Photo: Gunawan Kartapranata · CC BY-SA 4.0
Arsik (Batak Carp Cooked Dry with Andaliman)
A Batak carp dish from North Sumatra: a whole carp, scales left on, is rubbed with a paste of turmeric, andaliman and torch ginger fruit and cooked over low heat in a little oil and water, basted with the liquid until the pan is nearly dry. The Batak name means fish cooked until dry. It is served whole at weddings and other feasts.
Ingredients
- carp · about 1kg, gutted, scales left on; tilapia also works1
- salt1 tsp
- Paste
- shallots8
- garlic5 cloves
- candlenuts · or macadamias4
- turmeric4 cm
- ginger3 cm
- red chillies4
- andaliman · or 1 tsp Sichuan peppercorns2 tbsp
- torch ginger fruit (asam cikala) · or 1 tbsp lime juice3
- Pan
- galangal · bruised4 cm
- lemongrass · bruised3 stalks
- long beans · left long200 g
- cooking oil2 tbsp
- water250 ml
Steps
- ⏲ 5 min
Gut the carp but do not scale it. Rinse, pat dry and rub it inside and out with the salt.
- ⏲ 5 min
Grind all the paste ingredients fine. Keep a pinch of the andaliman back.
- ⏲ 15 min
Rub the paste over the fish inside and out and leave it 15 minutes.
- ⏲ 3 min
Lay the galangal, lemongrass and long beans over the base of a wide pan and put the fish on them. Spread the rest of the paste over the fish and add the oil and water.
- ⏲ 30 min
Cover and cook over low heat 30 minutes. Every 5 minutes, lift the lid and spoon the liquid from the pan over the fish. Do not turn it.
- ⏲ 10 min
Uncover and cook 10 minutes more, still basting, until the liquid has nearly gone and the paste clings to the fish. Check that the thickest flesh by the backbone is opaque and flakes.
- ⏲ 30 sec
Just before taking it off the heat, scatter over the andaliman you kept back (huoguo).
- ⏲ 1 min
Lift the fish whole onto a plate and serve with the beans and rice. Push the scales aside and eat the flesh.
Variations
- With tilapia. Around Lake Toba it is as common as carp.
- With sea fish. Mackerel or snapper can be cooked the same way.
- At a feast. The fish, whole from head to tail, is laid on rice with its head towards the person receiving it.
Tips
- Do not scale the fish. For a feast it is meant to be whole, scales and all.
- Do not turn the fish. The top cooks under the basting.
- Only a little water. Covered in liquid, it becomes a braise.
- Cook freshwater fish right through. As ca loc nuong trui says, freshwater fish carry parasites and are not eaten underdone.
More detail and the reasons why (2)
- The name is the method. According to Indonesian Wikipedia, arsik comes from mangarsik, pouring liquid over the fish while it cooks, and its other name, dengke na niarsik, means fish cooked until dry. The fish is neither sunk in a sauce nor fried. A small amount of liquid keeps going over the top until it has cooked down and the paste clings to the fish.
- Why some andaliman is kept back. Andaliman is a relative of Sichuan pepper and numbs the tongue. Huoguo says "The numbing compounds are heat-sensitive: fry them long and the ma disappears, leaving just bitterness." After forty minutes the paste keeps the aroma and loses much of the numbness, so a pinch at the end brings it back.
The basics behind this dish
- Browning and the Maillard ReactionMeat fails to brown for one of three reasons: it is wet, the pan is cool, or you put too much in at once. Plus how the brown film stuck to the pan becomes your sauce.
- Cooking Meat: Temperature, Resting, and Cutting Against the GrainDoneness is a core temperature, not a number of minutes. What resting actually does, how to handle a thick cut, and why the direction you slice changes the texture.
- Knife Skills: Grip, Cuts, and Why Size MattersHow you hold the knife matters more than how fast you cut. The pinch grip, the claw hand, and why uniform size is a cooking decision rather than a cosmetic one.
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