Epok-Epok

These vegetable puffs are on the National Heritage list of 101 near-extinct foods. But if you listen to Johoreans, epok-epok is just what Johoreans and some Singaporeans call the karipap.

There may be a vegetable-filled – rather than the more common potato- or sweet-potato-filled – karipap called epok-epok sayur. Safiah Mahmood, better known as Kak Orkid, who served four Malaysian prime ministers and whose recipes appear in the book Selera Perdana (Cuisine Of The Premiers), says in the book that epok-epok is a type of curry puff with a vegetable filling and gives a recipe for epok-epok with a filling of bean sprouts, chives, tofu, prawn, shallot, garlic, and chilli.

This recipe is from the story, "Malaysian food for the ages".

Serving

Ingredients

skin

400g all-purpose flour

75g margarine

½ tsp salt

120-180ml water

Rub the margarine into the flour. Mix in the salt. Add water gradually until the mixture comes together into a firm, smooth ball of dough. It should not be sticky. Cover and set aside for 30 minutes.

Method

For the filling, heat oil and saute the shallots and garlic until fragrant. Add prawns, water and salt, and cook briefly. Add tofu, bean sprouts, chives and chillies. Toss together and take off the heat. Allow to cool.

Roll out the dough to 3mm thick and using a 7cm round cookie cutter, stamp out circles.

Pinch the edges of the circles to make them a little bigger. Fill with 1 heaped teaspoon of filling and bring the edges together to form a half-moon. Pinch together and seal with a fluted edge.

Deep-fry until golden (for these dainty epok-epok, it will take only 1-2 minutes on each side). Drain. Makes 30-40.

The edges of these epok-epok are crimped by hand; nowadays there are plastic moulds that wlll do the job for you.