Nasi Kuning, food for the heart or medicine?

 In the old days I was always plagued with chicken-soup with rice, bone dry crackers and weak “taste to nothing” tea when I was sick. Or worse boiled rice, boiled with chicken broth that flown over the rice. Ow my, not going to bother you with it. Well you know, I have not been up to par, having colds and infections in my air ways and inflammations in the shoulders.

A friend in the UK when he learned I have been sick for months, pointed me out to the great medicinal value of Turmeric ( Kunjit, Yellow root, Kurkuma )
So I started searching for recipe’s that use Turmeric, and get the best benefits for health while eating something great. Now I stumbled on Nasi Kuning that originates from Indonesia and the Moluccas, a vibrant yellow rice dish that is eaten with celebrations and parties, which is great for health. The yellow stands for happiness and luck and resembles the colour gold. And for health, there is also Lemon-grass used in it, which is also used to help getting rid of a cough and nasal congestion. It is not as difficult as Nasi Goreng, but has amazing taste, creamy sweet with a zesty like citrus tone. Better than bland chicken-soup he.

What you need is:

300 gram Pandang rice or Basmati rice
Lemon-grass ( Sereh ) 1 stalk, 3-4 leaves or rather petioles from it 6 inch long
5 mm of Galangal root ( use Ginger if you really can't get Galangal )
2-4 cm of Turmeric root ( Kunjit, yellowroot )
1 chicken stock cube
2 tea spoons of concentrated coconut cream ( Santan ) or a tin of coconut cream or milk
2 Salam leaves, Daun salaam, or Indonesian bay leaf, or 1/2 a bay leaf.
ground pepper as that enhances the medicinal properties for Kurkuma

With this rice you put in the herbs if possible fresh and take all out when it is ready. If you have to use powder you can leave it, but hey it is best to get it fresh, and it will not cost you a lot.

Take 3-4 layers (petioles) of lemongrass and give them a good bash without breaking.

Take 5 mm of skinned galangal root in 2-3 slices.

Take 2-4 cm of Turmeric and grate it on a fine grater.

Everything gets a nice yellow colour, including the hands.

Put all in a pan with 2 chicken stock cubes, 2 teaspoons of coconut butter ( concentrated coconut crème ) or a small tin of coconut cream.

300 grams pandang rice and 2 Salam leaves.
If you can’t get salam leaves you can use ½ a bay leaf.

Add water until it is 25 mm above the rice, and get it to a modest boil. When boiling, lower the heat after 10 minutes to a slow simmer, and leave it for another 10-15 minutes.
Times can differ if you have other rice, so check the package of the rice.
The rice is ready when it is lovely soft and creamy, and just a bit sticky.
Take the herbs out when ready, and form nice bowls just simply using a cup or a small kitchen bowl.

Here you have the result, presented with stir fried vegetables and Satéh Ajam ( Chicken Satay )

Enjoy !

Yours sincerely,

Bart J. Meijer

Sambal Ulek (sambal oelek NL) fast recipe, and a load of joy!

In my previous post about Sambal (Indonesian pepperpaste) its background and history, I gave a few recipes. Now, I got loads of questions about it, and was even asked to make recipes for other sauce makers. Now, I would love to, but till waiting for a job offer. . . hihi.

Well I think I will please my good readers though, if I can give you a fast recipe, so you can try the first and most important Sambal there is.
Now from my Indonesian friends I got to hear, I need to try to make Sambal with a traditional mortar, as it tastes better and different. Now I can relate to that, as I can smell and taste the difference between hand cut and machine chopped onion, the same with pressed garlic and cut garlic.
So, for sambal you need a coarse mortar, not a smooth one, to be able to grind the chillies a bit.

So you need:
A mortar and pestle
5-10 mild to medium hot chillies (50 grams) Lombok or Rawit
1 clove of Garlic
1 tablespoon of Olive oil, or Peanut oil
1 tablespoon of Lemon juice
1 good pinch of salt

Clean the chillies taking the seeds out, to make it easier, slice and cut them fairly fine.
Clean, slice and cut the garlic.

