Mee Bandung and Teh Tarik in a Cup

We were warned that prices of food in Miri may go up any time!!

So when we went to Latifah Cafe true enough some of the prices have been changed. But the mee bandung had quite a big serving - in fact two of us shared it and it was just fine.

The teh tarikh was just enough for me but it was a wee bit cool - not hot enough as teh tarik should be. May be it was because it wasn't made by an experienced tea puller!





Having a grandmother who came from Java I was often intrigued by the myriad of recipes available from Indonesia over the years. My aunts from the Indonesian side had visited Sibu but none of them had time to exhibit their culinary skills. In fact we all ended up eating in Foochow restaurants!

Now that most of them are living in Australia I suppose they would do some homecooking using old Indonesian recipes and eat in fancy pseudo Chinese restaurants (pardon me please).

Here's a fairly good old (large family) Mee Bandung recipe from a relative . But she won't say if this authentically Mee Jawa or Mee Bandung. So many people I know claim that Mee Bandung is from Johore. I will not argue about that.

Ingredients:
2 kg yellow (yew mien) noodles
20 pieces dried chili (remove seeds, soaked in hot water and sieved)
5 cloves garlic (smashed)
10 pcs red onions
1/2 - l cup dried shrimps, soaked in a cup of water
1/2 kg fresh prawns (shelled and deveined)
2 cups of chicken or beef - boiled and shredded (You can use bakso beef balls)
Greens/sawi - cut 1 inch length
bean sprouts (50 sen)
1 cup sugar
6 cups beef / chicken stock
1 tablespoon oyster sauce (optional)
some slices of fried salted fish
Eggs (according to the number of people you are serving)
Salt
Vegetable oil / olive oil/sesame oil
spring onions
fried onions
Chinese parsley
a few drops of fish gravy

Method
Blend dried chilli, dried shrimp and its stock, sugar, garlic & red onion.
Heat up vegetable oil in wok (kuali).
Fry all ground ingredients till light brown.

Add in shrimp and boild shredded chicken or beef.
Add in chicken or beef stock and salt. Simmer until slightly thick.
This is the broth for the noodles. Leave it in the pot.

Before serving individual bowls this is a good tip:

.....Serve by portion, boil an egg in gravy for each serving.

.....Or make poached (half done) eggs for every bowl.

For every individual bowl/serving add vegetables till soften in the broth and lastly add in yellow noodles (which you can blanch first).

Serve in a flat bowl with half boiled egg/poached egg on top, sprinkle with parsley and spring onions and fried onions.Add sliced chillies if you like.

Sprinkle pepper too.

Mee Bandung is sweet and therefore well liked by Foochows who have a sweet tooth.