On coconut and inverse braising. Seitan Rendang.

Variable 3 or 4 becoming northwest 4 or 5.

Slight occasionally moderate.

Wintry showers.

Good occasionally poor.

 

 

The first time someone offers you a proper Beef Rendang you might be a bit disappointed when it is placed in front of you.

Very dark pieces of meat (sometimes with flecks of burn), no gravy at all. It looks dry and cooked to death. With some gritty bits. Your eyes search for a condiment or dipping sauce, but there is none.
You tuck in..and experience not only a taste explosion, but also a revelation in texture. Soft, juicy, spicy, sweet and savoury, caramelized and very coconutty. And before you know it, you ate the whole dish and look for more.

The beef is cooked with the inverse braising method. Normal braising is done by frying the meat until it is brown and sealed and then you add a liquid and let it simmer until soft. The Rendang method lets you cook the beef in coconut (milk) and once it is soft, you increase the heat and let all the liquid evaporate until all is left is the coconut oil. This gets hotter and hotter and fries the beef at the last step. This is also the only stage you need to stir and act quickly or it gets easily burned, however you want all oil soaked up.

The Beef Rendang is now sealed and lasts for a long time, a bit like Biltong, but of course juicier.

There is only one problem: Unless you travel in Malaysia or Indonesia, you are unlikely to get it properly done. If you google Beef Rendang and look at the pictures, you find all kinds of beef with more or less gravy. Sometimes as much that it resembles a curry, sometimes properly (it should look like this) , but most of the times semi-dry and a bit sloppy like this 

This is due to the coconut. In order to get the right mixture between liquid and oil, you need to get several coconuts (young but not green), clean the flesh, let it sun dry, grate it, toast it until golden and then pound it to release the oil. This is called Kerisik and if you are interested in doing it properly, here is a link. 

Most people, like me, don’t go through that process and need to make it somehow work. Yes, you can use desiccated coconut to get the Kerisik, but even that is very time consuming. So most people just use tinned coconut milk. But there is not enough fat in the tinned variety to brown it off, hence the sloppy approach (if you want to use coconut milk, may I suggest the Aroy-D brand). Even the coconut cream, which I will be using, is not perfect; hence I also added coconut oil and a bit of desiccated coconut, the latter for the required change in texture.

And Seitan? Now, if you are not familiar with Seitan just be aware that it takes quite a lot of faith to cook with it. You know Halloumi and Tofu? Well, you got Seitan: Tasteless as Tofu but spongy and gummy like Halloumi (yes, I have a knack for making Vegetarian alternatives sound scrumptious). But this texture means that during a long cooking process the chewing gum texture disappears and the pieces develop a meaty texture. The sponge and general lack of flavour means it soaks up every sauce, in fact much better than beef.  Since Seitan contains no fat, you need to add a bit of coconut butter (or oil) at the beginning in order to give the saturated fat mouth-feel.

And if you have a slow cooker, the whole cooking process is a doddle, despite the long list of ingredients. In fact it is a doodle to cook anyway, so don’t be afraid. And if I cant convince you to give Seitan a try, cut your beef (brisket) in small pieces and treat it like the Seitan in the recipe. And if you want to “Gilt the Lily”, use Venison.

Oh, and one last tip: You can, if you cant get it, replace the galangal with more ginger..but not the other way round. Too much galangal develops a slight bitter, metallic taste in a dish.

Seitan Rendang

The Spice paste

50gr desiccated coconut

2 birds eyes chillies

1tsp coriander seeds

1 tsp cumin seeds

1 tsp of turmeric powder

2 garlic cloves (I am modest here, seen it also with one or two garlic bulbs!)

2 shallots

about 3 cm of galangal, skinned and cut in 4 pieces

about 3 cm of peeled ginger, cut also in 4 pieces

a sprinkle of dried chilli seeds or 2 dried chillies

The stew

2 lemongrass sticks, outer leaf removed and sliced once in half

4 Kaffir Lime leaves, left whole

2 cinnamon sticks

1tsp tamarind paste

1tsp rock sugar or kandis

1 sprinkle of salt

1 jar of Seitan pieces (I use Biona Organic Seitan Pieces 350g , already slightly marinated in ginger and soya sauce)

2 tbsp coconut oil

about half of a pack of creamed coconut (normally 200gr, so around 100gr), just make sure it is 100% coconut, no other ingredients.

If you don’t use a slow cooker:

1 small tin of coconut milk

 (just in case)

Start with the spice paste: Put the desiccated coconut into a pan and heat it gently until it is golden brown. Tip in a blender. Grind the coriander and cumin seeds finely and add to the blender. Add all the other spice ingredients and 2 tablespoons tablespoons of water and blend to a nearly smooth paste. Add a bit more water if necessary.

Put spice paste in the slow cooker and add all the other ingredients bar one tablespoon of coconut oil. Add about 200ml of water in order to get the creamed coconut into a thick liquid.

Cook on low for about 4-5 hours. If you don’t have a slow cooker, just add all the ingredients in a wide pan and cook on the lowest setting of your oven, however you might need to watch it since the liquid evaporates much faster than in a slow cooker. The small tin of coconut milk might come handy here.

Once the Seitan is soft and you have maybe 4tbsp of the thick liquid left, remove the lime leaves, the cinnamon and the lemongrass sticks. You can now either proceed immediately or let it cool down, cover and do the final step the next day.

If you did it in a pan, heat pan now to high and add the last spoon of coconut oil. Let all the liquid evaporate ( since you used creamed coconut which will curdle on high heat, you wont get all the liquid away but end up with browned curdles clinging to it . These will also brown. If you used a slow cooker, transfer it now to a pan and proceed as above.

Serve with either rice or Roti or Paratha bread (the Shana frozen Parathas are a godsend!) and, if you wish, some kind of greens (I cooked Morning Glory, but why not serve it with green beans or spinach with garlic and soya sauce.

See, I told you, it is dead easy.

What is not easy is making a decent photo. At least not for me but my camera is crap.

Apologies for that lousy picture.