Lumpia

About This Recipe

Lumpia are Indonesia's spring rolls, a direct legacy of Chinese immigrants who settled the north coast of Java — the most famous version, lumpia Semarang, was reportedly born of a 19th-century marriage between a Chinese trader and a Javanese woman who merged their two recipes. Thin wheat wrappers are rolled tightly around a savory filling of pork, shrimp, and vegetables, then deep-fried until the skin blisters into a golden, shattering crust around a juicy interior. In Semarang the filling stars bamboo shoots; elsewhere cabbage and carrot dominate. Eaten with sweet chili sauce, a fresh bird's-eye chili, or thick garlic-tauco sauce, lumpia bridge street snack and party platter effortlessly.

Ingredients

Serves 20

• 20lumpia wrappers or thin wheat wrappers
• 300 gground pork
• 150 gshrimp, minced
• 2 cupscabbage, finely shredded
• 2 mediumcarrots, grated
• 3 stalksgreen onion, chopped
• 3 clovesgarlic, minced
• 1 tspsalt
• 1/2 tspwhite pepper
• 1 tbspsoy sauce
• oil for frying

Instructions

1. 1

   Cook filling

   Fry the garlic in a little oil until fragrant, add the pork and shrimp, and cook, breaking up clumps, until no longer pink. Stir in the cabbage, carrot, and green onion and cook just 3 minutes — the vegetables should wilt but keep some bite. Season with soy, salt, and white pepper, then spread on a tray to cool completely.

   A hot or wet filling will steam the wrapper from inside and tear it — cool it fully and drain off any liquid before wrapping.

2. 2

   Wrap

   Lay a wrapper in a diamond orientation, place about 2 tablespoons of filling in a log across the lower third, fold the bottom corner over snugly, fold in the sides, and roll tightly toward the top corner. Seal the tip with a dab of water or flour paste so the roll doesn't unfurl in the oil.

3. 3

   Fry

   Heat oil to 170°C — a cube of bread should brown in about 30 seconds — and fry the rolls in batches of 4–5, turning occasionally, until evenly deep golden, 3–4 minutes. Lift out with a spider and drain on paper towels or a wire rack.

   Let the oil recover its temperature between batches; rolls fried in cooling oil absorb grease instead of crisping.

4. 4

   Serve

   Serve hot while the crust still shatters, with sweet chili sauce, kecap manis, or the traditional accompaniments of whole bird's-eye chilies and crisp scallion batons for biting between mouthfuls.

Variations

• •

  Lumpia Semarang: fill with bamboo shoots, egg, and shrimp, and serve with a thick sweet garlic sauce.

• •

  Lumpia basah: skip the frying entirely for the fresh, soft 'wet' version popular in Bandung.

• •

  Vegetarian: replace pork and shrimp with crumbled firm tofu, shiitake mushrooms, and extra cabbage.

• •

  Chicken lumpia: use ground chicken thigh for a lighter but still juicy filling.

Storage

Freeze uncooked rolls in a single layer, then bag them; fry straight from frozen, adding about 1 minute. Fried lumpia keep 2 days refrigerated and re-crisp well in a 190°C oven for 8 minutes.

Frequently Asked Questions