Tempe sebagai nama tempat/daerah :
* Danau Tempe, sebuah danau di Provinsi Sulawesi Selatan.
* Kecamatan Tempe di Kabupaten Wajo, Sulawesi Selatan.
* Desa Tempe di Kecamatan Tempe, Kabupaten Wajo, Sulawesi Selatan.
Macam-macam tempe sebagai makanan :
Kurasa Tempe ga murni berasal dari Indonesia. Ini salah satu komentarku di Miss Morgan. Akhirnya ketemu juga tulisan bahwa Tempe berasal dari China. Tempe sudah dikenal lama di Jawa, terutama Jogjakarta dan Surakarta. Sudah disebut dalam "Serat Centhini" yang di abad ke-16. Serat Centhini adalah kitab/buku yang disebut juga Suluk Tambanglaras atau Suluk Tambangraras-Amongraga, merupakan karya sastra Jawa yang menghimpun segala macam ilmu pengetahuan dan kebudayaan Jawa.
Coba simak tulisan dari beberapa situs di bawah ini :
Ini tulisan dari :
http://bumisegoro.wordpress.com/2007/09/06/sejarah-tempe/
Penasaran dengan sejarah tempe versi Onghokham, penulis iseng googling dan menemukan sejarah tempe dari official blog of Taschanfood . Berikut kopiannya:
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Sejarah Tempe
Indonesia
Proses pembuatan tempe boleh jadi menjadi teknologi pengolahan makanan yang tertua dalam sejarah masyarakat Jawa. Serat Centhini, sebuah buku yang diterbitkan pada abad ke-16, mengindikasikan bahwa tempe sudah dibuat dan dikonsumsi masyarakat pada masa itu. Tempe mungkin diperkenalkan oleh orang Cina yang memproduksi makanan sejenis yaitu Soybean Koji, yang merupakan hasil fermentasi kedelai dengan jamur Aspergillus. Pemakaian Rhizopus sebagai ragi tempe di Indonesia kemungkinan karena adaptasinya yang lebih baik dengan iklim Indonesia. Referensi pertama oleh orang Eropa tentang tempe pada tahun 1875 yaitu dalam Kamus Bahasa Jawa - Belanda. meningkatnya popularitas tempe di pulau Jawa, dan kemudian menyebar ke daerah-daerah lain di Indonesia serta negara-negara lain di dunia dimulai pada abad ke-20. Pada era tahun 70-an, daun pisang yang digunakan sebagai pembungkus tempe muali diganti dengan plastik.
Eropa
DI Eropa, tempe diperkenalkan oleh orang Belanda yang dahulu menjajah Indonesia. Pada tahun 1895 ahli mikrobiologi Belanda and ahli Kimia bernama Prinsen Geerlings mengadakan penelitian pertama untuk mengidentifikasi jamur tempe. Pabrik Tempe pertama di Eropa didirikan di Belanda oleh para pendatang dari Indonesia. Artikel berbahasa Inggris pertama (yang menyebut tentang tempe) muncul pada tahun 1931 dalam buku “Vegetables of the Dutch East Indies “, yang ditulis oleh J.J. Ochse. Artikel yang populer tentang tempeterdiri dai 7 halaman diterbikan di Perancis tahun 1982 dalam Le Compas.
USA
Di Amerika Serikat, tempe mulai dikenal baru pada tahun 1946 dengan diterbitkannya “Possible Sources of Proteins for Child Feeding in Underdeveloped Countries”, dalam American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Pada era tahun 60-an da ketertarikan baru tentang tempe dengan adanya penelitian di Cornell University (New York) dan di USDA Northern Regional Research Center (Illinois). Pada tahun 1961 Mary Otten menjadi yang pertama memproduksi tempe. Jasa terbesar dalam memperkenalkan tempe pada masyarakat Amerika adalah pada The Farm, sebuah komunitas spiritual dan pertanian besar di Summertown, Tennessee. Toko tempe pertama didirikan pada tahun 1975 oleh Mr. Gale Randall di Undadilla, Nebraska. Sebuah artikel yang ditulis oleh R. Rodale dalam “Prevention” tahun 1977 membuat dirinya dan tokonya terkenal secara nasional. Pada era tahun 80-an pada saat Industri tempe makin meluas, media mulai menunjukan ketertarikan dan muncul berbagai artikel di jurnal-jurnal sains. Selama tahun 1983 sekitar 1 juta tempe diproduksi untuk dipasarkan.
Negara Berkembang lainnya
Tahun 1940-an Van Veen mencoba untuk memperkenalkan tempe di Zimbabwe. Tetapi segala usaha untuk memperkenalkan tempe sebagai sumber protein yang murah di Zimbabwe dan negara berkembang lainnya di Afrika dan Amerika Selatan mengalami kegagalan karena penduduk setempat tidak terbiasa dengan makanan yang difermentasikan oleh jamur.
Tren Terkini
Di Eropa, Amerika Serikat dan Negara-negara Industri lainnya ketertarikan terhadap tempe terus meningkat seiring dengan meningkatnya kepedulian dalam kesehatan, gizi dan vegetarisme.
Diambil dari http://pecintatempe.multiply.com
Sumber foto : http://www.soytempeh.com
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Dilihat dari isinya, mirip sekali dengan tempeh-info .
ternyata di amazon juga banyak loh buku tentang tempeh (begitu dunia internasional menuliskan tempe). dengan kata kunci tempeh terdapat 2,503 Results untuk kategori books. kalau di indonesia ada berapa buku ya yang judulnya memakai kata kunci tempe?
Dua buku yang sering menjadi rujukan adalah The Book of Tempeh dan History of Tempeh: A Fermented Soyfood from Indonesia (Soyfoods History Series).
Sebagian dari buku yang kedua dapat dibaca di sini.
Selama ini dunia mengenal tempe sebagai makanan fermentasi dari Indonesia. Hal ini barangkali terkait dengan riset yang orang Eropa (dalam hal ini Belanda) dilakukan di negara koloninya. Sementara China sendiri saat itu cenderung tertutup dalam pergaulan dengan Eropa. Dalam Wikipedia disebutkan “In fact, tempeh is an adaptation of tofu to the tropical climates of Indonesia.” Wikipedia versi indonesia juga memuat tulisan tentang sejarah tempe secara cukup mendalam.
Sementara heboh masyarakat kita mengenai HAKI terkait tempe dapat dibaca di sini.
satu lagi, penasaran aja dengan nama danau di Wajo (Sulawesi), danau tempe. ada hubungannya ga ya?
