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Traveling or visiting a new place can be very exciting. However, there are few things that we need to research. As for me that will be what place i can visit, accommodation, transportation and next….well…. I guest what's coming to our mind will be the food. What kind of food we can try or is that any unique local food that we can taste. Therefore, here some information about Indonesian food, but in here I will only specially highlight related to the Indonesian Rice Dish.
Rice for most of Asian people is very known as the basic food that most of us eat beside noodle and bread. Even for some people in western countries Rice is also very known well. Basically, Rice is the seed of the grass species Oryza sativa (Asian rice) or Oryza glaberrima (African rice). It is the agricultural commodity with third highest worldwide production and consumed largely by the world's human population. Rice can come in many type, shapes, colours and size. Rice also contain nutrition and calories which provides 20% of the world's dietary energy supply. As basic human food, there is so many type of food which use rice as the main ingredients. Here some type of Indonesian Rice dish.
1. Nasi Goreng / Fried Rice
Nasi goreng or English called fried rice is one type of food well known in the world. Nasi goreng is stir fried rice in small amount of cooking oil or margarine with adding kecap manis (sweet soy souce) shallot, garlic, tamarind, chilli and accompanied by other ingredients, particularly egg, chicken, prawns, vegetables and etc. In southern Asia, countries like Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia it is one of famous local dish.
In Indonesia, fried rice is coming in many type of style and flavor. There are Nasi goreng kampung, Nasi goreng ikan asin (salted dried fish), Nasi goreng seafood, Nasi goreng special, Nasi goreng nanas (pineapple) and etc. Even some part area of Indonesia such Makasar have they own nasi goreng called Nasi Goreng Merah. The shape or style or the way to cook basically is almost same like other nasi goreng. What's make different is the red colour that produce from the ingredient which is tomato paste. The taste is savory, a bit sweet and sometime a bit spicy. In Indonesia, there are two version of nasi goreng which is halal and non halal. Basically, it is same what make the different is the non halal use the pork as the ingredients.
2. Nasi Padang
Well, if you came to Indonesia and ask people about nasi padang, I bet you all people will know about it. In Indonesia it is very famous food, although the food originally come from area of Padang (sumatra) but now you can find it in all area of Indonesia. Nasi Padang (Padang-style rice) is a miniature banquet of meats, fish, vegetables, and spicy sambals eaten with plain white rice. It is set with dozens of small dishes filled with richly flavored foods such as beef rendang, curried fish, stewed greens, chili, eggplant, curried beef liver, tripe, intestines, or foot tendons, fried beef lung, fried chicken, and of course, sambal, the spicy sauces ubiquitous at Indonesian tables. In indonesia, there are many restaurant serve nasi padang like Sederhana, Sari Ratu, Garuda and etc. If you come to the restaurant remember, customers take and pay for only what they have consumed from array. So don't worry if they serve so many types of small dish.
3. Nasi Campur
Nasi campur english called mixed rice or also known as nasi rames is a dish contain of white rice accompanied by small portions of a number of other dishes, which includes meats, fish, vegetables, egg and etc. In Indonesia, there are two types of nasi campur which is the non halal use pork or known as nasi campur babi (babi:pork) and halal often known as nasi remes. Although basically it divide by two types, in indonesia there is many type of nasi campur. For example is Nasi Bali is mixed rice with base of many cury and vegetable dish. The Balinese version of mixed rice may have grilled tuna, fried tofu, cucumber, spinach, tempe, beef cubes, vegetable curry, corn, chili sauce, sate lilit and etc. Also for non halal you can add lawar and babi guling.
4. Nasi Uduk
Nasi uduk or means mixed rice is an Indonesian food from Betawi, Jakarta. It is steamed rice cooked with coconut milk and sometime adding with pandan leaves to give it more fragrance. It is usually serve with varieties of additional side dishes such as tempe orek (tempeh stir fried with sweet soy sauce), teri kacang (anchovy with peanuts), and shredded omelette, with sambal kacang (peanut sambal) and etc. And not to forget the bawang goreng (fried shallots) are sprinkled on top of the rice prior to serving. Nasi Uduk can be widely found across the country. It is usually wrapped inside banana leaf and eaten on breakfast or lunch even dinner.