Now you can use a normal mortar and pestle like this

But I use a Indonesian Lesung, where you rather rub the ingredients fine, not bash them

So, salt, oil, and garlic, chilli and a good splash of lemon juice in the mortar

Give it a good rub, and while you do it, you will notice the smell change to a balanced herbs like freshness.

Enjoy !

Yours sincerely,

Bart J. Meijer

Trinidad Moruga Scorpion going for Guinness record, or just going for your money?

In my quest to find out more about these so-called new pro-claimed record winners, I have had a good few emails and questions, why I would dig. Or why it is an interesting topic even. Note these questions have only been asked by people in the chilli business, or affiliated to it. Most of the time, I do answer; I am trying to follow the money. But as soon as the word money drops, all gets silent, or I get answers like “I am just earning my living”.
If I also hear from growers of the next possible runner ups, that they get over 1000 emails per day begging for seeds, do the calculation yourself for 10 dollar per 10 seeds or more.. Nothing wrong with it, if it really is a winner, but you know what? You need to win first, before you are a winner.

So, the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion, Trinidad Scorpion “Moruga”, TS Morouga, and TS Morouga blend, that are the pretty much the same, has been announced on 5 February 2012 by NMSU’s ( New Mexico State University) Chile Pepper Institute (CPI) as the hottest pepper on earth. Jim Duffy from Refining Fire Chillies provided the seeds to the CPI and comes in several media for that and sells these seeds from this “Hottest pepper on earth”.

Nothing wrong with that sofar, however. . . .
A lot of controversy is there, as a lot of debate all over the web starts about the facts and numbers, and the question rises for proof and the publication of this proof.
Proof of this scientific research and its research gets published by the American Society for Horticultural Science in the Hortechnology issue August 2012 22(4) under the title: ‘Trinidad Moruga Scorpion’ Pepper is the World’s Hottest Measured Chile Pepper at More Than Two Million Scoville Heat Units. This title is somewhat better and I will explain this.

But first, where does this chilli come from? It has been found in Moruga, Trinidad in the Caribbean’s. It is found by Sara Ragoonanan, who found a lot more superhot chillies in this region. She, and I quote: “I found it in 2007, it was used as a vegetable. I used it for hot sauce. That's how I discovered this variety packed heat. I knew this was the variety I was searching for, I would first dissect the pods, and take some seeds out for growing. I did start trading seeds with no charge to growers worldwide. At that time I did not think super hots would get this recognition. “
She shared them with several people amongst others with Christopher Phillips, who shares them also wtih Neil Smith from the Hippyseedcompany and Marcel de Wit from the Chilli Factory. I love it, that sharing bit!
Those last two tell me both they have send seeds to Jim Duffy and Jim tells me he got it from Jukka in Finland. Funny in between the lines this great chap Neil Smith, is dyslexic so he miss spells the name Moruga to Morouga. So almost another variety was born. . . Sorry, drifted off, so after this trip around the world, let’s go to New Mexico.

Proof:
For testing SHU (Scoville Heat Units) the Chilli Pepper Institute grows chillies on fertile fields along the Rio Grande, in a high desert country, 1200 meters above sea level where the sun always shines, the air is dry, and only20 cm of rain a year. Well, that is bound to give good results. They performed an excellent test by the first look at it, testing the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion, Bhut Jolokia, Trinidad Scorpion, Douglah Trinidad Chocolate, and Trinidad 7-pot Jonah to see which variety has the highest average measured heat level (mean) and how the chile peppers are related, using molecular analysis. Now, sounds great but I would have loved this research to compare the others to the current Guinness Book of records chilli, the Trinidad Scorpion Butch T.
And they do not? Well, they could not get the seeds at the time they answer by mail after asking.

