Food Talk: Roasted Chicken, Lombok Style
Ayam taliwang, or roasted chicken, is a classic Lombok dish. (JG Photo/Petty Elliott)
Jakarta Globe, Petty Elliott
Lombok, an island neighboring Bali in West Nusa Tenggara, has gained popularity as a tourist destination in recent years. But few visitors are familiar with the island’s cuisine. Lombok cooking is characterized by its extensive use of fresh root spices, such as aromatic ginger, tumeric and galangal, along with a tangy mix of chilies, tamarind, lime juice and shrimp paste.
The taste of Lombok food is quite different from that of other Indonesian cuisines, due to its notable lack of a strong soy sauce flavor. Its closest match is Balinese cuisine, but it uses different types of meat. For example, goat and beef are rarely used in Balinese cooking, while Lombok is famous for its beef and jackfruit soup, beef and goat curry, and minced beef sate.
Another famous dish is ayam taliwang, a barbecue chicken dish marinated in a sweet, sour and spicy sambal. The traditional way to prepare it is to barbecue the whole chicken over coconut shell charcoal, but roasting it in an oven works just as well.
For this week’s recipe I have prepared a modern take on ayam taliwang that you can make in your own kitchen.
Ayam Taliwang
Roast chicken has universal appeal as a powerful comfort food. Those sharp popping sounds from the oven and the wondrous aroma that fills the kitchen build anticipation and appetite.
One of the key ingredients in this dish is kencur, or aromatic ginger. It is not easy to find outside of Indonesia, but it can be replaced with double or triple the amount of regular ginger. This dish serves four.
Ingredients:
1 whole chicken, weighing about 1.5 kilograms; 2 tablespoons vegetable oil; 2 tablespoons lime juice; 3 red tomatoes, finely chopped; 1 teaspoon palm sugar or brown sugar; salt and black pepper
For the paste:
125 grams (around 14 stalks) shallots, peeled and thinly sliced; 4 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced; 5 centimeters kencur, peeled and thinly sliced; 8 curly red chilies and 3-4 red bird’s-eye chilies (optional); 1 teaspoon roasted shrimp paste, or 2-3 tablespoons fish sauce
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees Celsius.
2. Cut along the backbone of the chicken with kitchen scissors or a sharp knife, then press firmly on the breastbone to flatten it. Wipe with a kitchen towel to dry the chicken. Set aside.
3. Put all of the paste ingredients into a blender, or grind with a pestle and mortar until fine.
4. Heat the oil in a frying pan, add the paste and cook for 4-5 minutes until the mixture is a little bit dry. In the meantime, season the chicken with salt, black pepper, oil and lime juice. Set aside.
5. Add tomatoes and cook for another 4-5 minutes, or until the texture resembles that of thick sambal. Keep stirring over a low heat.
6. Add sugar and lime juice. Season with salt and black pepper. Mix well and taste the seasoning. Set aside to cool for 5-7 minutes.
7. Prick the chicken with a sharp knife and smear the sambal all over it. Leave it to marinate in the refrigerator for more than an hour in a large dish.
8. Remove the chicken from the refrigerator 30 minutes before cooking.
9. Put the chicken in a baking dish with baking paper and pour the leftover sambal on top. Cook for about 50-60 minutes. Serve with steamed brown rice and stir-fried vegetables or sauteed potatoes and salad.
Petty Elliott has been writing about food and giving cooking demonstrations for more than five years. Her book on Indonesian cuisine, “Papaya Flower,” was published in 2009.
