Jamu

For another of our excursions we visited a Jamu lady. Jamu is a traditional herbal 'medicine' in Asia-Pacific. The lady we visited makes 11 different drinks to treat all types of ailments. We tried two of them. Typically the Jamu sellers will mix up the drinks at home and then walk around selling it. We went to her house where she kindly mixed us up some lovely beverages from the ingredients below.

Jamu kunyit asam (sour tumeric Jamu)

Jamu beras kencur (Rice flour and ginger Jamu)


We didn't really enjoy either of them, but maybe if we were sick enough...:)

At the end they asked if we would like to taste the most bitter drink in the world. We each took a sip of a drink made from the brotowali plant. It's purpose is to "clean your blood". It was completely awful. The taste didn't go away for about half an hour. They said that you're only supposed to drink it about once a month. If you would drink it every day your tongue would go numb. We're going to go with once a lifetime.