About this recipe
A composed plate of blanched and raw vegetables with tempeh, tofu and boiled egg, dressed in a thick peanut sauce. The name is usually glossed as 'mix-mix', and the dish is assembled rather than tossed. Tempeh and tofu both appear here and are not the same thing: tempeh is a firm, nutty cake of whole soybeans bound by culture, tofu is a soft curd pressed from soy milk.
Recipe facts
- Yield
- 4 servings
- Prep
- 35 minutes
- Cook
- 25 minutes
- Total
- 60 minutes
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Spice
- Medium
Allergens Contains peanuts, soy, egg and shellfish (terasi in the sauce, optional). Vegetarian if terasi is omitted; vegan if the egg is also omitted.
Development draft. This is an untested development recipe from the cookbook project. It has not been kitchen-tested, and the quantities and timings are the author’s working draft rather than a verified result.
Ingredients
The plate
- 4 oz (115 g) green beans, trimmed and halved
- 1/2 small cabbage, about 8 oz (225 g), cut into wide ribbons
- 4 oz (115 g) bean sprouts
- 8 oz (225 g) waxy potatoes, boiled and thickly sliced
- 7 oz (200 g) tempeh, cut into 1/4 in (5 mm) slices
- 7 oz (200 g) firm tofu, cut into 1/2 in (1 cm) slabs
- 4 eggs, hard-boiled and halved
- 1 small cucumber, sliced
- Neutral oil, for shallow-frying
Bumbu kacang (peanut sauce)
- 1 cup (150 g) roasted unsalted peanuts
- 3 cloves garlic
- 3 red chillies
- 1 tsp (5 g) terasi, toasted (optional)
- 3 tbsp (45 g) palm sugar
- 1.5 tbsp (22 ml) tamarind concentrate
- 1 tsp (6 g) salt
- 1 cup (240 ml) warm water, plus more to loosen
- 2 tbsp (30 ml) kecap manis
To finish
- 3 tbsp (15 g) crisp fried shallots
- Prawn crackers or emping (melinjo crackers)
- Lontong or steamed rice (optional)
Equipment
- Large saucepan for blanching
- Frying pan
- Mortar and pestle or processor
- Slotted spoon
Method
- Blanch the green beans 3 minutes, the cabbage 2 minutes and the bean sprouts 30 seconds, lifting each out with a slotted spoon into cold water. Drain all well.
- Heat 1/2 in (1 cm) of oil in a frying pan over medium-high heat. Fry the tempeh slices until deep golden and firm, about 3 minutes a side. Drain on a rack.
- Fry the tofu slabs in the same oil until golden and lightly crisp, about 3 minutes a side. Drain.
- Make the sauce: grind the peanuts to a coarse meal. Pound the garlic, chillies and toasted terasi to a paste.
- Combine the ground peanuts, paste, palm sugar, tamarind, salt and warm water in a small pan. Simmer 5–8 minutes, stirring, until thick and glossy. Stir in the kecap manis and loosen with water to a pourable but coating consistency.
- Arrange the green beans, cabbage, bean sprouts, sliced potatoes, tempeh, tofu, egg halves and cucumber in groups on a wide platter rather than mixing them.
- Spoon the warm peanut sauce generously over the top, leaving some components partly visible.
- Scatter with fried shallots and serve with crackers, and lontong or rice if you want a fuller meal.
From the foundations
The book pairs this recipe with the following, from the sauces, sambals and pastes that open the collection.
The Complete Edition
Gado-Gado sits in the Indonesia chapter
The book carries this recipe in full alongside the rest of the Indonesia chapter, the pastes and dips it is built on, and the twenty-seven pantry studies that open the collection.
In review with Amazon KDP
Both editions have been submitted to Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing and are currently in review. Submitted prices are $9.99 for the kindle edition and $49.99 for the paperback. Neither is on sale yet, and prices are as submitted rather than final.