When in later years, the Chinese settled in the  Archipelago, they brought their equipments along for their own manufacturing of certain ingredients, like for instance tofu and other food products derived from soybeans. The local population was quick to adopt these dishes, as they are simple to make and yet they taste good.  They  are better for the health than the local dishes which uses high cholesterol ingredients and use very little vegetables. Also, preparation of local dishes is elaborate as many spices are used, some of which have to be ground or pounded and chopped to be able to make them ready for cooking.

          It is thus not surprising that not only the Chinese, but also the local population, to have one or two Chinese dishes on their daily  menu. The spread of the Chinese cuisine may be due to he Chinese restaurants, who have given good service to their clients, such as take out meals, home delivery and also cooking classes.
           At present we have different categories of Chinese restaurants, caterers and foodstalls, all claiming to serve Chinese food.

          A favorite Chinese dish is the noodles or mien, which is served in hundreds different styles, each region, yes even each city has its own recipe for noodles or mie (also Bakmi) as it is commonly called in Indonesia. Almost every city all over Indonesia has  their own specialty of noodles  and they advertise themselves as Bakmi Bandung, Bakmi Yogyakarta, Bakmi Belitung, Bakmi Medan etc. In Jakarta we can find noodles named after the street where they were first sold, like Bami Gajah Mada, Bakmi Kenanga orBakmi Kelinci. It must be admitted that they all taste different, although it is not certain, what makes the difference. Some of the noodles are localized, most are not and could have been made in any city or village in China, except that for the local consumption the dishes are mostly halal.
           Localized noodles are for instance the bakmi Riau, from the Riau islands, an island group close to Singapore. Here the noodles are served with some lettuce leaves, slices of cooked potatoes, bean sprouts and tofu, topped with a hot peanut sauce. The Bakmi Belitung is garnished with slices of cooked potatoes, shrimp cake, cucumber, bean sprouts, tofu and  served with a thick meat sauce, finished with some crackers made of the melinjo nuts. For chili lovers fresh ground chili with lime juice is also served. The noodles from Yogyakarta is served  with a chicken broth cooked with ground candlenut and garlic. Pieces of chicken, an egg poached in the broth and fried garlic pieces garnish the dish.
          Chili is not the only ingredient that makes the difference, santan or coconut milk can transform the original dish into a different meal. This is the case with laksa, a plain noodle soup with shredded chicken with some spring onion, but served in a coconut milk sauce to which lemongrass, ground candlenut and basil leaves are added. 
          Interesting is to observe how vendors have localized the Chinese cuisine. Tahu pong is fried tofu served with a pinch of salt and a small green chili. You may expect some shrimp dumplings on your plate when you order siomay  from a street vendor or when you queue up at a wedding reception in front of a table offering that dish. You will not get it, because siomay means here, a mixture of tofu, cucumber, cabbage, bitter gourd stuffed with meat or fishballs, the same dish that would be called Yong Tau Fu in Singapore or Malaysia.  The difference lies in the peanut sauce that is served with this dish, giving it a local flavor.  The same dish may be served in a fried version, in which case it is called batagor an acronym for bakso, tahu goreng meaning fried meatballs and tofu. Usually this dish is served with a hot peanut sauce, while in the city of Surabaya in East Java, it is served with a black shrimp paste. Either way, it is difficult to find the Chinese roots of this dish.
          Pushcart sellers reap quite a handsome profit by vending their wares in strategic places. The most frequently found products are bao, fried tofu, fried rice, fried noodles and chicken porridge. These food are always halal,  in view of the prospective customers, who come from all walks of life. The vendors can be found near office buildings or buildings where evening courses are held. Students going home or going to the courses may want to enjoy a snack. Fried noodles and rice usually stand near construction sites. Laborers usually stay for the night at the sites and have no opportunity to cook, so buying food is their only way to stay alive. The meals are usually made pungent by the addition of the petai bean, a medium size bean with a pungent taste.
           The petai beans may also be found by in the old established restaurants for the chefs know what their customers like. Chinese have learned to like their pungent taste, just like they learned to appreciate the durian, a fruit with a terrible strong smell, but delicious to eat. 
          This phenomenon indicates, that Chinese adapt easily to almost everything, including their digestive system, contrarily to the remark of Professor Geza Révész, a Hongarian psychologist who had once said, that the stomach  is the most conservative organ, that does not like strange sensations.  With strange sensations he meant in this case, unfamiliar food.
          It is the nature of the Chinese food that changes and additions are easily  carried out. For the Chinese, this easy adaptation is an advantage, especially for those who wants to open restaurants in countries, where the people have never tasted Chinese food and are not adventurous to try new dishes and new tastes.

Chinese food is enjoyed everywhere in Indonesia and are offered for sale in 5 star restaurants as well as push-cart vendors, who push their cart through the streets in search for perspective customers, or stay at certain strategic places. Whereas the 5 star restaurants keep the recipes as close as possible to the original Chinese recipes, the middle and lower class food sellers have changed the recipes by modifying it or adding ingredients to suit the taste of the locals. In many cases these changes have made the dishes estranged from their Chinese roots.
          This is in  line with the Chinese culture in Indonesia, which has been found to be “polluted” which strange elements. The Tiong Hwa Hwe Koan (-N˜), an organization founded in 1900 found it necessary to purify the Chinese Indonesian culture from foreign elements. To be precise, the THHK had suggested that   47 issues in the marriage rites 35 issues in the burial rites to be changed or omitted, because as they have been mixed with foreign elements. Since 1900 there have been more foreign elements mixed into the Chinese culture and the Chinese food is no exception.
          The hybrid culture could not be avoided, since many Chinese, who came from China in the early days did not bring their wives, when they immigrated, but they married local women, who brought their culture. This culture has been adopted by the generations thereafter and changed creatively into a new culture, which is now popularly called the Peranakan culture, with their special clothing, language, literature and cuisine.  
 
 
References:
Riwajat 40 taon dari Tiong Hoa Hwe Koan – Batavia (1900 – 1939) (40^th anniversary of the Tiong Hwa Hwe Koan) – published in commemoration of the 40^th anniversary.  

Newman Jaqueline M.,  Food Culture in China – Westport Ct, Greenwood Press – 2004.  

Tan Chee-Beng, Food and Ethnicity with Reference to the Chinese in Malaysia, in David Y.H. Wu and Tan Chee-Beng (eds) : Changing Chinese Foodways, Hongkong, The Chinese University Press, 2001. 

Tamotsu Aoki, The Domestication of Chinese Foodways in Contemporary Japan: Ramen and Peking Duck, in David Y.H. Wu and Tan Chee-Beng (eds) : Changing Chinese Foodways, Hongkong, The Chinese University Press, 2001.