5. Nasi Kuning / Tumpeng
Nasi kuning or english called Yellow rice is originally food from Indonesia. Nasi kuning also identical with tumpeng which is a cone or triangle shaped rice dish like mountain with its side dishes. It is traditionally featured in the slamatan ceremony or other occasion. The taste of yellow rice is almost same like white rice the difference is only the colour. The Yellow colour is come from the ingredients called turmeric.
6. Nasi Bakar
Nasi bakar or english called burned or grilled rice is a relatively newly developed Indonesian dish around the early 2000s. Nasi bakar is steamed rice wrapped in banana leaf seasoned with spices and other ingredients. Then the banana leaf secured with lidi semat (small needle made of central rib of coconut leaf) and later grilled upon charcoal fire. The burned banana leaf produced a unique aroma upon the rice. The banana leaf package is opened upon consumption. There are many variants of nasi bakar according to its ingredients, such as fried chicken, empal gepuk (fried beef), anchovy, peda fish, milkfish, salted fish, shrimp, mushroom, tempeh, tofu, salted duck egg etc.
7. Nasi Timbel
Nasi timbel is Indonesian food originally come from Sunda, west of Java. It is a hot steamed rice wrapped inside banana leaf. Nasi timbel made in ways similar to making lontong, compressed, rolled and wrapped in banana leaves. It is served with various side dishes such as fried chicken, empal gepuk (fried beef), jambal roti (salted fish), tahu goreng, tempeh, salted duck egg, sayur asem, with lalab and sambal. Nasi timbel have a unique aroma as result of the heat of hot-cooked rice touches the banana leaf. Nasi timbel later evolved to nasi bakar. As to remember the sambal from Nasi timbel (Sundanese food) can be very very spicy.
8. Nasi Pecel
Nasi pecel is white rice served with pecel (cooked vegetables and peanut sauce). It is originally come from java and identically as Javanese rice dish. It is popular in East and Central Java. The vegetables are usually served are kangkung (water spinach), long beans, cassava leaves, papaya leaves, and add with fried tempeh and traditional cracker called peyek. There is no meat in Nasi pecel, so it can be called vegetarian food.
9. Gudeg
Gudeg is Indonesian food originally from Yogyakarta. It is made from young unripe jack fruit (gori or nangka muda). The young unripe jack fruit is boiled for several hours with palm sugar, coconut milk and add with spices include garlic, shallot, candlenut, coriander seed, galangal, bay leaves, and teak leaves, the latter giving a reddish brown color to the dish. It is have sweet taste as result of palm sugar and coconut milk.
Same like Nasi pecel, gudeg also can be consider as vegetarian food if it is served solely. However commonly it is served with white steamed rice, chicken either as opor ayam (chicken in coconut milk) or ayam goreng (fried chicken), telur pindang, opor telur or just plain hard-boiled egg, tofu and/or tempeh, and sambel goreng krechek a stew made of crisp beef skins.
10. Lontong & Ketupat
Lontong and ketupat is commonly known in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. Lontong is made from rice wrapped inside a banana leaf in the form of cylinder. Then it boiled, cut into small cakes and serves with other dishes.
Meanwhile, Ketupat is a type of dumpling made from rice packed inside a diamond-shaped container of woven palm leaf pouch. Both ketupat and lontong almost have the same texture. It is usually eaten with rendang, opor ayam, sayur labu (chayote soup), sambal goreng ati (liver in sambal). Lontong and ketupat also can be served as accompaniment of satay , gado-gado (mixed vegetables with peanut sauce) as well as the main element of certain dishes such as ketupat sayur / lontong sayur (ketupat in chayote soup with tofu and boiled egg) and etc.


