Instant(Pot) Rendang

Rendang is one of the most delicious dishes in the Indonesian repertoire, and generally takes foreevvveerrrrrrr to make. It's one of the few things I'll ignore my beef ban for, but I never bothered to make it myself. Which is too bad, since then I could a) use good sustainable meat and b) eat twice as much of it. But it occurred to me that, now that I have an InstantPot, things like this should be easy. The idea of rendang is that the beef (or other meat, or even a potato in theory/according to some cookbooks but why) slow braises in coconut milk with a pile of spices, then when all the liquid is reduced out it browns in the coconut fat. The great thing about pressure cookers is they'll get a piece of meat fall-apart tender in no time. The less great thing is, because they're sealed shut, they're shit at reducing down liquid. But even though this recipe required the second step of reducing the coconut milk, the fact that the beef was already well dismantled meant I could do it much faster than in th traditional method, and the whole thing was definitely faster, and required less careful braising. It didn't occur to me til afterwards that I'd want to write this up, so all I have is a photo of the final product on my plate about to get devoured. It's unphotogenic brown mush, but it's crazy delicious brown mush. 100% will make again.

The ingredients are lightly adapted from James Oseland's excellent cookbook Cradle Of Flavor: Home Cooking from the Spice Islands of Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia; method is adapted from this blog, one of the few InstantPot rendang adaptations I could find online. It's a more Malaysian version, though, where I was going for Padang, but I bet it's good too.

NB: There's a lot of ingredients in here, particularly spices and aromatics. Some advance planning/internet shopping may be necessary for the more unusual stuff. Western Indonesia's (and especially Sumatra's) history at the intersection of the spice trades between Maluku in the east (cloves, nutmeg) and India to the west (cinnamon) are strongly reflected in this dish. There's a moment making this where I dropped in the nutmeg and cloves and the whole thing smelled like German Christmas gingerbread - colonialism made scent. (The Germans got it from the Dutch, who colonized the Spice Islands and all of Indonesia, along with some bits of India. The Malaysian version goes even more Indian-influenced, with cumin and cardamom, reflecting British rule over both countries.)

InstantPot Beef Rendang

1.5 lbs good cubed beef, the kind you'd use in stew, with plenty of marbling
1 whole nutmeg
5 whole cloves
6 shallots, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
fresh red chilis to taste (one habanero did it for me)
1.5 tsp turmeric powder
a 2-inch chunk of ginger, peeled & chopped
a 2-inch chunk of galangal, peeled & chopped
5 candlenuts (Oseland suggests unsalted macadamias as a substitution)
1 can coconut milk
a 4-inch stick of cinnamon
1 star anise
2 stalks of lemongrass, tied into knots
6 kaffir lime leaves
5 daun salam leaves
1 tsp kosher salt

1) Bash up the nutmeg into pieces under a Pyrex. Put it in a spice/coffee grinder with the cloves, grind into a powder.

2) Put the shallots, ginger, garlic, galangal, chilis, and candlenuts in a tall measuring cup with a bit of water. Use an immersion blender to grind to a smooth sludge. (You can also do this in a small food processor.)

3) Turn the InstantPot on to Saute. Add just a bit of coconut oil to the pot. When it gets hot, use it to saute the flavoring paste, making sure to stir enough that nothing burns. This mode is hot, and at least in mine there's no 'medium' setting option. (It's been suggested you could do this sauteing in a spoonful of the coconut cream from the top of the can. Probably true, but I didn't try it.) After a minute or two, add the ground spices, turmeric, star anise, cinnamon stick, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, and daum salam. Stir fry another minute or two. Everything should start to smell really good.

4) Add the beef, coconut milk, and salt. Add enough water to barely cover the beef. Seal on the lid, and set to pressure cook for 45 minutes.

5) Now is a good time to cook something green to go with it, and get a pot of rice ready to go.

6) When the pot beeps, let it sit for 5 minutes then do a manual release. (This is a good time to start the rice.) Take off the top and set it back to Saute mode. Cook down until the liquid is gone and the fat starts to foam. At first you'll only need to stir occasionally, as the liquid thickens things will start to stick and constant stirring gets important. Let everything fry in the remaining fat for a few minutes until it gets nice and brown and/or you get fed up with how badly it's sticking to the bottom. The meat will be totally falling apart here - that's good. You may want to cycle the heat element on and off to keep it from getting too hot at the end.

7) Transfer the rendang into a serving dish and pull out all the whole spices and leaves you can. Consider deglazing the pot with a little bit of liquid and scraping up all the tasty brown bits stuck to the bottom, since there's a ton of flavor in there, but you don't want to be pouring anything too liquidy over the rendang. Serve with rice and a veg.