Palm Oil is Attractive to Indonesian Gastronomy

TODAY, Indonesian traditional culinary is not merely considered as methods of survival, but also a local wisdom in choosing, sorting, mixing, and cooking food. It is important for Indonesians to aware of it and love the food as an important heritage of the country. That’s why the government deems it necessary to promote any traditional food products, including palm oil products. Deputy Cabinet Secretary Ratih Nurdiati said that as she opened the Gastronomi Mini Potluck Festival at the Krida Bhakti Building, Ministry of State Secretariat, Tuesday (23/10/2018). “The Indonesian culinary that we are enjoying now is part of Indonesian gastronomy, the diet used to be eaten by our ancestors to survive on,” she said. A gastronomy seminar was also held in the festival which was organized by Indonesia Gastronomi Association (IGA) in collaboration with Cabinet Secretariat and supported by the Indonesian Oil Palm Estate Fund (BPDPKS). This event was also a momentum for BPDPKS and Indonesian Palm Oil Association (Gapki) to promote and educate public on palm oil. BPDPKS and Gapki used the event to share views on advantages of palm oil and to help the publics to aware that palm oil is literally everywhere – in foods, cosmetics, cleaning products, fuels, and so on. “People need to know that palm oil is found in many Indonesian foods, not only for cooking oil, but is also found in many kind of foods,” Kanya Lakshmi, Gapki’s Secretary General said in press conference, (22/10/2018). This festival is expected to be an event for public to know that palm oil derivative product in foods is not only cooking oil, but is also found in many edible food products, including cereals, baked goods like bread, cookies and muffins, protein bars and diet bars, chocolate, coffee creamers, margarine, and so on. [caption id=`attachment_3218` align=`alignnone` width=`2048`] (Foto: JAY/Humas)[/caption] The festival offers the truly unique opportunity to experience the archipelago culinary, such as buntil and botok from Central Java, Se’i from East Nusa Tenggara, Arsik and Roti Jala from North Sumatera, Sala Lauak from West Sumatera, Choipan and Tempoyak from West Kalimantan, Mie Celor and Pempek from South Sumatera, Paniki and Woku from South Sulawesi, Ikan Kuah Kuning from Papua, and others. An Indonesian Gastronomi seminar was also held in this festival in Building III, Ministry of State Secretariat. Ratih said, Indonesian culinary should be presented more attractively to make it more appealing than other’s country culinary as Indonesia has many ethnic groups which also have unique culinary. Back to the old days, Europeans vyed to come to Indonesia for spices. “We should learn from history, we have to make a strategy to promote our food to be the flagship in tourism industry, particularly in food tourism,” Ratih said. ***