Description:Rujak Cingur is a traditional Indonesian dish that is commonly found in East Java, especially in its birthplace of Surabaya. The word "cingur" in Javanese language means "mouth,"
which refers to the slices of boiled cow lips or snouts that are added to the dish. Rujak Cingur typically consists of slices of various fruits such as cucumber, kerahi (a type of cucumber unique to East Java), yam bean, young mango, pineapple, ambarella, and kedondong, which
are then mixed with rice cake, tofu, tempeh, bendoyo, cingur, and vegetables such as bean
sprouts, water spinach, and long beans. All of these ingredients are mixed with a sauce made from fermented shrimp paste, boiled water to dilute it, sugar/palm sugar, chili, fried peanuts, fried onions, salt, and thinly sliced young green banana seeds (klutuk banana). The sauce is blended by crushing it, then topped with the cingur slices. If served without cingur, the dish is called "rujak ulek."
There are two ways of serving Rujak Cingur, namely the "normal" and "matengan"
(pronounced like "mate-ngun") methods. The normal method involves serving all of the
ingredients mentioned above, while the matengan method only consists of cooked ingredients such as rice cake, fried tofu, fried tempeh, bendoyo (boiled kerahi), and vegetables (water spinach, long beans, bean sprouts) that have been boiled or steamed. It does not include the raw fruits, as some people do not like them. Both methods use the same sauce.
This dish is called Rujak Cingur because the sauce used is made from fermented shrimp
paste and cingur slices. This is what sets it apart from other rujak dishes that usually do not use cingur or cow lips. Rujak Cingur is typically served with shrimp crackers and presented on a banana leaf or plate.