Indonesian Coffee Flan at Everydaydish.tv!

Photo by Yongkie Hurd

During my vacation at Portland, Oregon(see last blog), one exciting event I did was fulfilling Julie's request to present my Indonesian Coffee Flan recipe in her Everyday Dish.TV, a newly born website to present healthy and creative cooking. This is, indeed, a wonderful site with videotaped cooking shows (click on Cooking Show) where you can view what the dishes look like and how recipes are made, in short webtv segments. No measurements of ingredients are mentioned during the videotaping since you can find the recipes on the right hand side of the cooking show page. It is a smart idea for individuals who want to learn an easy-does-it cooking by using simple recipes and simple techniques.

I was, of course, NERVOUS, because the experience was really nerve-wrecking! It was my first experience being videotaped. Just try it, cooking something with someone breathing on your neck and watching you closely or from behind your back. In my case, it was the camera and the cameraman/director/producer, Jay. I was cooking under the shining bright lights everywhere. Hence, I have never cooked like this before. But Jay was very patience with me and methodical. At one time, he offered me a shot of tequila...hhmm....what a good idea! But I didn't take a shot and was able to go through it with his help. Let me know what you think of my video: Everyday Dish.tv presents Indonesian Coffee Flan. You may need to download the latest Quicktime 7 for Windows to view all the cooking shows in this site. If you are an iPod user, you can subscribe and download all cooking shows from this site. DH happens to get an iPod for his birthday and will be able to show his wife cooking to everyone he knows. :-)

Indonesian Coffee Flan is a recipe I invented because an acquaintance visited an Indonesian restaurant, had this dessert, and wanted to know how to make it. The secret ingredients are Indonesian Palm Sugar called Gula Jawa, Pandan (Southeast Asian flavoring leaf smells like vanila, also called screwpine leaf), vanilla, and a good coffee. I grew up with these ingredients and have always used agar powder in making jello-like desserts. I didn't know that gelatin powder that is used commonly in the US is made of an animal ingredient until I became a vegetarian and was told so. Indonesians have always used agar powder which is derived from seaweed for gelling desserts.

You may say, 'Wow these are EXOTIC ingredients! How can I find these ingredients?' If you live in a metropolitan area, you can find these ingredients in asian markets who usually carry Indonesian ingredients. You may find Gula Jawa (palm sugar) and agar powder in the aisle of Thai or Indonesian ingredients and the pandan leaves in the frozen section. It is very unfortunate that I can't find fresh pandan leaves in the States. The aroma of fresh pandan leaves is so wonderful!

Agar powder found in Asian markets in small packages

If you live in a non-metropolitan area, you can find on-line sources for gula jawa: IndoMerchant or Indonesian Food Mart; agar powder: barryfarm.com or Amazon , and pandan essence (use 1 to 2 teaspoons): Importfoods.com.

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