Even though the publication of this research in HortTechnology at first glance looks great, it is wildly vague about how many plants there were planted it their test fields, and even do not name a specific number of pods tested. This is a bit strange, together with the title “World hottest measured Chilli” Then if you want to read the issue from HortTechnology, or the part that has the research the answer is: It is copyrighted so, you have to pay money for it. . . .
After asking by email the CPI replies: We harvested 30 pods per plant, randomly picked from different places all over the plant, 20 plants per replication and there were 4 replications.
There were 2,400 pods harvested from each variety.
So the article should have been clear on that.

The result from all this testing is clear; The Trinidad Moruga Scorpion has peaked at 2,009,231 SHU having a low at 953,703 SHU and an average heat level (mean) of 1,207,764.
So is this now the new Guinness Book of Records chilli? No, as the other winners had to proof average (mean) heat level, and this chilli is 200.000SHU+ under par.
So is the “World hottest measured Chilli” No, as we haven’t seen publications of research by others, nor their test results for highest measured. V ( Nor is the Trinidad Scorpion Butch T tested for this at the CPI themselves either.)
Why? It is not important what the highest is, it is important what the average is if you want to make produce with it. Would I want to use it at home? No, as I have 2 kids and a wife, and I would not like it to play Russian roulette with food that can be twice as hot depending on which plant you took a chilli from.

Still, seeds are sold as mad, so from this self proclaimed title money is made. People contesting this “record” are being told that the other record breakers are not tested by a third party.
SHU measurements would have been done by colleges or second grade laboratories.
Only one pepper would have been tested and other rubbish.
The lab equipment would not be calibrated with the other labs, etc etc.
Well for SHU measurement there is a standardized procedure that any labrat can do if he has the tools.
Even the scale at the local butcher is calibrated every year, so what do you think they do in a lab, smoke pot?
Even Guinness is attacked: “Guinness is Independent and nothing but a record keeper and record publisher. They are not a scientific organization. They can make their own rules and set their own criteria and change it anytime they want.” ( Guinness when I called them, asked me to provide links to these statements, and to send them on to their legal department )
These poor excuses was what tickled me to look further into things, as they sound to me like poor excuses, or as poor advertisement for a chilli that is not a winner.
And claiming victory on a self proclaimed title of “World hottest measured Chilli” is too silly to step in to.

Weird enough there has been more controversies with the “New Mexico Scorpion” as well. This was also claimed to be a new found variety, that later was discovered to be a renamed one.

The Trinidad Scorpion Butch T, the current record holder.

The current record holder therefore is still Marcel de Wit from Australia with the Trinidad Scorpion “Butch T” and after asking he let us know:
So the Guinness World Record was:
- Tested more than one pod.
- 8,500 Trinidad plants, commercial growers.
- Scientifically tested and averaged/MEAN heat.

Anybody telling you differently just tell them to read this ... and yes we have had to send a scientifically correct tested, backed up by THREE horticulturists, pack with lots of information to Guinness World Record to PROOF we did it Scientifically!

All in all I think it is great that a chilli grower works with  the CPI, and is giving away loads of seeds to research, as others did not. So I hope Jim Duffy can select the hottest plants, topping at 2 million SHU. If he gets that one stable at say 1,8 million SHU, I bet nobody will go over that mark.

If you want the hottest, ask for proof, if there is none I’ll bet you. . .
There is none.

Yours sincerely,

Bart J. Meijer
Images by Chris Fowler, a chap in the UK with excellent seeds as well!

Taste review Sichuan (Szechuan) peper or the spice the west forgot to steal.

Now this is an odd way to start a post, with a title like that, but you will get it later.

This pepper that is not a pepper at all, is one weird thing.
Somewhere down the line in history things got confused and the word pippali from the ancient Dravidian language (India) word for long pepper (Piper longum). Via the Persian people it landed in the Roman empire. The Romans however, turned pippali into the Latin piper which was used by the Romans to refer both to black pepper and long pepper, as the Romans believed that both of these spices came from the same plant. And they do not. Now as this piper was getting expensive, people started looking for alternatives, cheapest being the black pepper. Now following this mistake after the Roman times even the melegueta pepper was called piper in the 15th century, and after this the Portuguese dicovered the Portuguese peper (chilli ).

