Macaroni Schotel

I never really make this dish in purpose seeing the works I have to do to prepare all this at once. Usually when I make pasta with bolognese sauce I always have left over sauce. Or I just make the sauce a bit more. I use this bolognese sauce to make macaroni schotel. With new cooked macaroni and white sauce, I will have new dish for the whole family and afterall it's also less work in the kitchen.

The picture here was made before I put it in the oven. Once it was out of the oven, my children and hubby ate it straight away and nothing left to be photographed...!!!

Macaroni Schotel
225 gr macaroni

Bolognese sauce:
300 gr minced
1 onion, roughly chopped
400 gr (1 can) diced tomatoes
70 gr (1 can) tomato paste
1 cube broth
salt & pepper

Bechamel sauce:
50 gr butter
50 gr flour
1/2 ltr milk
50 gr grated cheese
salt, pepper, nutmeg

Directions:
1. Boil the macaroni with salt al dente and drain well, put aside.

2. Make the bolognese sauce:
- Bake the chopped onion until transparent, then add the meat in and occasional stirring. Cook until the meat brown and the liquid is gone.
- Add the diced tomatoes and broth in. Season with salt and pepper. Let it boiled until the tomatoes become soft.
- Add the tomato paste in the sauce, stir well. Lower the heat, cook until the sauce thickened.

3. To make the white sauce (bechamel sauce):
- Bake the butter to melt in a sauce pan.
- Add the flour in the melted butter, keep stiring until the flour absorbing all the butter.
- Pour milk gradually while you're whisking the roux. Keep whisking until the sauce is thick.
- Add the grated cheese in the sauce, season with nutmeg, salt and pepper to suit.

4. Pour the macaroni gently in the white sauce mixture.

5. Put all this into a large oven dish, pour the rest of the bolognese sauce on, sprinkle with grated cheese and bake for about 20 minutes at 180°C.

Beef Rendang

Rendang is a dish made from beef slowly cooked in coconut milk and spices for several hours. The slow cooking process allows the meat to absorb all the spices and to become tender. Though rendang is sometimes described as being like a curry, and the name is sometimes applied to curried meat dishes in Malaysia, authentic rendang is nothing like a curry.

Beef Rendang
(source: Menu Sehari-hari Yasa Boga)

Ingredients:
500 gr beef
2 tablesps dessicated coconut
2 sticks sereh/lemongrass
5 lime leaves
1 ltr coconut milk
2 curry leaves
1-2 teasp(s) tamarind paste
salt to season

ingredients to be grinded:
3 big red chillies
4 shallots
2 teasps ground coriander
1 teasp ginger
2 teasps curcuma


Directions:
1. Heat the oil in the deep pan. Add in the pan the paste, lemongrass, lime leaves, curry leaves and tamarind. Stir fry until fragrant.

2. Add the beef and dessicated coconut in the pan, stir fry until the beef colored.

3. Add the coconut milk and salt in the mixture, stir well. Lower the heat.

4. Let the rendang slowly cooking and once in a while stirring the mixture.

5. Remove from the fire after the beef is tender and the liquid is dry.

Semur Betawi (Batavian Beef Stew)

The Betawi (Orang Betawi, or "people of Batavia") are the descendants of the people living around Batavia (the colonial name for Jakarta) from around the 17th century. The Betawis are mostly descended from various Southeast Asian ethnic groups brought to or attracted to Batavia to meet labour needs, including people from various parts of Indonesia. They have a culture and language distinct from the Sundanese and Javanese. The Betawis are known for their piety towards Islam. (text adapted from wikipedia).

Semur Betawi (Batavian beef stew), is a beef dish which is cooked slowly using mix ground spices. Since I live in Belgium in the area of dutch speaking, I found out that the word "semur" is actually coming from dutch word "smoor or smoren" which means slow cooking. The method to make semur is the same as making "gesmoord/gestoofd rund" (Engl. translated "beef stew"), only the ingredients are different. So during colonial time, there were mixtures of foods culture between Dutch and Indonesian. According to a dutch book I found out that this semur betawi is one of old recipes from before the war. So fascinating to know about this.