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Ini tulisan dari :
http://cahyoga.net/wpress/?p=9
Berita dipatenkannya tempe di Jepang dan Amerika sempat menghebohkan masyarakat Indonesia. Di antara komentar-komentar yang muncul adalah bahwa kita akan sangat dirugikan oleh paten tersebut, karena tempe merupakan makanan asli Indonesia, yang akan sangat menyengsarakan bagi industri rumah tangga tempe apabila harus membayar royalti ke Jepang untuk setiap potong tempe yang diproduksi dan dijemur di pekarangan rumahnya sendiri. Komentar lain yang mengemuka adalah penimpaan kesalahan kepada masyarakat (bukan pemerintah) Indonesia yang sedemikian bodohnya sampai tidak melakukan proses sanggah terhadap paten tersebut.
Beberapa hal terkait dengan berita paten tempe tersebut layak untuk kita jadikan bahan guna mempelajari kondisi HaKI di Indonesia. Yang pertama bahwa klaim bahwa tempe merupakan produk asli Indonesia dan khas Indonesia seharusnya diluruskan terlebih dahulu. Menurut catatan sejarah, tempe tidak hanya berkembang di Indonesia namun juga di Jepang, Cina, dan Nepal. Sehingga wajar sebenarnya apabila Jepang juga dianggap memiliki hak berdasarkan sejarah atas tempe sebagaimana masyarakat Indonesia.
Yang kedua, bahwa ternyata yang dipaten di Jepang bukan proses pembuatan tempe melainkan proses pembuatan tempe menjadi bahan kosmetik. Demikian pula yang dilakukan di Amerika, ternyata adalah paten untuk proses pembuatan obat-obatan dari tempe. Dari dua hal dia atas, dapat disimpulkan betapa minimnya informasi dan pengetahuan yang kita miliki mengenai paten di luar negeri, baik dalam hal apa yang dipatenkan maupun keterkaitan dan dampak paten tersebut terhadap kita.
Hal ketiga yang perlu kita perhatikan adalah mengenai komentar yang menimpakan kesalahan kepada masyarakat Indonesia yang tidak melakukan proses sanggah terhadap paten yang juga masih kabur intinya tersebut. Kesalahan tersebut seharusnya tidak ditimpakan kepada masyarakat Indonesia mengingat pihak-pihak pengelola tempe umumnya bukanlah kalangan yang memiliki sistem manajerial mapan, melainkan industri rumah tangga sederhana yang menjalankan usaha industri tempe sekedar untuk memenuhi kehidupan sehari-hari. Bagaimana mungkin kondisi masyarakat industri tempe yang demikian diharapkan untuk dapat mengetahui adanya proses pematenan tempe di Jepang dan Amerika, sekaligus melakukan proses sanggah di sana.
Kesalahan dalam kasus ini seandainyapun ada seharusnya lebih dibebankan kepada pemerintah daripada masyarakat. Pemerintah adalah institusi yang secara konsepsi merupakan perwujudan masyarakat yang bertugas melayani masyarakat. Sebagai institusi yang juga dapat dipastikan sanggup berinteraksi dengan dunia intenasional secara baik, maka pemerintahlah yang seharusnya paling bertanggung jawab apabila sampai industri rumah tangga tempe Indonesia harus terkekang dengan paten dari Jepang tersebut. Kasus paten tempe di atas seharusnya menjadi pelajaran penting bagi pemerintah untuk aktif melindungi perekonomian nasional dalam hal HaKI dari paten yang terdapat di luar negeri yang berpotensi mengancam perekonomian nasional khususnya pada skala kecil dan menengah. Dan bukan justru hanya berperan seperti pemerintah negara maju yang bersifat pasif dengan resiko menghalangi perkembangan perekonomian nasional.
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Ini Tulisan dari :
http://www.soyinfocenter.com/HSS/tempeh1.php
History of Tempeh - Page 1
A Special Report on The History of Traditional Fermented Soyfoods
A Chapter from the Unpublished Manuscript, History of Soybeans and Soyfoods: 1100 B.C. to the 1980s
by William Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi
Copyright 2007 Soyinfo Center, Lafayette, California
Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4
Tempeh (pronounced TEM-pay) is an Indonesian word referring collectively to a variety of fermented foods (typically tender-cooked legumes) bound together by a dense mycelium of fragrant white Rhizopus mold into compact cakes (Ko and Hesseltine 1979). The most popular of these is soy tempeh, and hereafter we will use the term "tempeh" to refer to soy tempeh, unless otherwise noted. In the West tempeh is usually sold in cakes 6 by 8 by 3/4 inch thick (15 x 20 x 2 cm). These are sliced then served fried, baked, or steamed. When fried, tempeh's flavor and texture are meaty, resembling those of southern fried chicken or fish sticks. Before cooking, soy tempeh contains 19.5% protein, compared with 17.9% for hamburger and 21% for chicken, on average.
To make tempeh, cooked and dehulled soybean cotyledons (which may be lightly acidified with a traditional lactic acid prefermentation or, nowadays, with lactic acid or vinegar) are well drained then inoculated with spores of Rhizopus oligosporus mold, packed into perforated containers (polyethylene bags or banana leaves, holding about 8 ounces) and incubated at 30-31*C (86-88*F) for about 24 hours, until the beans are bound together tightly by the mycelium. The tempeh is then ready to sell or to cook.
Tempeh is unique among major traditional soyfoods in that it is the only one that did not originate in China or Japan. It originated in today's Indonesia, almost certainly in Central or East Java, almost certainly prior to 1800, and perhaps as long ago as a thousand years or more. Tempeh is also distinctive in that less is known about its origins and early history than about those of any other soyfood.
Etymology . In Indonesia, traditionally and in dictionaries since at least 1875, the name for this food was written témpé , with various accents being used, especially to indicate the ay pronunciation of the final letter "e." Soy tempeh was called témpé kedelé . In August 1972, when Indonesia modernized its language as part of an Indonesian-Malaysian effort to make the two similar languages even more similar, the accents were dropped and the word came to be spelled tempe (still pronounced TEM-pay).
In English and other European languages, the word has come to be spelled "tempeh," the final "h" being added to prevent the word from being pronounced "temp." Most Westerners feel that the correct pronunciation is more important than the correct spelling. The first Westerner to use the spelling tempeh was the Dutchman H.C Prinsen Geerligs in an 1896 German article about soyfoods. But other early Western authors (especially the Dutch) wrote the word as témpé (Gericke and Roorda 1875; Heyne 1913), tempé (Boorsma 1900; Stahel 1946), or tèmpé (Vorderman 1902). The earliest English language references to this food, both translations of Dutch publications (Ochse 1931, Burkill 1935), referred to it as témpé . Van Veen and Schaefer (1950) were the first to spell it tempeh in an English language article. The new spelling quickly caught on. Steinkraus et al. (1960) were the first in the US to spell it tempeh . Since the early 1960s, the word has consistently been spelled this way in European languages, except in a few Dutch and English language articles written by Indonesians.
