Minang Fried Beef

Our Indonesia helper taught me to cook this dish many years ago. It is a simple Minangkabau dish. Minangkabau people are from West Sumatra, Indonesia. Their dishes are popular in South East Asian and is famous for its rich taste of succulent coconut milk and spicy chili. This dish that she taught me is very simple and didn’t use any coconut milk in it. Even without the coconut milk the dish has a nice fragrant of coconut because of the coconut paste/kerisik in it and it is not spicy at all. It goes really well with rice or bread.

Ingredients:
From My Kitchen Snippets

1 pound beef – I used flank steak
2 tbsp chili paste or sambal Oelek
4 shallots
2” fresh ginger
6 cloves garlic
2 green chilies – cut small
1 medium size onion – slice round
3 tbsp tomato ketchup
2 tbsp coconut paste/ kerisik (recipe below)
2 tsp sugar
Salt to taste

For the Coconut paste/Kerisik

1 cup fresh grated coconut

1. In a non-stick pan, dry fry the grated coconut until golden brown. Remove, pound or blend it into paste while it is still hot and set it aside to be use later.
2. Sliced garlic, shallots and ginger thinly and set it aside. Slice beef thinly and set it aside.
3. Heat up 2 -3 tbsp of oil in a frying pan, sauté the garlic, ginger and shallots until lightly brown and fragrant. Add in the chili paste and continue to stir-fry for 1 minute. Add in the beef and continue to toss and turn the beef until it change to color.
4. Add in some water, enough to cover the beef. Bring it up to a boil, cover and turn the heat down to low. Let the beef simmer until it is soft. Stir occasionally and add more water if necessary.
5. Add in the ketchup, coconut paste, green chili, onions and all the seasonings. Cook for another 2 minutes and let the sauce thickens.
6. Dish out and serve with warm rice.

Note: You can add more chili paste if you like a spicier dish.