So, with all this history I read for hours again, I get the distinct feeling that more and more the name pepper started getting to be used for a herb or rather fruit that has a mouth feel being spicy, hot or prickly.
The Szechuan is not just a district in China, with Chengdu as its capital. And actually it is Sichuan, the Cantones write it like Szechuan. And no the Sichuan (four rivers) province is not just a province, it is almost a culture on its own complete with its own typical cuisine, fantastic. I will tell you more on a later occasion about the Sichuan cuisine.

The Sichuan (Szechuan) or flower pepper belongs to a cuisine, and I heard about it years ago, so at one point I could get them and some more of their typical spices. That name is odd and confusing as it's Sichuan, 4 rivers, Szechuan is how it appears on most menus as it is how Cantonese tend to write it...
Anyways, the utter disappointment was big as the taste was not at all that good. Now recently I got a mail from China Spice in the UK, that I needed to taste this Sichuan flower pepper that they hand selected at the spot in the Sichuan regent. So to be honest I was sort off like, sure, I can, but will it really bring something? I have heard and read soo much about their cuisine, but tried and failed, and thought nothing of it.

Curiosity killed me when I got the parcel so I simply had to dig in. Most of all actually as I was warned that the effect of this flower pepper might ever so surprise me. When I opened the bag, the aroma immediately came towards me, fragrant citrus/lemon with a flower like almost perfumy smell. Smelling again, the smell is very complex, citrus, black pepper, bayleaf and eucalyptus without the mint, maybe even lavender. Now the smell was so complex, I had to ask my friend and collogue taste tester Aldo.
Although we almost always agree, he smells something different: Flowers, curry plant, black pepper, Mandarin orange, and all combined making him think of perfume as well.
Take only half a husk John Coupland said, and told me it plays your tongue so everybody tastes it different due to a bioactive component called Hydroxy-alpha sanshool is  So I actually listened and took only half, ready with an other half. Instantly I got the citrus, black pepper and the herbs with vague bayleaf and the acidity pleasant and very strong taste, not at all like the stuff I tried earlier. After the taste has gone all around your mouth, then your tongue starts acting up, like you get different tastes on different places. Then the fizz starts, almost like a light electrical current of those fizzy candies you use to eat back when we were kids. This is really exciting!
Now to be sure I asked Aldo again, to ask what he tasted:
He tasted flowers, grains of paradise, black pepper, then the anesthetic like you get from Acmella oleracea, then Mandarin Orange.

 

Left cheap stuff- right the good quality.

Now be warned about the cheap stuff, you can see it is brown not red, or has a lot of seeds in it. The seeds are in it to make it heavier, even though the seeds can not be used, it adds weight. So even though it might be cheap, you get less value for money, and a heap of seeds you can not use. The seeds are gritty and hard, and will not soften at all. So you need to take them out. It either lacks totally for any tingling or fizzing, or the play off tastes you get. It merely tastes only like old Mandarin oranges or cheap toilet lemon blocks.
Second warning, everything tastes different after eating Sichuan pepper, your beer, your desert and your cigarette if you still smoke. They say your tongue gets rebooted after eating it, and that my readers is true, fantastic! Get the good stuff and taste, then take a bit of dark chocolate. . . .  Not telling hihi

Now as the Sichuan flower pepper from John and Jenny Coupland from China Spice are super fresh I hoped to get some seeds I might try and seed. . . . I found a stunning 4 only in a bag I will not finish in at least 3 months, that is quality. John and Jenny, you gave us taste testers a great challenge, and a lovely experience to boot eh interest to the Sichuan cuisine!
Thank you !!

Yours sincerely,

Bart J, Meijer
And Aldo !