In Japanese, Nakazawa (1928) first wrote the word in Roman letters as tempeh. Nakano (1959) wrote temupe , in katakana. Ohta et al. in 1964 started writing it as tenpe , which thereafter became the standard katakana form, although a few reports have written it as tenpei .
World Overview . Tempeh probably originated several centuries ago on the island of Java, in today's Indonesia. The earliest know reference there was in 1875. Much early research and publication was done by Dutch scientists, in Dutch. Tempeh was first produced commercially in Europe sometime between 1946 and 1959 and by 1984 there were 18 tempeh companies in Europe. The earliest known reference to tempeh in the United States was by Stahel in 1946. Extensive research work on tempeh began in the early 1960s at Cornell University (under Dr. Steinkraus) and at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center (under Dr. C.W. Hesseltine and Dr. H.L. Wang). America's first commercial tempeh was produced in 1961 by Indonesian immigrants, and the first commercial production by a Caucasian started in 1975. The number of tempeh companies in America increased from 13 in 1979 to 53 in 1984. The earliest known reference to tempeh in Japan was by Nakazawa in 1928. Starting in 1983, with the soymilk boom in full swing, Japanese food companies started to make tempeh in large quantities. By early 1984 the world's largest tempeh companies were:
Avg. Weekly Production
Company Name Country Year Started lb/week kg/week
1. Marusan-Ai Japan 1983 15,148 6,885
2. Tempe Production Inc. Netherlands 1969 13,200 6,000
3. Quong Hop/Pacific Tempeh USA/CA 1980 7,000 3,182
4. White Wave USA/CO 1979 5,850 2,659
5. Soyfoods Unlimited USA/CA 1981 5,800 2,636
6. Torigoe Flour Milling Japan 1983 5770 2,623
7. The Tempeh Works USA/MA 1979 5,500 2,500
8. Marukin Foods Japan 1983 4,620 2,100
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN INDONESIA
Early History (pre 1875) . Tempeh probably originated on the island of Java at least several centuries ago. At that time the people of Java, without formal training in microbiology or chemistry, developed a remarkable family of fermented foods called tempeh. Today we might call these products meat analogs, since they have much the same texture, flavor, and high protein content as various flesh foods. The people also learned to make tempeh from oilseed presscakes (the protein-rich cakes left after pressing the oil from oilseeds such as peanuts or coconuts), okara (the soy pulp remaining after making soymilk or tofu), and other agricultural wastes, whose high fiber content and relative indigestibility make them otherwise suited only for livestock feeds (Steinkraus 1983).
Since ancient times the Malay language has been the lingua franca of the archipelago that includes today's Malaysia and Indonesia. The people of Java have had a written language since antiquity, with existing stone inscriptions dating from the seventh century A.D. This early literature concerned primarily religion, philosophy, and culture, with very little information about food.
The world's earliest known reference to tempeh appeared in the Serat Centini , which was probably written around A.D. 1815 on the orders of Sunan Sugih, then Crown Prince and later Pakubuwana V of Surakarta, in today's eastern Central Java. The main author was probably Rangga Sutrasna. This classic work of Modern Javanese literature contains a line mentioning "onions and uncooked témpé ."
Although the Serat Centini was written in about 1815, it is quite possibly based on much older sources; the story is set in the reign of Sultan Agung (1613-45), and the descriptions purport to be of that time. Thus tempeh may well have existed in the early 1600s. However the actual document in which this reference appears (Codex Orientalis 1814 of the Leiden University Library) bears the date 1846, making it conceivable (but highly unlikely) that reference to tempeh was added just prior to publication.
The Serat Centini , written in verse, tells of the adventures of "students" wandering in the Javanese countryside in search of truth. In the course of the story, detailed information is given on many subjects including Javanese culture and life. The passage mentioning tempeh occurs in a description of Wanamarta, a prosperous place, in the context of a reception given to Jayengwesti, and involving all sorts of foods. These, including "onions and uncooked témpé ," are simply listed without further information.
Conservative estimates that tempeh originated at least several centuries ago are also supported by evidence based on the food's present widespread geographical distribution, popularity, and large number of varieties. Tempeh is known in even the most remote rural areas throughout most of Java, is an integral part of the cuisine served in a wide variety of popular dishes (90 named Indonesian recipes are given in our Book of Tempeh ), and by the mid-1970s it was being made from at least 17 indigenous seeds and presscakes by more than 41,000 shops, using simple, traditional methods.
But where did tempeh come from? The earliest known written record of soybeans in Indonesia was by the Dutch botanist Rumphius (1747), who reported that they were being used in Java for food and as green manure. Yet soybeans may well have been introduced to Indonesia at the time that regular trade started with south China in about 1000 A.D. One Sundanese (West Javan) name for soybeans is kachang jepun (Japanese bean), which may be historically significant. At least one East Asian scholar (Anderson 1983, personal communication) believes that tempeh developed from an application to soybeans of an earlier fermentation used on coconuts, perhaps the now famous coconut presscake tempeh ( tempeh bongkrek ). The well-traveled Indonesian Dr. Sastroamijoyo (1971) feels that tempeh may have originated over 2,000 years ago. He has pointed out that even before that time the Chinese were making a similar product, the soybean koji for their soy sauce, produced by inoculating cooked dehulled soybeans with wild molds such as Aspergillus oryzae . This method could have been brought to Java from China by early traders and modified to suit Javanese tastes; the use of Rhizopus may have been due to its better adaptation to the Indonesian climate. The rise of tempeh's popularity in West Java (where the culture is Sundanese), and its spread to other Indonesian islands and other countries of the world, probably began in the 20th century. We hope that Indonesian scholars will soon begin a serious search of their literature to help us construct a more reliable picture of tempeh's early history.
Another possible lead may lie in China. In 1931, in Beijing (Peking), William Morse observed a fermented soyfood closely resembling tempeh and called tou chiah ping ("soybean fried cake"; Morse 1928-31). Details on this product are given later at China. No other reference to such a product has been found in European-language soyfoods literature. If this is a type of tempeh, it is probable that it was taken to China from Indonesia (the East Indies) by Chinese traders and that it became established on a local scale in China. There is the possibility, however, that the product originated in China and migrated to Indonesia, where it was developed, perhaps because of a similar existing product made from coconut (tempeh bongkrek). It would be very interesting to know more about tou chiah ping : Is it fermented with Rhizopus ? What is known of its history? There are no known references to it after 1931.
