Hunting for authentic Indonesian cuisine; meeting Yayu Slocock, Dorset based Indonesian cook

By Nelly Andon
For and On behalf of Connect Indonesia, The Charity team. 

My mouth is still watering thinking of the food Yayu served us for lunch yesterday.  We woke up to a very cold morning, the weather was rather wet and gloomy but nothing would dampen our spirit when thinking about Indonesian food coming our way. Julia arrived earlier than I expected, so we hit the road immediately.

Our destination is Wimborne, the home of Mr and Mrs Slocok. Yayu Slocock is originally from Blitar in Java, but she left Java for Australia when she was 17 years old. She then later met Mr Slocok, an English gentleman from England,  which she later married. Yayuk followed her husband to the UK in the late 80s and settled in Wimborne. They have 3 children, all now grown-ups.

Yayu is an Indonesian food enthusiast, she has been working hard for years to promote Indonesian food to the British public in the region where they live. She taught and share her food passion at an adult further education college in Bournemouth and has been providing cookery classes for the local Women Institute (WI) in Wimborne. Yayu also creates occasional pop-up style dining in her home which proofed to be very popular in the area. Yayu has written her first Cookery book “Yayu’s Simply Indonesian” which can be purchased on Amazon. She is now planning her second book scheduled to be published in the next year or so.

I asked Yayu if it was OK to give us a small demonstration of her traditional cooking, and we are very happy that she agreed. On this occasion, Yayu demonstrated “Sambal Goreng Tempe”, a traditional dish from Java, which was absolutely mouthwatering. She also cooked other amazing dishes on the day, including  Egg curry, sambal terasi, and some Ayam Bakar (Grilled chicken).

Our sincere gratitude to Mr & Mrs Slocock for allowing us into their lovely home and served us beautiful food.  Wishing Yayu the very best of luck for her work and mission to connect Indonesia to the British public through cooking.

Thank you, Julia, for taking a day off to accompany me on this journey, you are a star.

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