass, turmeric, candlenut/kemiri). Its most distinctive note remains terasi, a fermented and dried shrimp paste which, when grilled, releases a powerful umami aroma — the deep bass of all archipelago cuisine.