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When people think of Indonesian street food with peanut sauce, they usually think of Satay or Gado-Gado. But for me, Ketoprak is my number one choice. This Jakarta classic takes tofu, rice cakes, and thin vermicelli noodles and smothers them in a spicy and garlicky dressing that’s way bolder than your average salad. It’s savory, a little sweet, and hits every single craving at once. I used to have it every weekend for breakfast.

What is Ketoprak?

Ketoprak is a unique salad from the Jakarta area that features lontong/ketupat, bean sprouts, rice vermicelli, and tofu. It has a garlicky and spicy peanut sauce as its dressing.

Ketoprak is an underrated Indonesian street food with distinctive flavor and texture. Simply put, it is a salad and a meal in one dish.

One might compare it to its sister, Gado-gado, but it’s a different dish in every sense.

Ketoprak Jakarta with overlay text — Photo Credit: So Yummy Recipes.

Just like any other street food, you can enjoy Ketoprak any time of the day. It is one of the most popular food items offered by sellers in the Jakarta area.

Hence, the name is Ketoprak Jakarta. I doubt you can find this special vegan dish outside Jakarta.

Ingredients

Contrary to what some people think, you don’t need many ingredients to make Ketoprak. You only need tofu, rice vermicelli, bean sprouts, and lontong or ketupat. As for the peanut sauce dressing, you only need peanuts, chilies, garlic, palm sugar (or brown sugar), lime juice, and sweet soy sauce.

Of all these ingredients, lontong or ketupat was something I couldn’t make easily.

Traditionally, you use banana leaves to make lontong, and for ketupat, you need coconut/palm leaves woven into a diamond shape. And banana leaves are so expensive here in the UK. The palm leaves are impossible to get as they don’t exist here.

But now you can make your own lontong in a food-grade plastic bag. You can check my post on how to make lontong without banana leaves.

Lontong Is One of the Key Ingredients

Before I share my recipe, let me tell you a little bit about the difference between lontong and ketupat.

The difference between lontong and ketupat lies in how you wrap the rice before cooking.

Lontong uses banana leaves rolled into cylinders, and you put the rice in them. Ketupat uses palm leaves woven into a diamond-shaped pouch.

Both lontong and ketupat are cooked by boiling them in water for long hours. It normally takes 2-3 hours to boil them, depending on how big your lontong/ ketupat is and how many lontong/ketupat you put in the pot.

Unlike Western salads, many Indonesian salads and dishes use lontong or ketupat, the hard-boiling rice that some people in the West call rice cake.

How to Make Ketoprak

Apart from boiling the lontong and frying the tofu, you don’t really need to cook anything else to make ketoprak.

When your lontong is ready, you can dice your tofu and fry it. And set aside.

Then, soak your rice vermicelli in hot, boiling water for about 3 minutes. Drain it and set it aside. Do the same for bean sprouts. Soak them in boiling water for about 2-3 minutes, drain, and set them aside.

To make the peanut sauce, you can use roasted and salted peanuts, which are ready-made from the shop. And, of course, if you want, you can use raw peanuts and fry them yourself. The taste of the sauce may differ slightly because the deep-fried peanuts have a distinct fried flavor. It’s a rich aroma that makes your food more flavorful. But I’m okay with the roasted peanut aroma. For me, they both equally make tasty peanut sauce.

roasted peanuts, chillies and garlic in a blender

Anyway, you put 200 grams of peanuts together with 2 tablespoons of peanut butter, 3-4 bird’s eye chilies, 4 cloves of garlic, 2 tablespoons of palm sugar (or brown sugar), ½ teaspoon of salt, and 1 cup of water in a blender or a food processor. Blend and process it until it all becomes a smooth, thick sauce. Add 1-2 tablespoons of lime juice. You may want to use less or more water until you get a smooth, runny sauce that is as thick as double cream (heavy cream).

Assemble the Dish

Try the sauce. It should be rich, spicy, garlicky, sweet, and salty all at once. Feel free to make adjustments to suit your taste, especially with the chilies.

The last thing you want to prepare is the crackers, but they’re optional. Traditionally, Jakartan people use onion crackers—rice crackers with an onion flavor. But you can also use rice crackers. You can even use the ready-made ones from the shop!

So now you have everything ready to assemble.

a plate of Ketoprak Jakarta, the vermicelli, beansprouts and tofu salad from Jakarta

Cut the lontong into small squares or pieces and arrange them on a plate. Sprinkle some rice vermicelli over the lontong, then add bean sprouts and tofu on top.

