Indonesian Nasi Goreng 🇮🇩

Sez
Aug 7, 2019
3 min read

Updated: Aug 8, 2019

"Since so many of you have been asking for this recipe" we thought it was about time we actually wrote down the exact measurements you need to create the famous Nasi G. It's not hard, but it is also not very easy especially if you are lacking the main ingredient (that changes this from fried rice to INDONESIAN fried rice), which is the Kecap Manis aka sweet soy sauce aka elixir of life.

If you are lucky enough to be visiting Indonesia any time soon, always get the Kecap Bango version which has a picture of a bird on it. This is my all time fav brand and probably the only brand we Indonesians trust. If you are not so lucky, you might be able to pop to a big Sainsbury's/Waitrose/Tesco and you might find 'Ketjap Manis' in the Exotic Produce Aisle.

We actually have a step-by-step that you can watch on our Instagram profile highlights under 'Recipes 🍳' so make sure you're following our Instagram page at www.instagram.com/SezPK

Serves: 4 or 5

Difficulty: Level 2

Wow factor: 🇮🇩🇮🇩🇮🇩🇮🇩🇮🇩

Ingredients

600gr of cooked rice, freshly cooked the day before but has been left in the fridge overnight
5 cloves of garlic, chopped finely
2 large shallots, thinly sliced or you could use 1 large onion
1/2 of a thumb-sized ginger, chopped finely
1 red chilli, thinly sliced
3 carrots, diced into small quarters
2 spring onions, chopped finely
Your choice of veg, you can either stop here or you can add: peas, a few pieces of tenderstem broccoli, mangetout, baby corn, sliced mushroom, you do you bb
4 eggs, loosely beaten in a bowl
Chicken stock cube
Your choice of meat, we used 160gr of shredded cooked chicken breast
Oil for frying
Seasoning: 2tbsp soy sauce, KECAP, salt, pepper, dash of turmeric, dash of paprika, dash of cumin, dash of ground coriander

Instructions

Heat your choice of cooking oil in a large wok
Now if you wanted to, you can use a pestle & mortar to ground up the garlic, shallots/onion, ginger and chilli into a paste, then fry it, or you could do it the lazy way and sauté the garlic, shallots/onion, ginger and chilli in the wok on high heat (which is what we did)
When it is fragrant, add a dash of salt and pepper, then add your carrots, spring onions and choice of veg
Fry until the newly added veg is soft. Now add your soy sauce, turmeric, paprika, cumin and coriander. Feel free to add more spices if you'd like
After around 5 minutes of frying, add your meat (which should already be cooked) and the chicken stock cube to the mix. Add a teeny-tiny splash of water if it is all looking a bit dry and mix well for about 3 minutes
Now add your cooked rice into the wok and mix thoroughly with all the ingredients in the wok
Bring out the Kecap Manis and literally drizzle it all over the rice. I think we used up to about 3 or 4 tablespoons. Just keep adding until it is a nice brown colour or until you think it is sweet enough. Feel free to also add more salt/pepper/spices to taste
In the meantime, using a separate frying pan, heat up some oil and fry your egg mixture not forgetting to add a dash of salt and pepper too. Once the egg is done, fold it and cut it into stripes
Assemble your Nasi Goreng. Put the rice on the bottom and the eggs on top. Serve with prawn/garlic crackers and you're ready to go! 🍚

Why does the rice need to be cooked the day before and stored in the fridge before cooking? Because according to a lot of Indonesian grandmas out there and www.thekitchn.com, "If you start with sticky, warm, just-cooked rice, your fried rice will turn out soggy, without those distinct chewy grains that a good fried rice has. Instead, cook the rice at least a day ahead of time and refrigerate. This helps to dry the grains out enough to give your fried rice a good texture." and we totally agree.