Sinful not to share! (Recipe of the week: Daging Bola)

(**ACHTUNG! For those who are fasting, beware there is a food picture below. Avert your eyes nearing the cooking instruction.)


Last weekend I had a bit of a cooking spree to celebrate the arrival of Ramadan and the changing of the seasons. And basically I just wanted to cook, and lots of food for that matter, too, so I invited loads of people over.

For the iftar meal on Sunday, I knew that at least 3 young children were coming, so I had troubles deciding what to make.
My thought then went back to 2 foods that I remember loving the most growing up.

One is corn soup with quail eggs (lots of veggies: carrots, mushroom, corn, onion sprigs). This is the 'soul' food that mum always made whenever one of us was sick, to make us feel all better with the colorful presentation and nutritious contents.
This soup I always make whenever I feel homesick or when I'm really sick altogether. Always works!

The other one that I thought of was Javanese meatballs, or as we literally call it: Daging Bola. Different mothers have different versions, but I think my mum's version is by far the best.

The following is the recipe that mum gave me over the phone 90 minutes before my guests arrived:

Daging Bola a la Taiko Tari's Mamma

some ground beef (about 250 gr)
pearl onion/shallot (about 5 cloves, if not available, substitute with onion, obviously not 5, but about 2 tbsp for the meat, 2 tbsp for the soup afterwards)
garlic (about 3 cloves for the meat, 2 cloves for the soup afterwards)
salt (to taste)
pepper
vegetable oil (about 2 tbsp)
1 whole fresh tomato
ground corriander (1 tsp)
kecap manis (to taste, approximately 3 tbsp)
beef broth (5 cups)

How to make:

1. Season beef with ground pearl onion, garlic and salt and then ball the ground beef, size depends on however you wish, but for this one I like them to be large, I have big thumbs, so about 2/3 of the thumb is the diameter)

2. Boil the balled beef until the meat is cooked. Set aside the water used for boiling the meat for the broth

3. Ground together some pearl onion, garlic, coriander, and salt, stir fry it in the vegetable oil together with some coarsely chopped tomato

5. Put in the boiled balled beef stir fry together with the spices

6. Add the beef broth to the mix, bring everything to a boil, put in the kecap manis*. I like to add a half cube of beef consome to the mix just to ensure perfection in taste.

6. Let it simmer for 15 minutes.

*Unlike other recipes, for this you REALLY need to have the kecap manis. This is one of the dish where this particular sauce cannot be substituted. If your Asian shop doesn't have this, you can try to make it yourself. Here's a recipe where you can try to make this sauce.



The food was a HOOT! The children couldn't get enough of it.

Try it. It's so easy to make and it tastes heavenly.

Oh crap, now I miss my Mamma.