The Meals of the Day

Unless the times are very bad indeed, rice-eaters expect to eat rice three times a day. Rice by itself will do, with a few hot chillis to help it down, or rice porridge (bubur), if nothing else is to be had. For the sake of appearances, of course, it must be white rice, even at the cost of losing most of the nutrients and leaving little more than starch. If you think you aren’t getting enough Vitamins or proteins, and educated Indonesians are acutely conscious of the importance of these, then you may eat unpolished brown or red rice as well, or a health food like bubur kacang hijau (green bean porridge), but white rice is to us what white bread is to Europeans—a sign that we’re holding our own, respectably above subsistence level.