Pour the peanut sauce generously over the vegetables and lontong. Then, drizzle some sweet soy sauce and garnish with the crackers. Enjoy.

Top Tips to Make Irresistibly Delicious Ketoprak

There are many types of vermicelli. Make sure you choose the one that is made with rice. The thin dried noodles should look cloudy white, not clear white or any other color.
Soak the vermicelli for at least 3 minutes, but no more than 5 minutes. It may be hard or too soft. You can try having a bite before you decide to drain it.
Choose the extra-firm tofu. If you want to make your own tofu, check out my tutorial post on how I do it. If you follow my tutorial, you can even make Indonesian yellow tofu.
You also want to make sure you choose Indonesian sweet soy sauce, as other sauces can taste different. I tried other sauces in the past, and I regretted it. Did you know that sweet soy sauce is originally from Indonesia? So, I guess it’s only fair if we stick to the original.
The original Ketoprak Jakarta doesn’t use peanut butter. But I use about 2 tablespoons to add creaminess to the sauce. You can skip it altogether.

Ketoprak

4.91 from 11 votes

A traditional salad from Jakarta region that uses beansprouts, vermicelli, lontong/ketupat, and tofu. It's served with garlicky and spicy peanut sauce. The dish is popular as street food that can be enjoyed any time of day, as a snack or a meal.

BY: Devy Dar

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Prep : 20

Cook : 20

Total : 40

Servings:

Equipment

Ingredients

1 ready-cooked Lontong see the note.
1 ½ cups beansprouts.
2 ounces vermicelli/ fine rice noodles
5 ounces extra-firm tofu.
1 ⅔ cups roasted & salted peanuts see the notes.
2 tablespoons peanut butter optional, see the note.
4 red chilies see the note.
4 cloves garlic.
2 ½ tablespoons palm sugar or brown sugar. see the note.
½ teaspoon salt.
1-2 tablespoons Lime juice.
2 cups Water.
¼ cup. Indonesian Sweet soy sauce.
Crackers optional.

Instructions

Using a pestle and mortar, a blender, or a food processor, grind, blend, or process the peanuts, chili, garlic, sugar, salt, and water until it’s smooth and thick. You want the paste to be as thick as double cream. Not too runny nor too thick. So you may want to use more or less water than the recipe.
Add the lime juice in and mix well or give it another blitz. Set aside.
Put the rice vermicelli in a mixing bowl, pour boiling water from the kettle over it and let the rice vermicelli soaked in the water for about 3 minutes. Then drain the vermicelli, set aside.
Wash, rinse and blanched the bean sprouts with hot boiling water for a few minutes. Drain and set aside.
Cut the tofu into dice and shallow-fry them for about 6-10 minutes until the outer skin looks a bit golden. Set aside.
Cut the Lontong into small squares.
Take a serving plate.
Arrange the Lontong on a plate. Then add the vermicelli on the top, and scatter the bean sprouts and tofu over it.
Lastly, pour the peanut sauce generously and drizzle with some sweet soy sauce.
If using, garnish with prawn crackers.
Enjoy.

Notes

Although Lontong is one of the main ingredients of Ketoprak, some people may not like it. So if you think you won’t like it, you’re more than welcome to skip it. Though it may not be the same as the real Ketoprak Jakarta.
For the sauce, you can use roasted salted peanuts. Or you can deep fry raw peanuts yourself. If you decide to fry the peanuts, make sure you keep stirring as you fry. Otherwise, the nuts won’t be evenly cooked. And when you use the fried peanuts, you may want to add more salt to the sauce.
If you don’t have fresh chilies, you can substitute them with chili powder. I would put 1 teaspoon of chili powder. Or put as much as you like. Because some chili powder can be hotter than others. So be mindful of that. Try to add a little first then add more if you need.
Ideally, you use palm sugar or brown sugar. But if you don’t have it, you don’t have to worry. Just use the normal sugar but make sure you have a proper Indonesian sweet soy sauce.
Peanut butter is a new addition that can add the creaminess to the sauce. You can skip it altogether and still make a delicious sauce. So don’t worry if you don’t have it. But it’s definitely recommended.

Nutrition

Devy Dar

Devy founded So Yummy Recipes and Drizzling Flavor to share her love of food after exploring various cultures and cuisines for more than two decades. Her mission is to help others easily recreate traditional and non-traditional food with readily available ingredients. Her works have been featured in Reader’s Digest, Al Jazeera, MSN, Yahoo, Bon Appétit, and more.