Few weeks ago, I shared about fun games we did to celebrate Independence Day (Fireworks is not how we celebrate that special day, we play games to celebrate the most historical day in Indonesia). One of the most famous games is ‘Makan Kerupuk’ (Eating kerupuk). Although it is a bit difficult for me to translate Kerupuk but I will try (with a bit of help from Wikipedia) because Kerupuk is a food loved by so many Indonesian from the rich to the poor.
According to Wikipedia, Indonesia has perhaps the largest variety of kerupuk.
But…what is kerupuk?
Kerupuk is a kind of snack that we can eat as usual snack or as ‘lauk’ (the side dish we eat with rice). It is made from a mixture of tapioca (flour made of cassava) and other flavoring agents like fish, prawn, onion, etc. The dough is steamed and then we cut it thinly and let it dry under the sun. The dry kerupuk can be kept for a long time.
Kerupuk can be sold as both dry and already fried. Frying dry kerupuk is not as simple as it seems, that’s why people who can’t cook prefer to buy the already fried ones. Some dry kerupuk need to be warm up under the sun or it won’t expand when we fry it. Dry kerupuk is a smaller, harder and darker than the friend one. If we can’t fry it properly, the kerupuk will stay the same size as the dry one…and that means you have failed frying it. The failed one is hard and sooo not as delicious as the well fried one.
Some types of dry kerupuk
Here’s a video how Kerupuk seller fries the dry kerupuk:
However, we don’t have to do it with two oils like that…all we have to do is make sure that there is plenty of hot oil. We need to stir it once in a while because we have to make sure that every surface of the dry kerupuk has direct contact with oil.
There are so many kinds of kerupuk here…I don’t think I have eaten them all.
Here are some of the kerupuk I have eaten:
Kerupuk Bawang (Onion Kerupuk)
This is one of my favorites. I once had a neighbor who had a daughter living in Germany and she often asked her mother to send her this kerupuk all the way from Jakarta.
Kemplang or Kerupuk Palembang.
This one is so delicious and quite expensive because it is made from fish. The more expensive it is the more we can taste the fish.
Kerupuk Kulit (skin kerupuk)
This kerupuk doesn’t have flour in it because it is made by drying the skin of a cow/buffalo. This one is mostly found in West Sumatra. I have eaten the one from West java but not as delicious as the one from west Sumatra.
Kerupuk Udang (Prawn Kerupuk)
Also my favorite, especially the good quality one. I like eating this with rice. It is, of course, made from prawn.
Kerupuk Putih/Warung (White Kerupuk)
This kerupuk is the easiest to find and the common one people use the eat with rice. This kerupuk is also the one that we use for the game to celebrate Independence day.
There are still so many kerupuk here and if I provide all the pictures, one post won’t be enough. There are soy bean kerupuk, noodle kerupuk, red kerupuk, rice kerupuk, etc.
If you google (image) kerupuk…you’ll see so many kind of kerupuk. I make it easier for you 😉 > here.
Almost all kerupuk use flour as their main ingredient, the taste comes from what they mix in the flour dough…however, Kerupuk Kulit (Skin Kerupuk) is 100% from cow skin. This might sound gross for non-Indonesian but I can guarantee that it’s delicious 😉
Polychrome Interest 
Oh my!!! You are making me so hungry and jealous you get to eat this every day Nov! I LOVE LOVE LOVE kerupuk, it’s my fave Indo food, well equal w/ martabak telor I think, he..he.. I once ate 5 kerupuk warung (isn’t it called kerupuk aci also?) one morning when I was back home, of course I got stomachache after, ahah. I LOVE all these kerupuk, kalo pake kecap even better! 😀
Can I assume there’s no kerupuk in US? 😉
You should have bought a lot of dry kerupuk when you came to Indonesia 😉
Hahahaha I didn’t even know that kerupuk has a name…I thought it was called kerupuk warung. I like eating it with saus sambal, kecap is too sweet for me.
I would definitely be trying out
your cooking Miss. Novia and
these look delicious 🙂 🙂
Thank you for giving us a taste of Asia 🙂 Mmmm
Andro xxxx
Hope you can try this one day Andro 😉
I hope so too my sweet friend 🙂
Andro xxxx
Another good reason to visit so I can try it myself. I love your tidbits that you share.
You can actually find some dry kerupuk that you can fry by yourself in Dutch. That country has almost all our culinary.