There is a great need for more research on the origins and early history of tempeh. Promising areas for additional searching include early Malay-Dutch dictionaries, the classical Malay literature of the 18th and 19th centuries, the writings of foreign travelers to Java (especially European missionaries, botanists and naturalists, or Dutch or Japanese traders or explorers), and perhaps even Chinese historical records. Professors of Malaysian literature have told us that they think they have seen reference to tempeh in the classical Indonesian literature of the 18th and 19th centuries, but we have been unable to find a specific reference. In 1928 the Malay language was declared the official language of the future Indonesia. Despite the long history of written documents in Indonesia, no known records of tempeh's origin or early history have yet been found in the native language. In fact, the earliest records in Indonesian seem to date from the 1950s!
Early European References (1895-1939) . Since Indonesia (formerly the Dutch or Netherlands East Indies) had been a Dutch colony since the late 1600s, it was only natural that the first Westerners to study tempeh came from Holland. The earliest known reference to tempeh (actually témpé) in Indonesia by a European appeared in 1875 in a Javanese-Dutch dictionary, the Javaansch-Nederduitsch Handwoordenboek by J.F.C. Gericke and T. Roorda. The term was defined as "Fermented soybeans or presscake ( bunkil ) baked or fried in flat pressed cakes. It is well-liked as a side dish with rice." The term does not appear in Marsden's dictionary of 1812, but then he was in Sumatra and tempeh was most widely found in Java. In 1895 the Dutch microbiologist and chemist H.C Prinsen Geerligs made the first attempt to identify the tempeh mold in his classic article titled "Eenige Chineesche voedingsmiddelen uit Sojaboonen bereid" (Some Chinese Foods Made with Soybeans). After describing Indonesian soy sauce, and miso ( taucho ), he noted: "In a similar way, in Java, other molds are used to make leguminous seeds into more digestible foods. Thus the presscake, which remains after making peanut oil and would be indigestible without further preparation, is subjected to the action of molds. In central and eastern Java Chlamydomucor Oryzae [now known as Amylomyces rouxii ] is used, whereas in western Java an orange mold of the family Oospore (Neurospora) is used. In the former case, the food is called `bongkrek,' and in the latter `ontjom.' If soybeans are molded with Chlamydomucor the spice is called `tempets.' In the preparation the seeds are boiled, spread, mixed with a little molded cake from a former batch, and left alone for a while, until the mass is bound into a solid cake." A year later, when this article was published in German, he corrected two mistakes he had made in the 1895 Dutch version. He changed the name of the mold from Chlamydomucor Oryzae to Rhizopus Oryzae and he changed the name of the product from "tempets" to "tempeh." He added in conclusion that "it was finally sliced and enjoyed, mold and all." But he continued, apparently mistakenly, to refer to tempeh as a Chinese soyfood. Prinsen Geerligs' two articles ushered in the era of scientific research on tempeh by European microbiologists and food scientists.
Prinsen Geerligs and his Dutch colleague F.A. Went were particularly interested in the utilization of by-products from Java's expanding new sugar industry (Went and Prinsen Geerligs 1895, 1896). They wrote many articles about sugar, but also studied tapeh, arak, and other Indonesian fermented foods. In 1901 Went, then at Utrecht, the Netherlands, described onchom (formerly spelled "ontjom," a close relative of tempeh) and studied the mold involved, which he called Monilia sitophila ; it is now called Neurospora . In 1900 and 1901 the German Wehmer studied Javanese ragi (starter culture cakes, also called "Chinese yeast") occasionally used for making tempeh. In 1917 Prinsen Geerligs discussed tempeh as a food made using natural enzymes in East Asian home industries.
In 1900 the Dutchman Dr. P.A. Boorsma, who lived in Java and did original laboratory tests, published an excellent 13-page article on soybeans. In a detailed 4-page description of the traditional process for making Tempe kedeleh , Boorsma reported that the soybeans were parboiled, soaked in water for 2-3 days, drained, steamed in a steamer, spread in a layer several centimeters thick on woven bamboo trays in shelves, and covered completely with banana leaves. They were then inoculated by mixing in "mold-containing residues of a previous preparation" and covered lightly with banana leaves. "In the evening the mass is remolded a little and after two 24-hour periods one will obtain a coherent cake, which is cut into pieces and taken as is to the market." Boorsma then described the rise in temperature to 10-12*C above ambient temperature during the tempeh fermentation, the formation of ammonia in tempeh after 3 days of fermentation, and the likelihood that stories about nonsoy tempehs causing food poisoning were true. After microscopic examination, he concluded that Prinsen Geerligs and others were mistaken in stating that (1) the mold hyphae penetrate and dissolve the hard soybean cell walls and (2) cellulose is decreased during tempeh fermentation. He studied the chemical and compositional changes at four different stages during a 3-day tempeh fermentation, observing that fats and soluble carbohydrates decreased substantially, while nitrogen decreased only slightly. He also discussed the hydrolysis of soybean lipids and why tempeh is easier to digest than whole soybeans.
In 1893 the Dutch microbiologist Vorderman had described ragi, a traditional tempeh inoculum (though he did not mention tempeh), then in 1902 he discussed in detail two processes he observed for wrapping and fermenting soy tempeh. In the first and best-known way the soybeans were incubated between banana leaves; in the second the soybeans were wrapped in banana leaves to form a packet 20 cm long and 7 cm wide, then wrapped in a jati leaf. The packets were stacked in a bamboo basket for 24 hours covered with bags, then removed to prevent overheating and spread on the floor for 24 hours more. He noted (as Prinsen Geerligs had in 1896) that tempeh was fermented with Rhizopus oryzae . Vorderman (1902) was the first to describe other varieties of Indonesian tempeh and their close relatives. Ontjom beureum was made in West Java from peanut presscake fermented with the orange mold Monilia sitophila . Tempe bongkrek katjang and ontjom bodas , made in Banyumas in central Java, were each like peanut presscake tempeh but fermented with Rhizopus molds. Tempe bongkrek kelapa , from south Banyumas, was made from pressed coconut, inoculated with and in leaves already used for making soy tempeh. Low in price, it was eaten mostly by poor people. Tempe morrie , from Banyumas, was made from a mixture of soybeans and coconut milk residue, which had been washed and steamed. After inoculation with ground bibit leaves, on which were Rhizopus oryzae spores, the mixture was packed in the sheaf of the banana tree stem to form small long packages, then incubated. Tempe enthoe and tempe tjenggereng were made with steamed coconut oil presscake and coconut milk residue. The latter contained steamed corn bran and both were fermented packed in the sheaf of the banana tree stem for 48 hours. He concluded noting that tempe tjenggereng , like tempe bongkrek kelapa , had led to several cases of fatal food poisoning.
