Bakwan Jagung in The New York Times...

Bakwan Jagung or Corn Fritters are one of my all time favourite Indonesian snacks. They are versatile and can go by themselves as a "between meals snack" or they can form part of a main meal. So, I was pleasantly surprised to see a write up of Indonesian style corn fritters in The New York Times. It was also good to see a recipe attached to the article, and some quotes from an Indonesian Executive Chef, Djoko Supatmono, at the Satay Junction in Manhattan, New York.

I still eat bakwan jagung here in Australia. My wife is an excellent cook, and it helps that bakwan jagung is one of her favourites as well. My preferred accompaniments are sweet soy sauce with chopped chillies as a dipping sauce or sambal mentah (raw sambal - ground up chillies, garlic, pepper), or sambal Bali (I am not a connoisseur on that front, but my mother-in-law had the sambal Bali down pat). We are spoilt for fresh corn in this part of the world, and fresh corn is always the best way to go when making bakwan jagung.

It should not be too long before the Malaysians start trying to claim that they are the inventors of the Bakwan Jagung and that Indonesia stole it from them. Malaysia seems to want to claim all manner of Indonesian things from textiles to music, so food would seemingly not be such a big stretch. If Malaysia does not step forward to make a claim, then Singapore probably will.