Internet (Indonesian instant food)

...Well, semi-instant.

From left to right: a pack of Indo Mie (that is, Indonesian instant noodles), an egg, and a pack of Swift's Carne Norte (Philippine brand).

Internet as a food is a result of a word-mash of Indo Mie, telur (which means "egg" in Bahasa), and kornet daging (which means "corned beef/meat" in Bahasa).

I'm so glad that Indo Mie brand noodles can get exported to Philippine grocery stores now. I grew up in Indonesia, and that did some strange things to my tastes.

Even eggs were different there, I remember. Upon moving to Indonesia, my mother requested, in the little Bahasa that she knew at the beginning, for her room to be painted eggshell--which was supposed to be a shade of white. The workers painted it terracotta. My mother didn't understand what went wrong until she did the groceries. Even the best-stocked supermarkets had no white eggs anywhere. They were terracotta-colored, small, as angular as an egg can possibly be, and thick-shelled. When my family moved back to the Philippines, I had to practice working with white, plump, large (even when they were graded as small), thin-shelled eggs and get used to them again. My omelets were disasters, for months.

What on earth is Carne Norte? Yes, that's Spanish for "meat (of the) north" but according to the Internet (as in, the technology with the software and all the information) this means "corned beef" in the Philippines. Uhh...no it doesn't! Swift also has a corned beef packet labeled corned beef! If Carne Norte is corned beef then that's just confusing.

I've accidentally eaten wet dog food with a more appetizing flavor and texture than Swift's corned beef, by the way. Maybe it's because I followed the directions written on the packet and kept the packet in a bowl of scalding hot water, instead of making it like I prefer to make corned beef, which is pan-fried until the oil dries and leaves meat with the consistency of a crispy potato hash brown.

But maybe not, because I've eaten PureFood's corned beef straight from the can and that did not taste anything like wet dog food, that tasted like real meat and has always been my favorite brand.

I like to try new things, though, and I'll give Swift another chance... Here's hoping that their Carne Norte is better.

So...How do you corn beef, anyway? Are the cows fed corn? Is it because the meat is shredded into striated rows, like corn? The latter one was the explanation that one of my science teachers gave me, but it turns out to be that "corning" of meat refers to leaving it in a brine with large grains of salt. These grains of salt are called kernels, or corns.

Mi goreng means "noodles (that are) fried" which is a lie with these instant noodles because the noodles are immersed in hot water until cooked and then are mixed with a flavor pack to make it taste as if it's fried when it's not. Sneaky.

Bumbu (flavor powder), is mixed with minyak (oil), kecap manis ("ketchup that is sweet"--the "c" in written Bahsa is pronounced like "ch"), and cambal (chili sauce).

I was a picky eater as a child, but spicy food was the worst to me. When I moved to Indonesia, I had to get used to the flavor or else I'd starve to death. Indo Mie instant noodles was almost the only thing I ate during the transition, because at least I had the option of leaving the chili sauce out.

Nowadays, though, I miss a little kick. After some hesitation pictured above, I included the chili sauce.

I like a little more kecap manis than was shown, but was too hungry to take the trouble to make my own by boiling soy sauce and sugar into a syrup.

Incidentally, if you boil soy sauce, sugar, sake (rice wine), and mirin (rice wine vinegar) into a syrup, then you get Japanese tonkatsu sauce. I was supposed to do that last weekend when I met up with my friend, Angel, who gave me the Indo Mie pack--thank you, Angel! We'll get around to making those rice burgers some day.

The noodles are mixed in with the flavoring and topped with the packet of bawang goreng (fried garlic chips--"bawang" also means "onion" in Bahasa, but in the packet--and in Tagalog--bawang means garlic). Add the corn beef, and the egg.

Mmm!

The Carne Norte wasn't bad. It didn't get as crispy as PureFood's corned beef, but I might have just gotten impatient. Swift's Carne Norte tastes a lot like blood with a hint of liver somewhere in all that beef, which must be the stew referred to in the corner ("Guisado na!") And it does taste mostly like corned beef--so, I still count this dish as Internet.

PureFoods corned beef remains my favorite brand, though--and my definition of corned beef, as juicy with short strings and ability to crisp up to a meat hash or even up to beef bacon floss. In Indonesia, the corned beef was usually overly spiced, came out of unwieldly key-and-roll cans, and had the consistency of clay--which I thought was just wrong, but apparently that's the corned beef that the rest of the world is used to.

I wonder if PureFoods corned beef got imported to Indonesian grocery stores by now.

Anyway, good Internet today--PureFoods corned beef might even have been too salty to mesh with the other ingredients, so I can be comfortable in declaring that this had the best of both worlds.