In 1913, K. Heyne published a lengthy review of earlier literature on tempeh. In 1923 the Dutchman Jansen wrote "The Need of the Animal Organism for the Anti-beriberi Vitamin and the Amount of this Vitamin in Various Foodstuffs." He showed that in tempeh the content of anti-beriberi vitamin (first isolated by Jansen and Donath in 1926, and later named vitamin B-1 or thiamine) was reduced during fermentation. Jansen and Donath (1924), in "Metabolic Experiments on Rats and Digestibility of the Proteins of Some Foodstuffs" showed that tempeh protein is of good quality and makes a good supplement to the protein in rice. The vitamin A content was about the same as that of raw soybeans. The content of vitamins B-1 and B-2 in tempeh was further investigated by A.G. van Veen (1932, 1935); he found it to be a good source of both.
One of Indonesia's most famous (or infamous) types of tempeh is tempeh bongkrek, which is made from coconut presscake or the residue from homemade coconut milk, rather than from the usual soybeans. When contaminated it becomes toxic, and for as long as the local people can remember, it has periodically caused food poisoning and death in Central Java, mainly in the province of Banyumas and surrounding areas. The first outbreak of bongkrek poisoning was recorded by Dutch authorities 1895. Vorderman described several types of tempeh bongkrek in 1902 and noted that they caused fatal food poisoning. During Indonesia's economic depression between 1931 and 1937, when villagers tried to make bongkrek themselves rather than buying it from experienced producers, the poisonings became very numerous, up to 10 or 12 a year. There were few survivors. The local villagers believed that the poisonings were due to evil spirits or to the Goddess of the Indian Ocean in an angry mood! Starting in the early 1930s a group of Dutch scientists, starting with W.K. Mertens and A.G. van Veen from the Eijkman Institute in Jakarta, began to investigate the causes of bongkrek poisoning (van Veen 1967). Between 1933 and 1938 Mertens and van Veen published nine studies in Dutch and German on the bongkrek poisonings in Banyumas and the toxicology of bongkrek . In about 1933 they found the cause of the poisonings and discovered that the bacterium Pseudomonas cocovenenans was producing the toxins. Soon thereafter they isolated and named the two poisonous substances (toxoflavin and bongkrek acid). Amar?? and Grevenstuk (1935) and Baars and van Veen (1937) also published on bongkrek poisoning. In 1950 van Veen showed that at least one of the poisons is also a strong antibiotic for tempeh's Rhizopus mold. After 1950 many more investigations were conducted on tempeh bongkrek.
The first English-language information about tempeh appeared in 1931 in J.J. Ochse's Vegetables of the Dutch East Indies , an excellent 1005-page tome published in Buitenzorg (today's Bogor), Java. Ochse, a Dutchman, described the tempeh-making process in detail, saying that the mold used was Rhizopus oryzae , and that it was obtained from a former batch of tempeh. The next English-language reference appeared in 1935 in I.H. Burkill's A Dictionary of the Economic Products of the Malay Peninsula , a two-volume, 2,400-page work published in England. It contained six pages of information about tempeh and other soyfoods, including a description of the tempeh-making process. Burkill was a British authority on the flora of southern and southeastern Asia.
Tempeh During World War II and the Postwar Era (1940-1959) . During World War II almost the entire Malay archipelago was brought under Japanese control. Tempeh served as an important food in Indonesia and surrounding countries during the war, both for the native population and for foreigners in Japanese prisoner of war (POW) camps there.
The first English-language article specifically about tempeh was written in 1946 by Gerold Stahel, director of the Agricultural Experiment Station in Paramaribo, Surinam (a Dutch colony). Stahel described how, during World War II, the United States shipped soybeans to New Guinea in order to feed the Europeans and Indonesians living there. The shippers did not realize that residents of Indonesia, accustomed to eating fermented soyfoods, considered plain boiled soybeans to be unpalatable. Moreover, during the Japanese occupation of New Guinea, tempeh production had stopped and the local New Guinea starter cultures had, therefore, all been lost. Stahel, asked to furnish new cultures from Surinam, sent both fresh tempeh cakes and pure-culture starters to the Netherlands Indies Civil Administration (NICA) in New Guinea. Soon NICA kitchens all over the territory started using the US soybeans to make tempeh for the people.
As a result of his involvement in this project, Stahel's interest in tempeh grew, and in 1946 he wrote a detailed description of the way Javanese women in Surinam made and sold tempeh. He was the first to report on the bacterial acid fermentation of the soybeans during soaking that preceded the basic mold fermentation. Roelofsen, a Dutchman, was a prisoner of war (POW) in Japanese camps in Indonesia, where many Europeans were starving. Their basic foods were corn, sweet potatoes, chilies, and soybeans. Roelofsen made the soybeans into tempeh there and in 1946 reported the great shortage of protein in the camps and the important role played by tempeh in reducing deaths. He was the first to describe the use of pulverized dried tempeh as an inoculum. Roelofsen (1964) also did important nutritional studies of the food after his release. By a strange twist of fate, van Veen was made a POW during World War II and held in Indonesian camps where tempeh was widely served. In 1946 he reported that even POWs suffering from dysentery and oedema, who could not digest cooked whole soybeans, were able to assimilate tempeh. Fuel was sometimes so short in the camps that the soybeans, served as whole beans or for tempeh, were not adequately cooked. Yet the tempeh process helped to make these undercooked soybeans much more digestible. Van Veen concluded that many POWs owed their very survival to tempeh. De Bruyn, van Dulst, and van Veen (1947) came to the same conclusion. In 1951 Smith and Woodruff and in 1952 Grant wrote articles on "Deficiency Diseases in Japanese Prison Camps." They reported that the POWs, apparently in Hong Kong and Singapore, had made soybeans (often inadequately cooked) into tempeh to make them more palatable and digestible.
The first study in English on the chemical and microbiological changes occurring during tempeh fermentation, was published in 1950 by the Dutch microbiologists van Veen and Schaefer. This classic paper, based partly on van Veen's experiences in a POW camp, was more extensive than that published by Boorsma in Dutch in 1900. It described the tempeh-making process then attempted to show why tempeh was so much more digestible than soybeans. Also in 1950 Tammes published a detailed description of how tempeh was made in Java, including a description of how tempeh starter (ragi) was made.
Other than the Serat Centini (1815, 1846), the earliest known reference to tempeh in Indonesian or by an Indonesian appeared in 1956 (any earlier??) when Soetan mentioned it briefly in a booklet entitled Kedelai (Soybeans).
