Thursday, April 29, 2010

SEGO MEGONO WONOSOBO


Sego megono is very popular menu in Central java especially in Pekalongan, Purworejo, Temanggung and Wonosobo. each city has its own typical of sego megono.
Sego means rice. Megono derives from javanese Mego means cloud and gegana which means weapon. A reference said the history of sego megono started on dutch collonialization in Indonesia when people tried to make nice menu for the geurillas. As at that time meat and vegetables were rare. Megono is nice without meat or chicken.
Sego Megono is made of rice that is mixed with vegetables like cabbage, teri (dried fish), long bean, and cocunut.In Wonosobo my hometown, Megonoto is menu for traditional ceremony to thank God. Usually my mother make megono before we harvest rice paddy, before we moved to out new house,or just thank God for His blessing. Usually with Megono my mother prepared Ingkung. Ingkung is wholle chicken that is cooked with curry untill its welldone. It is very yummy. :)
When you visit Wonosobo... try megono for breakfast with tempe kemul. Tempe kemul is friend tempe with delicious flour. Once you tried you will never forget the taste and want some more.

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

MODERN VS OLD FASHIONED


This writting is inspired by conversation among me, my mother and my sister in law at night. Tomorrow we will cook to celebrate my nephew's circumsized. This is very comon when a kid circumsived the family makes celebration for this. Actually he had been circumsized 2 weeks ago, but the celebration held after my parents came to Surabaya. Usually my mother that cooks for every big event in his family.
Tomorrow we plan to make sega megana, chicken and deliver then on box to neighbour. This night we prepare the box for tomorrow. The box is beautifully decorated with batik motives. My sister wants to make the parcel looks traditional. Batik decorations and banana leaves instead of paper.


We are thinking that it would be nice and more traditional if we use besek instead of this batik decorated paper box.
when i was in Junior hi school, everytime a family had celebration usually besek is used as box. Besek is made of bamboo. As time goes by, people start to leave this tradition to use besek as box for food. People now use paper box or i find our neighbour in my village use plastic box.
It is going to be nice when people use besek as food box again. Why?
1. besek can last more than paper. Paper box is thrown to bin after used but besek can be used as spices box like my mother does at home
2. using besek is like preserving indonesian tradition
3. Using besek is good for micro industri
4. Besek is cheaper than paper and it is environmentaly friendly.

I think using local product is better than using modern product. I am so proud using local things. Local things makes unique. i am studying tourism, and i find that the offering of traditional ceremonies in bali or java also influenced by this modern shift. If Balinese usually formerly used local fruits for offering like green apples and green orange so it looks like really sacred ritual. But now we can see that the offering is very colorful and it makes less sacred in my opinion. Cu they use Fuji apples and china orange.

I am maybe too different than any other friends of mine. My friends live with me they prefer Fuji apples or orange from china that have very bright attractive orange colors. I love the taste of Malang Apples and Orange better than those fruits from other. It tastes fresher and watery. Buy them at local market where it is still fresh and no preservative and wax cus it is distributed to local market only, unlike those products from other continents or other countries.