A Dish From The Forest, The Local Food Of The Anak Dalam Tribe That Is Being Eroded By The Times
"It's a long process, so we rarely want to make it, at most once a week if we go to the forest and find gadung or bana, then we process it," he said. She also said that while eating jungle rice, none of her family members got sick, in contrast to the current situation where children often suffer from digestive problems due to instant food.
Sri Bungo repeatedly blew on the pile of twigs he had been burning, keeping the fire burning in the fireplace he had built under his hood. The black tarpaulin sudung that she and her colleagues had made was enough to keep everyone sitting in it cool. That morning (25/06) Sri Bungo and women from the Suku Anak Dalam (SAD) community of Dwi Karya Bakti Village were busy preparing for a food creation event involving the Women's PKK (Family Welfare Empowerment) group of Pelepat Sub-district, Bungo Regency. They agreed to choose a palm oil plantation area not far from the settlement as the location for the event.
"Let me feel that you are cooking in nature, like our parents used to," said Sri Bungo. The twenty-one-year-old woman is one of the female cadres from the indigenous community assisted by Pundi Sumatra. Since this morning, Sri Bungo has been ready with Gadung which will be processed into jungle rice. Although known to be poisonous, the Gadung processed by Sri Bungo is a local food that has long been consumed by the Anak Dalam tribe.
"Now if you are looking for gadung, it's a bit further inside," said Sri Bungo as she grated gadung. This woman with one child has loved cooking since she was a child. It was from her grandmother that Sri Bungo was told that Gadung contains poison so it must be processed properly.
"It takes a long time to make, maybe a week. 3 days soaked on land and a day in the river," she said. Sri Bungo says that the poison in Gadung is removed by washing it thoroughly many times. After that, Gadung is dried in the sun, then ground into flour. The flour is soaked again to remove the remaining poison, then dried once more before finally being cooked into jungle rice.
The smoke from Sri Bungo's sudung is getting higher, a sign that soon the jungle rice he makes will be cooked and ready to eat. Besides Sri Bungo, there is Diding who processes sago into porridge. On average, the tubers they get from the forest are processed by boiling or mixing with water into porridge. Although it looks simple and unattractive, both are local food sources that they have been consuming for a long time.
Diding said that this local food was starting to be abandoned due to its long processing time. Since settling down in 2014, he and his family started to recognise instant food and slowly abandoned boiled food.
"Processing this takes a long time, so we rarely want to make it, at most once a week if we go to the forest and find gadung or bana then we process it," he said. She also said that while eating nasi rimba, none of her family members got sick, unlike the current situation where children often suffer from digestive problems due to instant food.
This knowledge of local food has long enabled the Suku Anak Dalam community to survive without consuming rice. However, they began to face a local food crisis due to the conversion of forests into plantation land. Food sources from the forest began to be difficult to find, so they began to recognise instant food.
Sri Bungo and women from her community agree that their local food is healthier than that of the general population. Although aware of this, Sri Bungo and her colleagues could not do much about the food transition.
This problem has been addressed by Pundi Sumatra through the ESTUNGKARA programme since 2022. The women from the Suku Anak Dalam community became a group of change to maintain the local food traditions of their group. The activity, which is packaged in a local food campaign, aims to preserve and introduce food sources from the forest that are commonly consumed by the Suku Anak Dalam community.
"Nasi rimba ni makes you full, but it takes a long time to prepare," said Sri Bungo. In the midst of the onslaught of instant and modern food, some women from the Suku Anak Dalam community are the guardians of a priceless culinary heritage. Through these inclusion efforts, the hope to preserve and revive this local wisdom remains lit, just like the fire in Sri Bungo's fireplace that continues to burn, warm, and enliven the spirit of her community. Let us together support and appreciate the diversity of local food that is rich in stories and cultural values.