Brunei

The tiny country of Brunei is situated on the island of Borneo, surrounded by Malaysia. The island of Borneo is also shared in part by Indonesia. It also has one of my favorite capital names, Bandar Seri Begawan. It's just fun to say. Being such a small country surrounded by larger ones, Brunei doesn't really have much of a culinary identity distinct from Malaysia and Indonesia. They are culturally distinct in other ways, but the food is very similar wherever you are on the island. There are a few other countries that I've run into this problem for when doing research: the food of South Sudan is just Sudanese food; Pakistan's cuisine isn't much distinct from Northern Indian food. So, what I made for Brunei is a dish called soto ayam, which is enjoyed by Indonesians, Malaysians, and Singaporeans. Although it is probably associated with Indonesia more so than other countries.

Soto ayam is a very popular dish, so I figure I would be doing a disservice to that part of the world if I didn't make it in some capacity during this project. Soto ayam is basically a form of chicken soup. Ayam translates to chicken, and although I used a vegetarian recipe, I knew I should add some kind of chicken replacement in order to properly call it by its name.

The first step is to prepare the spice mixture. I processed shallots, garlic, spices (turmeric, cumin, and coriander), macadamias, and "sambal." The traditional recipe calls for candlenuts, but obviously macadamias are much easier to find. I put sambal in quotes because I basically made a quick version with some dried chili (piri piri and chili powder), lemongrass, and oil. Usually sambal has a few more ingredients but in essence it's a chili paste.

All chopped up, everything turns into an orange-yellow paste. This soup is usually a yellow color due to the fresh turmeric and ginger boiled in a broth. Since I used dried turmeric and my broth was naturally a darker color, my soup ended up more orange than yellow, but I didn't mind.

The broth simmers once for about an hour with lemongrass and ginger, then those are scooped out. The spice mixture is fried for a couple minutes in oil until fragrant and no longer completely raw, then the broth is added to the spice mixture. I basically just added a couple scoops of broth to the paste, stirred it up nicely, then added it to my big pot of broth. The broth then simmers for about another hour with all the other spices in it. Some people strain out the gritty bits from the spice mixture, but I thought it tasted good so I left it in.

Chik'n: tastes like chicken.

Next I prepared the "chicken." I used the frozen chik'n strips from Morningstar since I figured they would be the best alternative. Since they come "lightly seasoned" in some god-awful Italian seasoning, I always wash them off when I use them. After rinsing and thawing, I cut them up to recreate the shredded chicken look.

Soto ayam can be served with either rice or rice noodles as a base. I chose rice noodles since they're quick and easy to prepare and I figured they would be easier to eat at the bottom of a soup.

Clockwise from left: boiled egg, cilantro, celery leaves, bean sprouts, "fried" onions, scallions.

I assembled all my toppings on a plate for nice presentation and pretty pictures. According to the recipe I used, when eating this as a family, it's common to put everything in individual bowls and everyone spoons out as much as they want to put on top of their soup. Kind of like a taco bar. In the center above is the "sambal" I made. Typically this is served with crispy fried onions that you buy in a pack, but of course I tried to make them myself. I tried frying them in oil in a pan, which just made them soft, then I put them in a hot oven, which just burnt the ends. They never got crispy, but they tasted good.

I layered the noodles with the "chicken" in the bottom of two big bowls, then ladled the broth, which by that point had become more of a sauce, then added all the accoutrements on top. I didn't realize until just now that I ended up with all the toppings in the same places in the bowl as I did on the plate. Wow, Illuminati confirmed.

The final product was a great mix of spices, from the gingery-lemongrassy broth to the rich flavors of the nut-spice mixture, to the spiciness of the sambal on top. It was super filling and if it didn't take so many components to prepare I would probably make it in place of curry every once in a while. Maybe a pared down version with a thinner broth would be do-able on a weeknight.