Simple Breakfast : A Morning Asian Style

Nothing than having a great morning when the sun starts to sneaking a warm light like saying hello. Sound cliche, but it giving the best mood for me. Well, I do not hate rain or cloudy morning, but it just driven me into gloomy or moody way to be under expectation. Seriously, I always attracted to watching the light comes into a room (and my bed) and reflected in my eyes like a-heaven-light-comes-to-the-world, it always wowed me for seconds for how good this life begin again in another one good day (wait, how if it's like an-alien's light-trying-to-catch-me? no that's must be a morning nightmare..lol ). Ok, just saying. and here's my morning breakfast to complete the good morning I have today. As you've seen, a triangle asian-influenced dishes. Influenced by three different cultures, Indonesian for I was born and lived here, the others are Japanese and Korean for how I'd been inspired from their cultures and food, of course. 

First, for Japanese scent, I made three burnt onigiri / rice ball / nasi kepal (indonesian) with salty anchovies and chili garnished. The rice is fresh, a morning made with using chicken stock for the water (or usually I using same balance amount of water and stock) so it still moist for have much moisture and fluffy in shape. Because the stock, it is automatically have 'umami' flavor or savory. Then, burnt it in while to enhance more taste (of course I warn myself about the bad effect of those burnt, so just burnt in little part) and this is what I like, the burnt smell are being locked inside along with the hot temperature so it's nice to be eaten along all aromas it had. Don't forget that I also have fried salty anchovies too!

Simple Onigiri with salty anchovies

 1 cup  rice    (or adjust as you want)

500 ml chicken stock  (or balanced, using 50:50 of stock : water)

                                   (to keep it white use the clear part of the stock)

2-5 small anchovies

- since small anchovies here is usually salty, so it just simply fried until golden brown

Now, on the wood tray is Jeon, the Korean pancake style. I've been wrote about this here, where you can also found and enjoy my own version in simple recipe. And doesn't it feels great because you can any ingredients as you like, from meat to seafood, crunchy to sweety, for me, I have chopped sausage, cucumber and mustard, to give a light refreshment. 

Last, the green veggies in tiny plate are Indonesian dish named tumis daun pepaya / stir-fry papaya leaves. This dish is fit enough, yummy addict for vegetarian, I even regularly eat it alone only with warm rice and local sambal. By using papaya leaves, this simple dish are easy to made. The only problem that may comes is the bitter taste which is for some people it could drop the appetite. Here some options to get rid of it (rinse well the leaves first and after) : 

- double boiled together with guava leaves or cashew

- boiled it with some tamarind then rinse it again

- boiled with some amount of clay (yes, good quality clay, we used here named 'ampo'. It will absorb the bitterness and still, please rinse the leaves until it clean from clay)

- before boiled, add some sea salt and squeeze it for minutes then rinse (not quite effective, but it's good for some people who wants a bitterness taste still on it)

Stir Fry Papaya Leaves

500 gr    papaya leaves, well boiled, rough chopped

50 gr      anchovies / small shrimp

6            shallot (asian shallot usually small size)   firm chopped

3 cloves  garlic                                                    firm chopped

3            red pepper / chili                                  sliced

2            green pepper                                       sliced

1/2 tsp   salt

3/4 tsp   sugar

1/4 tsp   stock powder

50 ml     water

2           salam /asian bay leaves

2-3 cm  galangal (indonesian name: lengkuas)

1 tbsp   oil to cook
1/2 pax java basil (kemangi / asian basil - optional) chopped

- heat the oil, fried the anchovies / small shrimp first until golden brown

- add shallot and garlic stirring until fragrant

- add salam/ asian bay leaves and galangal, then red and green pepper

- pour the seasoning, add the papaya leaves (basil) then water, mix until it absorb and cook well

the final result is the leaves becomes smooth but not mushy or oily (see on pic)

the anchovies and  basil (if you use) are really good to bring more flavors into the dish, since they have their signature taste, and of course using galangal and salam leaves are having same works too. And if you have time to read in wikipedia (note: change to translate page since it's in bahasa) about the good-use of the papaya leaves, I'm sure you'd agree with me that this simple yummy dish giving an advantage for you!