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(photographs and other bits are not available yet but soon will be)
It was high on our list of '17 things to do while in Cornwall', a list we have studied and mapped and followed. And #3 was Truro Cathedral. We would never forget about going, and had in fact wanted to go on an earlier day. But it had started to rain. And then there was the walking tour. And the golf game. Oh, and we had the walk to St Michael's Mount, so who was ever going to have time to add on a Cathedral?
WE were!
For Truro Cathedral by all accounts is an 11 out of 10. Absolutely no one should miss it, most especially the Brotherly Traveler. So after our breakfast, off we finally walked through the streets and down toward the railway station.
Just taking the train is a Cornish experience. I have decided that one of the reasons the young people here are independent so early in life is the presence of railway cars. Railway cars are packed with young people. And not just teenagers – younger people than teenagers get on trains every day, which helps them to become independent of their parents and to lay their own plans. Don't you think?
Anyway, as they were cramming themselves aboard our train and laying their own independent plans, we laid some of our own. We had decided to make our own lunch and to eat it at some convenient point during our day, perhaps sitting atop a park bench, or something. We would also arrive in time to attend the free cathedral tour and then perhaps have some tea and cake. All of these plans sounded yummy, and we were eager.
Once you arrive at the Truro railway station, you must walk 0.8 miles down to the Cathedral, and this we did. Upon establishing ourselves as tour participants, we sat with our guide and listened to a marvelous lady welcoming us all from a microphone somewhere high up in the Cathedral, and then leading us all in The Lord's Prayer. Once this had finished, our guide (the redoubtable Mary) began the tour. I can tell you just by looking at the photos I took, exactly what we saw there:
- · The stained glass window depicting the execution of King Charles I in 1649. I felt very sorry (again) for this death, whatever anybody else might feel about the Divine Right of Kings
- · The Bishop's seat! The SconeLady's sister maintains a keen interest in the Bishop's seats that can be found in cathedrals throughout the world, including the United States. This first seat at Truro was used by the very first Bishop of Truro, Edward Benson.
- · The marble carvings above the Altar, perhaps the most splendid item in the Cathedral, as it depicts: 1) sacrifice, and 2) the giving of thanks – two key components honoring the Eucharist. At the center is Christ, surrounded by the Apostles, Angels, and Saints. One could stare at it for hours.
- · The Tinworth Panel. (Stare. For hours.) This terra cotta clay sculpture depicts Jesus on His way to the Crucifixion and includes Simon the Cyrene, the weeping women, the fighting in the crowd, the two thieves near Jesus, and Barabbus, the criminal who was released to the crowd instead of Jesus.
- · The terrific map of Cornwall which they call "The Land of the Saints". This map shows the Christian churches in Cornwall, each marked by a Celtic cross and light, and facing the Truro Cathedral which has a larger, brighter light that extends above to our great Cloud of Witnesses. This lovely map alone should urge you to tour this Cathedral. But plan the time well, for here just is not enough of it to view such a thing thoroughly.
The Tinworth Panel
There were so many other things I could share with you, but haven't the opportunity. Yet if you keep in mind that there is but one central Person honored within this magnificent granite structure, you can begin to understand at least a small inkling of its significance.
And, our final plan was realized! Charlotte's Tea House appeared before us as we approached the Cathedral. Instantly we knew this was the place for our after-Cathedral bite. And, as you can only imagine, it was a worthy bite.
See you along the Way!
the SconeLady

subset: commoncrawl


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WHAT color is your red wine? This is not a trick question, like asking about George Washington's white horse. For many wine professionals the color of a red wine is serious business.
Implicit in the varied hues are all sorts of clues about the quality and characteristics of the wine. You can tell, as a red wine arcs from bright and brilliant to dull and faded, whether it is young, aging gracefully or over the hill. You can sense whether it has matured in new or old barrels, and whether it's been filtered to the point of sterility.
Yet when producers today consider the colors of their red wines, they may think of them more as a marketing tool than anything else. Somewhere along the way consumers have come to equate darker red wines with better red wines.
"People are absolutely obsessed with color, and I think it's a mistake," said Neal Rosenthal, who imports wines, largely from France and Italy. "It has been said that the deeper the color, the more concentrated the wine. That's clearly inaccurate."
