During a recent road trip up to Maine, we stopped by Somersworth, New Hampshire to get some Indonesian food at a small hole-in-the-wall called Tasya’s Kitchen. The country Indonesia is composed of roughly 6,000 populated islands in South-East Asia, with cuisines that vary by region. Indonesian food has many international influences, from China, the Middle East, India and Europe as a result of the Islands being perfectly positioned for trading, and their wealth of natural resources. This area of New Hampshire has the biggest population of Indonesians in the United States, which is 17% of the Dover, Somersworth and Rochester region.
We were lucky to get their Tour of Indonesia signature for $18, which gives a sample of many of their popular dishes. The signature included beef rendang, which is a native Indonesian dish known commonly as a Malaysian one. Beef rendang is a dry curry of slowly braised beef in coconut milk with aromatic spices consisting of cinnamon, star anise, cardamom, and galangal (a root grown in South Asia similar to turmeric and ginger). The spread also came with lumpia semarang, an Indonesian fried spring roll with bamboo shoots, shrimp, chicken and veggies. Chicken satay, curried chicken, spicy egg and tofu, crispy potato, anchovies in sweet and spicy palm sugar, peanuts, garlic crackers, pickled veggies and rice were also included in the array of foods. Finally, the platter also included soto ayam surabaya, a chicken soup with turmeric, vermicelli noodles, egg, shredded cabbage, scallions and shallots.
The beef rendang was incredibly tender and delicious, and the chicken satay was flavorful and complimented well by the peanut dipping sauce. The curry chicken was more of a coconut milk style curry, and not spicy at all. The fried egg roll lumpia disappeared in a flash. Luckily for me, the spice level was not as high as Indonesian dishes are commonly known to be. Each component of this plate was fun and full of various textures and flavors. The spread lived up to its name, as I truly felt that I was taking a thorough tour of the country’s cuisine.
As if we had not eaten enough food already, we tried the pempek, an Indonesian fried fish cake made with tapioca, served with boiled egg and noodles in a sweet and spicy tamarind sauce for $10.50. This fish cake was similar to other kinds I have tried, the main difference being the sauce which added a pleasant sweetness to the dish.
Mie Goreng is Indonesian fried noodles with Chinese influence. It was made with egg, cabbage and scallion, then served with garlic fried crackers that are found everywhere from street hawkers to high end restaurants. These noodles had a nice char from being cooked over high heat with the sweet soy sauce, and an additional kick from the sambal mixed in. The fried shallot topping and fried garlic crackers lent a nice crunchy contrast to the noodles, and our palates were cleaned with pickled cucumbers.
Our server was friendly, and interested in how we found their restaurant. We are already planning our next adventure in Somersworth to try even more Indonesian food that we cannot get in the Boston area.