It is curious to note that, despite the fact that tempeh has long been a very important and widely used Indonesian food, all of the scientific studies on tempeh from 1895 to 1960 (and virtually all of the references to it in any language) were done by Europeans living in Indonesia. There are several reasons for this: First, while Indonesia was a Dutch colony, very few Indonesians were able to attend a university or to do scientific research of any type. There were very few Indonesian food scientists or microbiologists, and these were not encouraged to study indigenous foods. Second, during Dutch colonial rule, public opinion was strongly influenced by the Dutch emphasis on Western values and lifestyles, and the devaluation of indigenous values and lifestyles. Consequently a food such as tempeh, which was unknown in the West, and which was a low-priced food of the common people, acquired the image of an inferior, lower-class, or even poor-people's food, even though it was consumed by people of all classes. No Indonesian scientists felt it was worthy of their attention or research. Unfortunately, this attitude persisted even after independence. Sukarno, President of the Indonesian Republic from 1945-1967, admonished his fellow citizens on numerous occasions, saying "Don't be a tempeh nation," or "Don't be a tempeh scientist," implying that tempeh was somehow second class or inferior. Only by the mid-1960s did that image begin to change. And third, there was little interest in tempeh outside of Indonesia to stimulate interest inside.
New Interest in Tempeh (1960-82) . A new wave of worldwide interest in tempeh began in the early 1960s, sparked largely by the initiation of tempeh research on the part of two groups of American microbiologists and food scientists: one at Cornell University's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, New York, and the other at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center at Peoria, Illinois. Each group had an Indonesian as a catalyst and co-worker for its tempeh research. The Cornell group, under the leadership of Dr. Keith H. Steinkraus, worked with Ms. YAP Bwee Hwa, starting in 1958. This group did extensive, original research on tempeh and from 1960 published a series of pioneering scientific papers on all aspects of the new-found fermented soyfood. The USDA group, under the leadership of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine, got interested in tempeh as soon as the Indonesian microbiologist KO Swan Djien arrived in Peoria in 1960 to study industrial fermentations. There Hesseltine encouraged him to start by studying the tempeh fermentation.
The first Indonesian to do scientific research on tempeh, and to write a post-graduate thesis on the subject was Ms. Yap Bwee Hwa - a Chinese Indonesian whose name comes from the Hokkian dialect of Fujian (Fukien) province. After graduating from the Fakultet Ilmu Pasti dan Alam (Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics) in Bandung with a major in biochemistry (degree equivalent of MSc), she went to work in Jakarta at the Nutrition Institute under Dr. Poorwo Sudarmo, a progressive physician interested in nutritious, low-cost foods for infants. She then won a Fulbright scholarship to the United States and Sudarmo encouraged her to study tempeh. After reading an article by van Veen on the value of tempeh in prisoner of war camps, she made up her mind. The Fulbright committee suggested that she study at Cornell University, so she wrote Dr. Hand, head of the Department of Food Science and Technology at Cornell's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station. She visited plants tempeh plants in Indonesia to study the process, collected tempeh from the Jakarta market, then dried it and put it in a little brown bottle for later use as tempeh starter. She left Indonesia for the USA in August 1957. In the summer of 1958 she started to work in Dr. Steinkraus' laboratory at Geneva, New York, where, for the first time, she prepared tempeh. This was probably the first tempeh ever made in America. A graduate student in nutrition and food science, Ms. Yap pursued her interest in tempeh as a nutritious food for infants and children, in part because of the high rate of infant mortality in Indonesia caused by undernutrition (Yap 1984, personal communication). In 1960 she wrote her MS thesis titled Nutritional and Chemical Studies on Tempeh, an Indonesian Soybean Product . That same year she co-authored the Cornell group's first tempeh publication "Studies on Tempeh--An Indonesian Fermented Food" (Steinkraus et al. 1960). It is also interesting to note that it was from the pulverized sample of tempeh that Yap brought with her from Indonesia that the group isolated the culture of Rhizopus oligosporus , which Dr. Hesseltine later identified and gave the number NRRL 2710. This is still the most widely used tempeh culture strain in the USA.
Other early but brief descriptions of the tempeh process were given by Prawiranegara (1960) and Hardjo (1964, in Indonesian).
In 1961 Ko Swan Djien became the second Indonesian to publish scientific research on tempeh. Like Yap Bwee Hwa, he was a Chinese Indonesian whose name comes from the Hokkian dialect of Fujian (Fukien) province. By authoring or co-authoring at least six important articles about tempeh, Ko played a key role in introducing this food to the West, and in giving it a better image in Indonesia. Ko studied at the University of Wisconsin at Madison from August 1959, then did research at the NRRC from February to August 1960. Thereafter, he returned to the Bandung Institute of Technology, where his Laboratory for Microbiology began doing cooperative research on tempeh with the Cornell and USDA groups. Ko's first article, co-authored with Hesseltine in 1961, was about "Indonesian Fermented Foods;" it contained detailed information about tempeh making and recipes in Indonesia. Ko noted that there were thousands of tempeh shops in Indonesia and estimated that half or more of the country's 1959 soybean production of 17 million bushels (463,000 metric tons) was used to make tempeh.
Ko's most important and original article, presented in May 1964 at the International Symposium on Oilseed Proteins in Tokyo (and unfortunately never published) was "Tempe, A Fermented Food Made from Soybeans." The best report to date on tempeh in Indonesia, it discussed tempeh's history, traditional production methods, inoculum, packaging, chemistry and microbiology, contamination, shelf life, recipes, and price, plus a review of other research (including the best English-language bibliography of Dutch research to date) and a description of a tempeh pilot plant being developed in Bandung (complete with a mechanical roller-mill dehuller, water flotation hull removal, heated incubator and trays, and improved inocula). It was the first English-language publication to refer to the use of okara (soy pulp) in tempeh. In this article Ko signaled what he hoped would be the beginning of a new image for tempeh in Indonesia: "But there is no doubt that the time will come when Indonesians will be proud of their tempe, in the same way as the Japanese are proud of their sake, the French people of their wine, Italians of their macaroni, Indians of their curry, Russians of their caviar, the Dutch of their cheese, etc."
