264 Steamed prawns with petai beans (Toemis Oedang Peteh – Menado)

In this dish the best ingredients come together: prawns and peteh or petai beans. That’s a beautiful  combination. I love it. Basically anything with peteh beans I devour. ;-). Peteh beans are also known as stink beans. They smell extremely and can not be used in any dish. You know when you cook with peteh beans, the beans will be the base of the flavor. You can combine petai beans with everything; vegetables, meat and fish.

I use very fresh, large shrimps I just got from the fish shop. Icelandic prawns I like the best. Sauté the shrimps not too long if you buy them already cooked, otherwise they dry out. I think Beb Vuyk uses fresh shrimp in her dish.

I get peteh beans at my local Asian shop. They do not have to soak in water. I just cut them into thin strips and stir fry them with the shrimps. Phew that smell! Yummy!

This recipe is good for 2 people as a big side dish
It’s ready in 15 minutes

Steamed shrimp with peteh beans from Beb Vuyk’s Great Indonesian Cookbook, page 226

Ingredients

100 grams of shrimp
5 to 6 peteh or petai beans (fresh, salted or dried)
1 cup of water
2 tablespoons of oil

spices

3 tablespoons of chopped onions
2 chopped cloves of garlic
1 teaspoon sambal oelek (Indonesian chili paste)
3 green lomboks/chilies (unseeded)
1 teaspoon galangal (laos root)
1 teaspoon of Javanese sugar
1 salam leaf
salt

Soak the salted or dried peteh beans for several hours. Take the beans out of their skin and cut them into thin strips. Rub onions, garlic, chili, sugar and galangal with salt together into a paste and cut the green lombok into rings. Fry the paste in the oil. When the onions are yellow add the shrimp, the lombok, the peteh beans and salam leaf. Fry everything together with some water and let it simmer for a bit.

Salam is Asian bay leave. You can get them dried or fresh out of the freezer at an Asian food shop. I think salam gives food a light cinnamon scent. It makes flavors ‘warmer’.

I leave the green lombok out. My 5 year old loves prawns. Sad for her when this dish is too spicy. This dish can use some extra spiciness though.

We serve it with plain white rice. You can make a cucumber salad to ‘extinguish the heat’ if needed ;-).

Beb Vuyk, best known for her Groot Indonesisch Kookboek (Great Indonesian Cook Book), was much more than a great cook. She belongs to the most important Dutch-Indonesian (Indo) writers and journalists of her time. Check this out.