I just received a copy of a cookbook I have been looking forward to called Sri Owen’s Indonesian Food from an imprint of Interlink Publishing. As I’ve mentioned in the past, I’m very partial to Asian dishes, and I have a good number of cookbooks from different Asian countries.
Not only do I have Asian cookbooks, but I also have a number of “Standardized Menu Item Sheets.” These are very detailed descriptions of finished dishes that could be found in binders in the kitchens of some of the exceptional restaurants in 5-star hotels in Bangkok, Hong Kong, Bali, and Tokyo. I use these sheets to prepare versions of these famous dishes that the restaurants have become known for.
The Sri Owen book is a rather thick tome and has a wide-ranging number of recipes (more than 100) from the ancient land of Indonesia. Most are easy to follow once you have secured all the ingredients. The recipes vary from everyday dishes to specialties for festive or special occasions. The pages place the dishes in Indonesia’s appropriate regional and cultural setting, and they are delicious!
There are also recipes for assorted sauces, meat and vegetable stocks, salads, soups, and more – whatever is needed to assemble a great tasting and exotic-looking meal.
The book includes such well-known dishes as satays, sambal goreng and nasi goreng, and numerous regional specialties like lalampa (glutinous rice cakes stuffed with tuna), oseng oseng ayam dengan jamur (spiced and shredded chicken thighs with mushrooms), panggang bebek dengan kuah bayem (duck breasts with spinach sauce), and terik daging (spiced beef boiled in coconut milk).
Luckily, most of the required ingredients are now available in Asian ethnic markets or supermarkets with large international sections in the USA. Where I live, there are many Caribbean, Korean, Indian, Thai, Chinese, and Japanese markets, in addition to American supermarkets with large ethnic sections that carry ingredients particular to the cooking recipes and methods of these ethnic groups. I rarely have difficulty securing everything needed for a delectable dish.
In my travels, I also pick up ingredients, especially spices, that I might not easily find near me or which would be too expensive in the USA, such as high quality powdered saffron.
If you enjoy trying different cuisines, particularly Asian ones, take a look at Sri Owen’s book.
Manos Angelakis was one of the founders, the former Managing Editor for 25 years, the former Managing Editor Emeritus, and former Senior Food & Wine Writer of LuxuryWeb Magazine. He passed away in 2025 as an accomplished travel writer, photographer, and food and wine critic based in Hackensack, New Jersey. As a travel writer, he wrote extensively about numerous cities and countries. Manos was also certified as a Tuscan Wine Master and traveled to wine-producing areas in order to evaluate firsthand the product of top-rated vineyards. His articles in other publications include Vision Times and Epoch Times.
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