Brilio.net - Jengkol is one of the popular ingredients in various Southeast Asian cuisines. However, this ingredient often brings challenges for many people in the cooking process. Although known for its unique and rich taste, jengkol is also known for its hard texture and tends to be difficult to soften.
Indeed, basically, it takes a special technique to process jengkol. One method that many people do is to soak jengkol in coffee water overnight. In addition to making the texture softer, this is also considered to be able to remove the unpleasant odor that sticks to jengkol.
However, if you don't have time to soak the jengkol first, you can use a trick shared by Instagram user @peggi8. Through one of the videos uploaded, she admitted that she did not soak and boil the jengkol first. Instead of boiling it which would take a long time, the netizen chose to fry the jengkol.
As reported by BrilioFood from the Instagram account @peggi8 on Friday (13/9), frying jengkol can make its texture soft. In addition, the unpleasant odor in jengkol will be easier to remove because it evaporates when fried. Therefore, this method is suitable for use if you want to save cooking time.
But the first thing to do is peel the outer skin of the jengkol. Well, this skin tends to be hard, so it must be removed. After peeling, usually the inner skin of the jengkol will be visible. That part does not need to be peeled, okay? You can directly split the jengkol into two parts.
photo: Instagram/@peggi8
Next, prepare hot oil in a frying pan. Then add the jengkol that has been halved. Fry while stirring. At this stage, the skin of the jengkol will peel off by itself. So you can immediately separate it later after draining.
photo: Instagram/@peggi8
Continue frying the jengkol until cooked and crispy. When it starts to turn brown, remove and drain. After that, immediately place the jengkol in a container and fill it with water. Soak the jengkol for a few minutes to make the texture softer.
photo: Instagram/@peggi8
Well, the soaked jengkol can be drained again and cooked. In the upload, the owner of the Instagram account @peggi8 processes it with green anchovy chili sauce . So the jengkol that has been soaked will be crushed and mixed with green anchovy chili sauce which is ready to be eaten as a side dish.
This upload about the trick of processing jengkol has been watched more than 493 thousand times. Who would have thought, there are many other Instagram users who are interested and also provide direct responses in the comments column. Some of them even provide other suggestions in processing jengkol.
"I also never soak jengkol overnight when cooking it like this... I like to slice it, then wash it, fry it, then soak it.... When the skin has peeled off, I process it to make jengkol chili sauce," said Instagram @antifajri2020.
"If you want the jengkol to be softer, soak it in water before frying, Mak. Before frying, soak it in rice water," wrote the Instagram account @desni_alvia.
"This is my favorite from the past. There are still many who don't know that jengkol can be sauced or fried with balado," commented the Instagram account @dindaauliaa2020.