tempe bacem - sweet fried tempeh

Tempe Bacem Sweet fried tempe

Bahan-bahan:ingredients:
300 gr tempe
2 salam leaves (indonesian bay leaf) can substitute european bay or curry leaf
1 sereh (lemongrass)
500 ml water or coconut water
oil

bumbu:
2 cm laos (galangal)
1/2 tsp ketumbar (coriander seed)
1 shallot
1 tsp salt
2 cloves garlic
2 tsp palmsugar
1 tsp grated coconut
2 red lomboks (chilli)
2 teaspoon ketchap mani(optional)

Cara membuat:preparation/method:
Cut the tempe into small slices and slice again into 2-3 cm long pieces. Pound or grind the ingredients for the bumbu into a fine paste. Heat in a wok the water and add the bumbu, the tempe, the salam and the sereh and let it simmer slowly until the fluids have evaporated. Heat in a wok the oil and the the tempe golden brown and serve.

As dinner was obviously served at night, i gave up taking food pics due to crap lighting and we never had any leftover for lunch to be photographed in daylight!
This is great with rice and a dry or wet meat or veg curry.

While on holiday we ate this nearly every night, its a little like a sweet savoury version of peanut brittle, but not so sweet of course, and actually not so brittle, so not really alot like peanut brittle at all!!!! but its the closest i could come at a comparison. i hate tempe usually but this, i really dug!
What i did find really interesting about Indonesian cooking is that although they use coriander seed alot in recipes they never, ever use the grown leaves like the Thais and Vietnamese do. I wonder why?