During the 1960s at the microbiology laboratory in Bandung, Ko worked to stimulate new research on and interest in tempeh. When Indonesian newspaper reporters finally discovered that he had studied tempeh at a University and in the United States, they were simply astonished. Articles with bold headlines such as "Tempeh Steps to a Higher Throne" appeared in several widely read Indonesian newspapers in September 1965. This marked the beginning of a change in attitude toward tempeh in Indonesia. In 1965 a summary of Ko's work on tempeh was published in Indonesian; it included details of an extensive survey proving that Rhizopus oligosporus was the main tempeh microorganism. In 1968 Ko joined the Department of Food Science at the Agricultural University, Wageningen, in the Netherlands. There he began to stimulate new interest in tempeh in Europe. In 1974 Rusmin and Ko wrote an article on rice-grown tempeh inoculum and Ko (1974) showed that the tempeh mold prevented aflatoxin production by Aspergillus flavus . In 1979 Ko and Hesseltine wrote "Tempeh and Related Foods," an excellent expanded and updated version of Ko's unpublished 1964 paper, with more details on previous Dutch tempeh research. There Ko reported that, following the change in attitude towards tempeh in Indonesia from the mid-1960s, studies by universities and by government agencies during the 1970s had paid more attention to tempeh. Ko insisted on using the Indonesian spelling for tempeh, even in English-language articles.
Yap and Ko had pioneered the way for Indonesians to do research on tempeh in the United States. Many others followed in their footsteps. The next Indonesian to study tempeh was Nasruddin Iljas, who wrote his MS and PhD theses on tempeh at Ohio State University in 1969 and 1972. His was the first PhD dissertation ever to be written on tempeh. In 1970 and 1973 he published two studies with Peng and Gould at Ohio State; the first was a short article on ways of preserving tempeh and the second, "Tempeh: An Indonesian Fermented Soybean Food," was one of the best and most extensive works to date, containing a lengthy review of the literature. In 1970 Dwidjoseputra wrote her PhD thesis on the microbiology of ragi (starter) at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee. In 1975 Sudarmadji wrote his PhD thesis on tempeh at Michigan State University, and by 1978 had authored or co-authored five publications on the subject. He found that the phytic acid in soybeans (which can bind dietary minerals) was significantly reduced during the tempeh fermentation. In 1980 Rivai wrote his MS thesis on tempeh at the University of Minnesota.
Interest in and publications about tempeh in Indonesia increased rapidly after the late 1960s. In 1967 the Indonesian Department of Agriculture published Mustika Rasa ("Gems of Taste"), a huge (1,123-page) cookbook of the best recipes from throughout the Indonesian archipelago. Referred to as the "Bible" of local cooks, it contained 35 Indonesian tempeh recipes and seven onchom recipes. Also in 1967 several types of tempeh were included in the official Indonesian Food Composition Tables (Direktorat GIZI 1967). Dwidjoseputra and Wolf (1970) studied the microorganisms in tempeh inocula. Sastroamijoyo (1971) was the first Indonesian to suggest that tempeh offered an answer to the world food crisis. Hermana was senior author of six important articles between 1970 and 1974, and Indrawati Gandjar wrote the first two of her many publications on tempeh in 1972. In 1972 and 1975 Thio published on tempeh. Winarno was the senior author of three publications written between 1973 and 1976. The most important of these was The Present Status of Soybean in Indonesia (1976), compiled as part of the ASEAN Project on Soybeans and Protein-Rich Foods by an interdisciplinary team of Indonesia's top authorities on soybeans. It contained the first detailed analysis of the tempeh industry in Indonesia. This ASEAN Protein Project served as a major stimulus for additional research on tempeh by Indonesians, and numerous papers were published in its periodical progress reports (Saono et al. 1974, 1976, 1977; Suhadi 1979; Jutono 1979; Hartadi 1980). Tempeh was discussed extensively at workshops on Solid Substrate Fermentation sponsored by the ASEAN Sub-Committee on Protein, held in Bandung, Indonesia, in 1978, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in 1980. Other studies on soy tempeh were published by Noor (1975), Khumaidi (1976), Loegito (1977), and others.
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New Interest in Tempeh (1960-82) Continued
Starting in the late 1960s and early 1970s a number of changes began to take place in the process for making tempeh in Indonesia. The most noticeable of these was the use of polyethylene bags (and, to a more limited extent, wooden trays lined with plastic sheeting) in place of banana leaves as the container in which the tempeh was incubated and sold. These techniques were developed in 1964 by Martinelli and Hesseltine at the USDA/NRRC in Peoria, Illinois. The oldest method for making tempeh inoculum was the sandwiched hibiscus leaf method, in which inoculated soybeans were sandwiched between hibiscus leaves and incubated until the molds sporulated. The finished inoculum was known as laru , waru , or usar . Finally, the spores on the leaves were rubbed over warm soybeans requiring inoculation. In 1895 Prinsen Geerligs reported that kechap ( katjap ) and taucho ( Tao-Tjiong ) were both inoculated with Hibiscus tiliaceus leaves, in Java called "waroe." A sporulated substrate (typically a previous batch of tempeh) was also used. But starting in mid-1960s research began in Indonesia to improve traditional starters. Ko (1964) described an improved soybean-based starter, then in 1967-68 developed and tested a semi-pure culture inoculum based on cooked rice, incubated in aluminum trays, then dried, pulverized, and stored sealed in a cool place. The process required no sophisticated equipment (Rusmin and Ko 1974). Hermana and Roedjito (1971) were the first to publish a method for the use of steamed rice (plus cassava and soy flour) as a tempeh inoculum substrate. By the mid-1970s a pre-prepared rice-based tempeh inoculum started to be used by some larger manufacturers; a key supplier was the Department of Microbiology at Bandung Institute of Technology (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979; Jutono 1979; Hartadi 1980). By 1982 tempeh starter was being sold in Indonesian supermarkets.
Traditionally all of the soybeans used to make tempeh were grown domestically; presumably they had been selected over the years for their suitability to tempeh production. But imports of soybeans, largely from the USA, increased dramatically during the 1970s, reaching 156,000 tonnes in 1976 (about 25% of domestic production) then rising to roughly 365,000 tonnes in 1983 (59% of domestic production). US soybeans were larger, cleaner, and about 15-20% less expensive, but the Indonesian soybeans were found (by whom??) to have a higher content of isoflavones, which retards rancidification of the tempeh when it stands at ambient temperatures. Larger manufacturers began to dehull their soybeans with a motor-driven stone mill, then remove the hulls using a semi-automatic flotation device. However, the abundance of low-cost labor and the high cost of fuel, energy, and imported equipment, prevented widespread mechanization of the process. By 1977 a 75-minute color film had been made on tempeh; it was available from the Jakarta Management Institute (Shurtleff & Aoyagi 1979).