Anyone can confirm Mr. Rosenthal's point by tasting a traditionally made Burgundy or Barolo, wines of intensity and concentration that are from the paler side of the red spectrum.
To describe the myriad shades of red, you need a 64-crayon box of terms. Different hues can appear in varying degrees of intensity and luminosity, depending, of course, on the quality of the light and the background. Lighter red wines, like Beaujolais Village or Valpolicella, can be pale ruby, not much darker than the darkest rosé. The darker reds, like young syrahs, petite sirahs and cabernet sauvignons, can be practically blue-black. In between are subtle, incrementally different shadings from copper to crimson.
But winemakers today seem to view deep, dark colors as paramount. Indeed, red wines of all sorts tend to be darker nowadays than they used to be. The brick red of a traditionally made Chianti, for one, is just a pale patch on the darker Chiantis that prevail today. California reds have also gotten noticeably darker than they were, say, 15 or 20 years ago.
"There's no question that winemakers in Italy are making darker reds," said Burton Anderson, who has written about Italian wines for 30 years. "I've seen it everywhere in Italy over the last 15 years or so, from Barolo to Valpolicella to Brunello to Chianti to the deep south."
Mr. Anderson said he believes the darker wines are a byproduct of a trend toward stronger blockbuster styles, which so many critics seem to favor and so many consumers seem to want. To make these wines, many growers favor very low yields from densely planted vineyards. The competition among vines and the low yields produce grapes of great richness and concentration, as well as more intense pigmentation, which contributes to a darker color.
Modern winemakers have other ways to get dark colors: clones that produce more richly colored grapes, equipment that prolongs the juice's exposure to pigment-rich skins and limiting the use of sulfur as a preservative.
So while a darker color may signal a big wine, it doesn't guarantee one. The context is crucial. A pale garnet may signal a problem in a young cabernet, which is traditionally dark, but not in a Burgundy. "Côte de Beaunes tend to be this beautiful light cherry color, which I think is charming, but nowadays people say it's too light," Mr. Rosenthal said.
Like almost every characteristic of wine, color is subject to myth and misinterpretation. Though color may tell more about a wine than the legs that climb the inside of a glass, color offers far less information than a sniff and a taste.
As the winemaker for Turley Wine Cellars in California, Ehren Jordan makes zinfandels of rare intensity and power, yet they tend to be closer to cherry red than ultradark. Under his Failla label, he also makes subtle pinot noirs and syrahs.
"There's no doubt that people are fixated with color," Mr. Jordan said. "People seem to equate darker wines with better wines. For me it always seems odd, and it's maybe because I like Burgundy and I enjoy pinot noir, and pinot is not about color."
For a while, back in the 1980's and early 90's, pinot noir, the grape of red Burgundy, was about color. Many producers back then experimented with an unconventional technique that produced dark wines. They postponed fermentation, leaving grape skins to leach pigment into the juice for an unusually long period, producing a darker wine. But many winemakers turned away from this technique, feeling it dulled nuances in the wine rather than bringing them to life.
In California, the dark color of some pinot noirs has led some critics to question their makeup. Josh Jensen, the Calera Wine Company's winemaker, who makes intense, long-lived pinots, said he believes that some producers achieve dark colors by adding other grapes to their pinot noirs. It's legal in California, where a wine has to contain only 75 percent of a particular grape to be named for it, but for pinot noirs based on the Burgundy model of 100 percent pinot noir, this is close to heresy.
"I know of winemakers who have admitted adding 5 percent syrah," Mr. Jensen said, without naming names. "Of all the things you can do, that's an absolute no-no."
Blending grapes for color's sake is not without precedent. Mr. Jordan has found that in many of the oldest vineyards he uses for Turley, dating back 100 years or more, zinfandel is interplanted with small amounts of alicante bouchet or petite sirah, grapes that produce darker wines than zinfandel.
"Why else except for color?" Mr. Jordan asked, suggesting that this was a concern back when the vineyards were planted. "If somebody farmed it for that long, there must be some logic behind it."