History and Special Things from Gudeg

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Indonesia have so many traditional dish that have unique form and complexity, most of them are so popular around us. One of the most popular one is Gudeg. Gudeg or we can say it in English as green jackfruit stew is a very sweet traditional dish made of young jackfruit, cooked with palm sugar and seasoning until it turns dark. Gudeg is a traditional dish from Yogyakarta, but any source also tell that Gudeg is from Central Java. Nowadays Gudeg become very popoular in Indonesia, we can find it almost in every place in Indonesia, not only in Yogyakarta. There are many special and unique things that we can find in a Gudeg dish.

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Gudeg has unique and special not only in the taste of dish, but Gudeg has unique history also. The name ‘Gudeg’ has a story behind it. The story is that long time ago there is a couple lived in Yogyakarta. The husband is from England, and the wife is a Javanese girl. The husband called the wife with ‘dek’. One day the wife was confused what must she cook for the husband, then the wife found an old recipe with made from young jack fruit. Finally, the wife cooked it, and when the husband come, he try the dish, he like it and say “Good dek ..”. Becuse the wife was very happy to hear that, she talk to their neighbors, and than for a long time, the spell ‘good dek’ transform to Gudeg and become the name of that dish which made from young jack fruit. Beside the history of the name Gudeg, there is also another history, history when the first Gudeg found. However, there is a missed thing when actually the history when Gudeg found is still a mistery until know. No source can tell this history, but if we ask a people who have lived in the era of Indonesia’s Independence, many of them will tell you, that at that time there are many jackfruit’s tree at Yogyakarta and Central Java. So, Jackfruit is become one of the main dish at that time.

Other Special is that Gudeg have many variation of dish. The first one is Wet Gudeg or in the origrinal name we say it ‘Guded Basah’. Wet Gudeg use more coconut milk or use semi-fluid coconut milk, so they wet. Because of that, wet Gudeg just has short time expired. The colour of Wet Gudeg is brighter than the other variation of Gudeg. Other type of Gudeg is ‘Gudeg Kering’ or in english we can say it as Dry Gudeg. Dry Gudeg is the most popular Gudeg nowadays . Dry Gudeg use thick coconut milk, so that they dry, and we can save it for a longer time and we can also bring it for far travelling. The third variation of gudeg is ‘Manggar Gudeg’ . Manggar Gudeg is rather difficult to found. Manggar Gudeg use different main ingridient because they use the flower of Jackfruit tree (Manggar) as the main ingridient.

Gudeg is a complex dish if we look it from the way to cook this dish. Cooking Gudeg needs long time. Before cooking, we must have many ingridients like young jack fruit, coconut milk, palm sugar, teak leaves, and seasoning. Palm sugar and teak leaves will make gudeg ‘s color is brown. To cook it, we must boil it as long as 24 hours or more for steam the sauce. We do it in a firebox. For the sauce, we must make it until it turns dark brown . But, what in this text it is just a simple process, if you want to cook it, you must study it more because the complete recipe is very complex.

There are also a unique thing in the way people serve Gudeg. The first one is The Side Dish of Gudeg. To enjoy Gudeg there is a sauce, named Areh, which made from coconut milk. Then there is a special side dish named ‘Sambal goreng Krecek’ or in English we can say it a stew made of crisp beef skins. From the name we know that it is made from crisp beef skins. People usually eat Gudeg with chicken, egg, tempe and tahu. But, it is not in the usually case. They are cooked in hard boiled, the color is very dark brown. The process as same as Gudeg cooking process. Not only Side Dish, Gudeg also have unique at the container. The first is Gudeg Jugs. Gudeg jugs is a container of Gudeg like a big bowl made from clay. This kind of container is usually to bring a lot portion of Gudeg, but in many seller we must buy it, not free. The free and simple one is Besek. Besek is a container of Gudeg, it is a box basket made from rattan. Besides of that, nowadays, there is another kind container of Gudeg in the modern form. There is Gudeg in can. Ya, with this kind of Gudeg you can buy Gudeg just from the internet.

When you want to buy Gudeg, there is like an options are you want for the low price one or the expensive one. If people want the cheap one, they can go to the Gudeg seller in the street, actually there is many kind of this seller in Yogyakarta and Indonesia. However if you want the complete and expensive one, you can go to the Gudeg restaurant. There have more complete side dish, and you can found the unique container there.

In Summary, Gudeg is a unique, special, and complex traditional dish from Yogyakarta, which now become very popular in Indonesia. Now, we as an Indonesian must save gudeg and develope it more with our creativity.