Known for its culinary wealth, jajanan pasar or literally translated as market snacks is a favorite among Indonesian. These refer to a wide variety of snacks you found and bought in the traditional market. With different regions offering different snacks, these traditional foods are still quite popular.
In fact, some snacks come with a modern touch for better serving and taste, which confirms their first position on the snack list and contributes enough to economic growth in general.
Some of the Best Indonesian Market Snacks
Indonesian jajanan pasar are typically light bites or snacks with sweet flavor or savory ones. You can find a rich variety of these snacks across the country.
Most of them are made of rice flour, wheat flour, sago, tubers, tapioca flour, rice and sticky rice. Other than having it as snacks, they also have personal philosophies which represent the region they come from. Find some mostly-seen jajanan pasar below:
Lemper
Lemper has a savory and sweet taste. Made from glutinous rice then filled with shredded or chopped flavored chicken. You can have other fillings too such as beef, meat floss or shredded coconut. Usually, it wraps around banana leaves for aromatic scent.
Kue Lumpur
This yellowish brown kue is made of wheat flour, coconut milk, egg, water, margarine and sugar. It tastes sweet yet savory and comes with toppings like a slice of young coconut or raisins.
Nagasari
Nagasari is made from rice flour, coconut milk, sago, sugar and stuffed with banana. Sometimes, small jackfruit pieces are found in the white dough. Wrapped in banana leaves and being steamed, nagasari tastes sweet and sickeningly sweet.
Jadah
This white jajanan is made of sticky rice that has been mixed with coconut milk, pandan leaves, salt and shredded coconut. The texture is a bit mushy and sticky.
Kue Thok
Also known as kue ku or kue mata kebo (the bull’s eye kue), this traditional snack is made from glutinous flour filled with mung beans. With its brightly red color, the shape is similar to a turtle shell.
Onde-Onde
Taste extremely sweet, this snack has crunchy texture on the outside. Mong and red beans are obligatory filling. While it mostly looks golden brown, some onde-onde are also black.
Kue Pukis
Comes in half circle shape, original is the only taste available. However, we can find them in chocolate, strawberry, green tea, cheese and more flavors.
Kue Cucur
Looking similar to a sunny-side-up egg, this beautiful brown kue is made of rice flour and brown sugar which tastes sweet, of course! The extremely sweet and crunchy texture in the middle comes from being fried in a small cooking fire.
Kue Klepon
This coconut shredded-coated green ball tastes sweet. The surprise lies within the brown sugar that burst out upon chewing it.
Bika Ambon
It is made of tapioca and sago flour or wheat flour. Add turmeric powder for its bright yellow color.
How to Keep Snacks from Going Stale
The best ways to store your market snacks depends on their texture. Wet-type snacks require extra care than dry-type ones.
Here are a few best way you can follow:
- Place your dry snacks on a plate or dry container to keep them crunchy.
- Storing hot snacks in an airtight container will ruin the texture because the vapor rises off the hot food.
- Keep your snack in a dry and cool room rather than humid ones to prevent microorganism growth.
- An airtight container is better than a plate
- Wrap in a plastic
- Store separately between sweet and savory snacks
- Keep them in a fridge
- Freezer is also an option but only fried savory food is possible.
After years, these jajanan pasar still everyone’s favorite snacking or food gift.
Among the abundant list of jajanan pasar, we often find everything appetizing that it is hard to choose one as our favorite. Nevertheless, jajanan pasar is a part of Indonesian culinary culture that delicacy will always be offered.