Beef Rendang

Even though I am not in a good heath now, cooking still has to go on, cause we still have to eat. Luckily the back pain is not that bad during the day, so I manage to cook something. Yesterday I made beef rendang from scratch (normally I used instant seasoning, but this time I did not have it). I copied the recipe from Lia Surabaya, with a little modification in the quantity and also because I did not have big red chili and could not find the turmeric leaves here in Canada.
It turned out well in term of taste, however the color is a bit pale, maybe because it missed the red chili.

Ingredients:
- 1.5kg lean meat, cut into small chunk
- 1 can of coconut milk
- 1 tsp tamarind
- 8 lime leaves
- 1 lemon grass, cut into 2cm in length
- 20 chili paddy or bird's eye chili (this will make the rendang really spicy)
- 7 cloves of small red onion (in Indonesia the red onion is normally smaller than what we have here in Canada, so 7 is enough I think)
- 8 cloves of garlic
- 3cm galangal
- 4cm ginger
- 1tsp ground cumin
- 1tsp ground white pepper
- 4 star anise (Indonesian=buah pekak)
- salt
- 200ml water

In a cup, put tamarind, star anise and water. Microwave it for 1.5min. Take out of the microwave with care and stir it. Put it back and microwave for another 1min. Take it out and stir until all the tamarind distributes evenly. Take out the star anise. In a blender, put the star anise and blend with all the ingredients except meat, coconut milk, and 5 lime leaves (put the other 3 in). Blend with the tamarind juice until smooth.
In a pot, place the cut meat, the smooth blended seasoning and the lime leaves. Cook under medium heat for 30min. Add coconut milk, stir occasionally and continue to cook until all the water/juice immersed and the meat tender.
Serve while it is hot with steam rice.