Fire Islands — Eleanor Ford

Fire Islands is Eleanor Ford's book on the cooking of Indonesia, written by an English cook and writer who learned the food of the archipelago through a family connection to the country and through long travel within it. The title names the volcanic arc on which the islands lie, the same belt of ash-fed soil that grew the nutmeg, clove, pepper and chilli on which the history of the spice trade turned. The book belongs among the modern English-language authorities on the table of the archipelago, alongside the older works of Sri Owen and William Wongso.

The book is organised as a travel through the islands rather than as a catalogue of dishes, and this is its distinction among the authorities this library rests on. Ford moves between Java, Bali, Sumatra, Sulawesi and the eastern islands, and sets each recipe within the household, market or festival where she met it. The reader learns the dish together with the place that produces it, which is the manner of a regional survey and not of a collection of isolated formulas. Her recipes are written for a cook working outside Indonesia, with substitutions offered where a leaf, root or paste cannot be found, and the method is explained clearly enough for the dish to be reproduced with confidence. The subject matter ranges across the whole of the table: the spice pastes, bumbu, that underlie the braises and curries of Sumatra and Java; the grilled and smoked fish of the eastern coasts; the sambals that stand beside almost every meal; and the sweet and savoury preparations of festival cooking. Rendang, gudeg, sate and the many sambals appear as parts of a larger structure of rice, side dishes and condiments, which is how the Indonesian meal is composed. The book gives due weight to the aromatics on which that cooking depends, among them galangal Alpinia galanga, turmeric Curcuma longa, candlenut Aleurites moluccanus, lemongrass Cymbopogon citratus and salam leaf Syzygium polyanthum. The historical frame is the second strength of the work. Ford treats the archipelago as a place shaped by trade, and reads the table as the record of it: the Indian and Arab merchants who came for spice, the Chinese settlers whose noodles and soy preparations entered the kitchen, and the Portuguese and Dutch who arrived after them. The Banda conquest of 1621 and the long history of the Dutch East India Company, the VOC, stand behind the account of the Spice Islands, and the book keeps the reader aware that the nutmeg Myristica fragrans and clove Syzygium aromaticum of the eastern islands were once among the most sought-after goods in the world. As an authority, Fire Islands is best used for its reading of the whole archipelago and for the practical clarity of its method. It is a book of the cook's table rather than a scholarly apparatus of sources, and it should be read beside Sri Owen's two works for the older recipe tradition, Wongso for the view from within the country, Lara Lee for the Indonesian-Australian home kitchen, and Vivienne Kruger for the specialist study of Bali.

The table that Fire Islands describes is built on the balance of heat, sourness, sweetness and the savour of fermented shrimp paste and sweet soy sauce, set around rice. A meal is composed of several dishes served together, with sambal beside them, so that each mouthful can be adjusted, and the book follows that arrangement rather than treating dishes singly. Chilli, tamarind Tamarindus indica, coconut Cocos nucifera and fresh aromatics change in proportion from island to island, and the regional character of the cooking lies in that change.