Soto Sapi - Indonesian Spiced Beef Soup

One of the dishes I served at baby M's birthday party last weekend.
It was a hot day, and in Indonesia, we surely eat hot and spicy soup with a lot of acid to sweat it out. Slurp! If you did sweat, you'd feel like you just did one heck of a workout. Refreshed! Forget makeup, or use something totally waterproof :D

There are sooo many different kinds of sotos in Indonesia, I tried to do the yellow kind.

Recipe
Beef stock
- 1 kg beef (I used brisket and shin), blanched and cut into cubes
- 2 stalk lemongrass, bruised and cut into 5 cm long pieces
- 6 lime leafs
- 2 cm galangal, crushed
- hot water
- salt, pepper, sugar
Spice paste
- 8 cloves garlic
- 6 shallot
- 2 cm ginger
- 1 tsp turmeric (or more)
- 1 tsp salt
- a bit of cooking oil for saute-ing
Serve with
- crispy shallot
- kecap manis (Indonesian sweet soy sauce)
- lime wedges
- chopped scallion
- and of course rice ^_^

In a large pot, cook beef cubes in hot water with lemongrass, lime leafs, and galangal, bring to boil and simmer for 1.5 hours (minimum, or until tender), or pressure cook for 30 minutes. I made my spice paste by throwing all the ingredients into a food processor, followed by grinding it using a mortar and pestle until really smooth. You can use blender, try to make the paste as smooth as possible. Saute spice paste in a bit of hot oil until fragrant, add into the beef stock, mix well, and adjust seasonings if necessary. Garnish and serve hot.

Can't wait for winter so that I can use this soto as a hot pot soup base. Oh yes!