Thank you TBM 🙂
Mmmmm…. food is always a fav topic for this lady and as always it’s neat to hear about your favorite things, Novia… especially food!! 😉
I’ve never heard of kerupuk, but it sounds sort of like the rice crisps I find in the Asian food store… especially the seafood ones.
Ahhhh… except for the Kerupuk Kulit… that sounds like what we have here in the US, called Pork Rinds… a salty fried snack food made from pig skin deep fried till it’s all crispy like a potato chip.
Thank you Miyuki 🙂
It is a bit like rice crips (I have tried the ones from Japan) but we have more variaty because people but different kind of additional flavour to the dough. We also have ‘renginang’, it’s a crips made from a whole rice…looks like hundreds of rice sticking together.
I saw the pic and it does look similar with our kerupuk kulit. I guess all mammal skin can be made into kerupuk kulit (but I will never eat the pork one, it’s forbidden to eat anything from pork)
D’ohh!! I hadn’t thought about that… pigs have been farm animals here for like forever since our country was first settled so for me it is common to think of them as just another source of food. Strange though that we don’t eat the cow skin version here since we also raise cattle… and our early peasants, from where most of our native cuisine descends, were very thrifty people who used everything they could to provide for their families.
The renginang sounds like our rice cakes… little biscuits of rice pressed together and fried. If you would believe it… they are considered a diet food here! 😉
Hahaha we don’t use goat skin even though we eat goat 😉 I guess that’s the same with cow in your place.
It does look alike but we don’t press renginang, it looks like this>> http://tokojajanfatimah.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/rengginang.jpg
Ooohh!! Now those look like a dessert we have called “Rice Crispy Treats”!! We make them by mixing a breakfast cereal of puffed rice with melted marshmallow to make little cookies that look a lot like those… or sometimes into a cake we cut into squares. Sooooo… darn… sweet! Yum! 😉
well renginang is not sweet at all…it’s salty. I have heard of sweet renginang but I haven’t tried it yet.
I’ve definitely never had or even heard of Kerupuk before. Some of those images look like potato chips, but being made of flour it must be quite different.
It’s totally different. Chips are made purely from potato while kerupuk’s main ingredient is flour (except for kerupuk kulit) … it’s a bit like senbe (Japanese rice cracker)
I don’t know that one either!
Ah…I am afraid I don’t know what else to compare with
You have me drooling, and I don’t even know what it tastes like except how you describe it.
It’s a bit like Japanese rice cracker… but not quite the same.
I’ll trade you a pair of origami crane earrings for some.
Hahaha…deal 😉
Check your email.
Will do 🙂
I looove kerupuk; shrimp, fish, almost anything. Meal gets merrier with it 🙂 Good topic! I guess they are like chips.
They are like chips with different purpose 😉 this one we eat with rice.
Thank you Andina
Prawn kerupuk is my favorite!! I think it’s among nasi and sambal, of being kinds of food Indonesians can’t live without haha I also like Kemplang (I don’t even know the name of it before haha). My father is from Palembang and most of our relatives still live there, so we have toooons of them sent to us on Lebaran Day haha
Hear hear! I am planning to write about sambal next time 😉
I have known the name kemplang years ago because my kostmate was from Palembang and she often brought it when she went back to her kampung.
Didn’t know you’re a Palembangian (vocab maksa) 😉
It;s not going to fit in one post, Miss. We have a LOT of sambal’s variety! :p But I can’t wait for the post, must be mouth-watering :9
I have to manage 😉
We have so many kerupuk too but I only mentioned few of them.
I just remember that next month is October which means it’s time for me to share about Indonesian ghosts….sambal post have to wait.
I wonder if these are the same as what you get at Chinese restaurants. They lways taste of prawn. I like them quite a bit. I didn’t know there were so many flavours.
I think it is quite similar since we are both Asian…but we have more variaty than prawn.
Oh, how I love kerupuk! But well, I think most of Indonesian do love them, right? 😀 My favorite are fish and garlic kerupuk. But! I personally think the king of kerupuk is Palembangnese’s Kemplang. Yum! So tasty! 😀
Kemplang is really delicious 🙂 but I like all kerupuk.
I remember giving Kerupuk to my foreign friend once then realized a little too late that she was vegetarian and that I gave her the Kerupuk kulit one. I was so mortified & I didn’t tell her the truth. Still feel guilty after all this time 😦
She liked it, though..
Hahahaha…you have poisoned her!! If she finds this post, she’ll know the truth 😉
I like krupuk very much. the most favorite is prawn krupuk.
Indonesian food
I think, all Indonesian loves Kerupuk 😉
Thank you for stopping by