Food of Indonesia: Authentic Recipes from the Spice Islands (Food of the World Cookbooks)

The individual books in the "Food of" series by Periplus have extensive introductions. There are not as many recipes as I had hoped for. The ingredients list, along with the accompanying commentaries, are about the same, with an equivalent number of photos, as the Food of Asia. The Food of Asia contains many of the recipes, however, some do not have a photo.

The variety of main ingredients is pretty good, with recipes such as: Tempeh Stew, Hot Spicy Fried Tempeh, Water Spinach with Spicy Sauce, Vegetables with Spicy Coconut, Fern Tips (or Asparagus) in Coconut Milk, Stewed Eggplant, Lobster in Yellow Sauce, Simmered River Fish, Spicy Fried Sardines, Eggs in Fragrant Sauce and Pandan-style Eggs, plenty of chicken recipes, Duck Curry, several satays, Ginger Pork, Porked Cooked with Tomatoes and Seasoned Fried Beef Slices.

However, the Food of Asia contains some recipes, such as Balinese Squid, that do not appear in the Food of Indonesia. Also, the substitute of asparagus for fern tips is found only in the Food of Asia.

The ingredients list is thourough, with substitutions for (or omission of) many hard-to-find ingredients, but is a little more stringent than other books I have read. For example, shallot or onion was offered as a substitute for asofoetida in a different book, whereas here no substitute is given. On the contrary, macadamia nuts are suggested as a substitute, or even almonds or cashews, for candlenuts. The books on separate cuisines do not have such substitutions.

A word of caution, many of the ingredients are difficult to find even online. There are also several "fresh" ingredients, such as kaffir lime leaves, salam leaves, duan kasum, etc, that have to be shipped fresh and stay for only a short while. Most of the recipes in Food of Indonesia require many of the hard-to-find ingredients. Other cuisines, like Thai and India, have more availability of authentic ingredients as well as spice mixes that really help save time.

I think that the Food of Asia may be a better starting point. Make sure that you can find the hard-to-find ingredients from some Indonesian store or many of the recipes will be lacking. I have been able to make most of the recipes that I was really interested in, such as the tempeh, sardines and asparagus, but with a bit of difficulty coming up with all the ingredients.

Hope this helps.