Coconut, Santen, and Coconut Oil

Coconuts grow abundantly everywhere in Indonesia, and are used every day in cooking. Broadly speaking, they come to market at three stages of maturity: very young, young, and fairly old. The first two are usually called kelapa muda: the last is kelapa tua. The coconuts that reach Europe are all kelapa tua, with their smooth green or yellowish-brown outer husks removed, leaving the hard hairy shell.

Kelapa muda may be so young that the flesh can be scraped out with a spoon. The air kelapa (coconut water) is deliciously sweet, and is sold with the soft flesh floating In it. Or you can buy a nut by the roadside or on the beach, still fresh from the nearest tree, and have the top expertly sliced off by a man with a heavy-bladed knife. You drink the coconut water from the shell, and he will then split the nut down the middle and slice you off a little round spatula of shell to scrape away and eat the flesh with. A slightly older kelapa muda, sometimes called, logically enough, kelapa setengah tua (middle-aged coconut), is firm enough for the flesh to be grated. This can be done across the grain, so that you get small coconut flakes, or along the grain, to give long strands. You can also make coconut strands in a food processor, using the cheese-grating blade; and you can buy coarsely grated young coconut flesh in some Chinese shops in London and elsewhere, deep-frozen in plastic bags.