Anyway I love semur betawi. This traditional dish is not easy to find when you visit Jakarta. Even you might find one in some restaurants it's not always the same as the original made by the batavians themselves. I used to live in batavians area where many original batavians lived. Everytime they celebrated such as wedding, during Ramadhan or end of Ramadhan, they always brought some foods to be given to their neighbours. It was always a joy for us everytime they came to bring us some of their traditional foods, such as kue pepe, kue satu, kue bakar, dodol, tape uli, nasi uduk, nasi ulam, semur betawi and many others. Perhaps someday I'll put all those batavian recipes here as rememberance for my children and grandchildren.

Semur Betawi (Batavian Beef Stew)

Ingredients:
250 gr beef
5 red onions, thin slices
3 garlics, thin slices
2 cloves
2 salam leafs
1 tomato, cut in cubes
2 cm galanga / laos
2 cm ginger / jahe
1 lemongrass / sereh
6 tablespoons sweet soy sauce / kecap manis
Water as needed
salt & pepper
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg powder

Methods:
1. Cut the beef in thin slices.
2. Heat the butter in the pan, add with red onions and garlics. Cook until fragrant.
3. Then add the beef together with salam leafs, galanga, ginger, lemongrass, tomato and cloves. Stir all together and add water as much as needed.
4. Then add the kecap manis and stir well. Cover the pan and simmer until the meat is tender. Add water again if it's too dry.

**You can also add with slices baked potatoes at the end of the cooking.

Sweet Spices Beef

When the first time I made this dish, it turned out that this dish becoming one of me & my hubby favorite dishes. I just love the sweetness combined with the mild spices taste in the meat. So yummieee.... If it's too spicy, you can always reduce the chilli paste.

Ingredients:
300 gr beef
3 red onions
3 garlics
2 cm fresh ginger/jahe
2 cm fresh curcuma/kunyit (or 2 tsps curcuma powder)
3 kemiri nuts
1 eatsp chilli paste/sambal ulek
1/2 tsp cumin/jinten
1/2 tsp pepper
a pinch of salt
2 esps tamarind water
2 esps coconut sugar/palm sugar/gula jawa
2 esps dessicated coconut
3-4 esps kecap manis/sweet soy sauce
300 ml coconut milk/santan


Directions:
1. Cook the meat with water until the meat tender. Cut into thin slices. If necessary stamp the meat flat to make it more tender.
2. Using a blender, blend the red onions, garlics, ginger, curcuma, kemiri, chilli, cumin, pepper, salt and palm sugar until smooth and turning as a paste.
3. Heat the wok with a bit oil, then fry the spices paste in it until you smell the spices flavour.
4. Add with tamarind water, dessicated coconut and kecap manis. Stir in together.
5. Put the meat in the mixture, stir well.
6. Last one, add with coconut milk. Leave it simmer until the sauce becoming thick. Stir well. Ready to serve.

Beef Curry

I like to make this beef curry and my hubby loves this too. I have this recipe since I got married. At that time my cooking skill was very limited. Everytime I make this, it always reminds me old time when cooking was a daily struggle to me.

Ingredients:
1/2 kg beef
1/2 teasp salt
1/4 teasp black pepper powder
2 eatsps flour
11/2 eatsps curry powder
1/2 onion, roughly chopped
1 garlic, roughly chopped
1 cm ginger, roughly chopped
1/2 lt water
1/2 blok of beef broth

Directions:
1. Mix part of flour with curry powder.
2. Smear beef with mixture of curry powder, salt & pepper. Put a side.
3. Heat the oil, stir fry the beef until changing colour. Remove from the pan, put a side.
4. Stir fry onion, garlic and ginger.
5. Add leftover flour and curry mixture. Mix thoroughly.
6. Add water and beef broth, then add beef.
7. Simmer until the beef is soft and the liquid becomes thick.