Sambal Goreng Tempeh

Some dishes arrive in the Netherlands by ship, and then refuse to leave the family table. Sambal goreng tempeh is one of them: Indonesian in origin, Indo-Dutch in its Dutch afterlife, the kind of small dish that sits among the bowls of a rijsttafel and quietly steals the meal. But let me tell you a secret. The best rijsttafel dishes are not the grand ones. They are the ones people reach for twice.

The name already tells you the method, without asking us to invent romance for it. Sambal is the chili relish and goreng means fried; tempeh is the fermented soybean cake from Java, nutty, firm, and far more interesting than its pale reputation abroad. First you fry it until the edges turn crisp, then you tumble it through a sticky sauce of shallot, garlic, chili, ketjap manis, and santen, coconut cream. Crispness first, gloss second. Reverse that order and you have soft cubes wearing a good sauce badly.

History and cookery, they cannot be separated, especially at this table. Dutch households carried these dishes home through colonial history, migration, memory, and the weekly toko, the Indonesian grocer that became part of ordinary Dutch shopping. I prefer to keep it a bit more relaxed, in the Dutch way: one pan for frying, one pan for the sauce, and enough restraint to stop stirring once the tempeh is coated. Serve it warm, at room temperature, or tomorrow. It was made to wait for company.