Kluwek, Si Hitam Bumbu Rawon And Sup Konro Which Are Antimicrobial

Illustration of a bowl of rawon (Pexels / Valeria Boltneva)

JAKARTA - In Indonesia, kluwek or kepayang seeds are known by various names. Scientifically, it is included in the classification of plants in the Magnoliopsida class and the Achariaceae family.

West Javanese call it picung or Pucung. The people of East Java and Central Java know it as kluwak, kluwek, and Pucung.

Kluwek is also known by the Toraja people as a cooking spice. They call kluwek with pamarrasan. Have you ever tasted rawon, konro soup, brongkos, pindang tetel, and pindang tempe? The food uses kluwek as a spice.

A number of dishes in Indonesia that use kluwek tend to be black. This is because kluwek does give off a black color in addition to enriching the taste of dishes that are mostly made from meat.

Launching from the Indonesian Institute of Sciences, kluwek which has the Latin name pangium edule is useful as a natural preservative for meat, both fresh and cooked meat.

Kluwek is the fruit of a wild or semi-wild plant which is used as a spice in cooking. The Dayan Lundayeh people in Malinau Regency, North Kalimantan use kepayang seeds as meat preservatives.

Departing from the utilization of the Lundayeh Dayak community, the research team tested kluwek with a certain level of concentration to preserve meat.

In laboratory tests, two kinds of meat were selected, namely fresh meat that had been ground and cooked meat.

In the study, the team used 5.5 grams of kluwek powder for 1 kilogram of cooked meat and 6 grams for 1 kilogram of raw meat. The results, based on the pH levels of the two meats, found that the durability of cooked meat reached 72 hours without refrigeration or stored at room temperature.

Meanwhile, raw meat has a shelf life of 12 hours with a pH level of 6.76. The kluwek powder used has been conditioned on its temperature and texture. Providing treatment for kluwek aims to remove cyanide acid in kepayang seeds.

Reported by Kompas, Prof. Dr. Ir. Made Astawan, MS stated that besides being useful as a food preservative because it is antimicrobial, kluwek can release gases containing cyanide acid. If in a certain concentration, toxic cyanide acid will be released from the seeds.

Based on his recommendation, to be safe for consumption kluwek must be washed and boiled first. The cooking process with temperatures above 26 degrees Celsius can remove the toxic content of kluwek.

Want to process food and preserve mackerel until it lasts 6 days without going into the refrigerator? Use kluwek, but do the process of cooking kluwek seeds first so that the concentration of toxic substances disappears.