Resep Ikan Acar Kuning / Indonesian Yellow Pickled Fish recipe

Selam everybody...Merhaba from Turkey...

It's Fish cooked in yellow spicy pickled and It's one of Indonesian traditional food. We usually use fresh water Milkfish (ikan bandeng) to make this meal, since there is not one here I use sea bass fish that I think more or less has similar taste and texture with Milkfish. Cooked in yellow pickle. This dish is one of my favorite during chill days because it taste slightly sour, and fresh, and if you want it a little bit hot spicy, you can add more chillies.

I remember my mom usually made this with "belimbing wuluh" to give natural sour and fresh taste. You cut this "belimbing wuluh" or Averrhoa bilimbi (that it's beautiful name) into small round pieces and cook with all vegetables and fish....hmmm... my mouth watering just remember how sour this "belimbing wuluh".

Serve while it's hot with warm steam white rice, that's we normally eat it.

Here I also share my mom's recipe with step by step picture to give you  illustration how to cook it and you will experience another Indonesian food @(^_^)@

Ingredients needed: 

Serve for 4
- About 700 gr any fish you prefer (or about 2 large size) - better use milkfish. Here I use sea bass. Clean and wash them, cut in half.
- 1-2 large red bell pepper (cabe merah besar)
- 2 medium size cucumber, seeded and roughly julienne cut
- 3 medium size carrots, peel and roughly julienne cut
- some birdeye chilly (to taste) (cabe rawit)
- 3 ~ 4 Indonesian bay leaves (daun salam)
- If you can access to "Belimbing wuluh " or very sour starfruit, you will need about 6 or 7 depending how sour you wanna go. usually I use it in Indonesia. But here I use 2 ~ 3 tbsp lemon juice as substitute.
- 5~8 shallots (bawang merah), halved
- Enough Salt and sugar to taste.

- Enough cooking oil.

Some of Ingredients

Get ready with your fish. Clean them nicely. Actually I used only two of them. Cut them into half.

Fry the fish with enough cooking oil. No need to long to cook, just enough to dry the fish skin about 5 minutes each side. Drain and set aside.

Cucumber, discard the seed, and  roughly julienne cut . Do same thing with carrots and red bell pepper. Halved small shallot. Leave birdeye chilly in whole (if you prefer hot spicy, you can cut into pieces). Set aside.

Mashed the spices below:
- 4 pcs candlenut
- 4 cloves garlic
- 4 pcs shallots
- 2 cm fresh turmeric

Pound with mortar and pestle or with blender/ food processor. I prefer use my traditional pestle and mortar to do this job. @(^_^)@

In large skillet, stir-fry ground ingredient with bay leaves (İndonesian daun salam) until fragrant.

Stir in all vegetables pieces and chilly peppers. Pour about 1,5 cup hot water. Add salt, sugar and lemon juice. Test the taste in this stage. The taste should be freshly slight sour .

Add the fish, stir well carefully, otherwise you will ruin the fish. Cover skillet and cook until spices mingle with the fish and the vegetables slightly wilt. It took about 15~20 minutes.

Turn off the heat.

Enjoy your Yellow Pickled Fish @(^_^)@