The first detailed and comprehensive survey of the tempeh industry in Indonesia was published by Winarno and co-workers in 1976. It reported that, at that time, tempeh was the nation's most popular soyfood, making use of 64% of the country's total soybean production and imports. There were 41,201 tempeh manufacturers, mostly small, family-run enterprises, which made fresh tempeh daily. They employed a total of 128,000 workers, who produced each year 153,895 metric tons of tempeh having a retail value of US$85.5 million. Most companies were small, run out of the home. The largest companies used no more than 100 kg of soybeans a day to make 175 kg (385 lb) of tempeh. (This would be 1,050 kg (2,310 lb) of tempeh per 6-day week.) Tempeh was an important source of high-quality, low-cost protein and vitamins in the diet of all Indonesian socio-economic groups, and especially in the diet of low-income families. Yet its importance should not be exaggerated. Per capita consumption for all Indonesians in 1976 was about 16 gm a day or 5.8 kg (12.8 lb) a year. Tempeh was typically consumed in amounts of 100-200 gm per person per meal. A summary and analysis of Winarno's findings on the Indonesian tempeh industry is given in the professional edition of The Book of Tempeh (1979) by Shurtleff and Aoyagi.
The remarkable versatility of the tempeh fermentation process allows the preparation of many different types. Traditionally in Indonesia the great majority of all tempeh was soy tempeh ( témpé kedelé ) and by the mid-1970s it constituted an estimated 90% of all tempeh produced. Well-known varieties of soy tempeh included thick Malang tempeh and one-bean-thick Purwokerto tempeh. Other traditional types of tempeh included: okara tempeh ( tempe gembus or onchom hitau ; Gandjar and Slamet 1972; Gandjar 1977), soybean-hulls tempeh ( tempe mata kedele ; Gandjar and Hermana 1972), peanut presscake tempeh ( onchom hitam ; van Veen et al. 1968), the occasionally poisonous coconut presscake tempeh ( tempe bongkrek ; van Veen 1950-73; Harsono 1970; Gandjar and Hermana 1972; Arbianto 1977), velvet-bean tempeh ( tempe benguk ; Gandjar 1977), leucaena tempeh ( tempe lamtoro ), mung bean tempeh ( tempe kacang hijau ), mung bean pulp tempeh (Gandjar 1977), plus several other minor varieties (Vorderman 1902; Ko and Hesseltine 1979; Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979). The okara tempeh, presscake tempehs, and other non-soy tempehs were consumed more by lower-income groups. Starting in the late 1970s, however, the use of new seeds and grains for tempeh-making began to be investigated. Gandjar (1977, 1978) did several studies on winged bean tempeh. Tanuwidjaja (1977) studied the fortification of low-cost presscake tempehs with soy flour to improve the diets of the very poor. And bulgur wheat was reported to be mixed with soybeans to make tempeh (Hesseltine and Wang 1972).
Poisonings from tempeh bongkrek (made with coconut rather than the usual soybeans) continued to be a problem. From 1951 (when detailed records first began to be kept) until 1976, some 7,216 cases of bongkrek poisoning were reported in Central Java and 86 of these people (1.2%) died. In 1958 Harsono showed that the use of the acidic leaves of an Oxalis species (which grows everywhere as a weed in Banyumas) could be used to prevent toxicity in bongkrek. Unfortunately, this simple safety measure has not been adopted (van Veen 1967). In 1960 van Damme et al. elucidated the structure of toxoflavin. Laws have been passed to try to prevent production of tempeh bongkrek by unlicensed amateurs, but these too have not worked. So the periodic poisonings have continued into the 1980s. Fortunately soybeans are not involved.
On 11 March 1979 a key event took place in Indonesia with the organization of KOPTI, the Cooperative of Tempeh and Tofu Producers of Indonesia, with Achmad Rouzni Noor as director in Jakarta. Noor had a deep personal interest in helping tempeh makers to grow, modernize, and thrive. And national laws passed in 1979?? governing import and distribution of soybeans virtually compelled most tempeh makers to join KOPTI. By 1983 KOPTI had over 28,000 members in Java; 72% of these ran home industries. KOPTI's main functions were: (1) to buy basic materials (soybeans, inoculum, oil, etc.) collectively for its members at lower prices, (2) to improve member's production by developing new processing equipment (such as dehulling machines), helping members improve the quantity and quality of their products through better sanitation and preservation practices, and developing new products, (3) to provide marketing services, (4) and to serve as a source of capital for loans and helping members to form cooperatives. In part because of KOPTI, tempeh production was on the upswing in Indonesia by the early 1980s and the industry was modernizing. In 1984 Ko Swan Djien was able to write: "From my recent visit to Indonesia I get the satisfactory feeling that our efforts to have fermented foods valued in their right proportion are not in vain. Tempe is no longer considered an inferior food. Nowadays Indonesians are as proud of THEIR tempe as Japanese are of their sake, and French of their wine...!" (personal communication).
Shurtleff and Aoyagi (1979) conducted an informal survey in Java to identify which were Indonesia's best known and best liked tempeh recipes. The number preceding each recipe name indicates the order of "best known," with (1) being the best known. The number after the English recipe name indicates the quality ranking with (1) being the best liked. 1. Tempeh Goreng (Deep-Fried Tempeh with Seasonings; 2) 2. Tempeh Bachem (Tempeh Cutlets; 4), 3. Keripik Tempeh (Tempeh Chips; 6), 4. Sayur Lodeh (Tempeh & Vegetables in Coconut Milk Soup; 7), 5. Sambal Goreng Tempeh (Spicy-Fried Tempeh in Coconut Milk; 3), 6. Terik Tempeh (Tempeh in Coconut Milk Sauce; 5), 7. Sambal Goreng Tempeh Kering (Crunchy Chili-Fried Tempeh Topping, 1). Surprisingly the least well known of the "Top Seven" was the best liked.
Java is still the Mecca of the tempeh world, yet over the centuries, wherever Javanese settlers have gone, they have taken tempeh with them. Today it is widely produced and consumed in Surinam (where 30% of the population is Indonesian), and on the west and south coasts of Peninsular Malaysia. To a lesser extent it is consumed in Singapore, New Caledonia, and the other Indonesian Islands (especially Sumatra). Tempeh is also increasingly popular in the Netherlands, where it was introduced by immigrants from Indonesia in the 1940s.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN EUROPE AND AUSTRALASIA
History of Tempeh in Europe . As noted previously, all of the references to and articles about tempeh written between 1875 and the early 1950s were written by Europeans, most of them Dutchmen. Senior authors of references prior to 1940 included Gericke and Roorda (1875, 1901), Prinsen Geerligs (1895, 1896), Boorsma (1900), Vorderman (1902), Heyne (1913), Jansen (1923, 1924), Ochse (1931), van Veen (1932, 1933, 1934, 1935, 1936, 1938), Mertens (1933), Amar and Grevenstuk (1935), and Burkill (1935). Yet, perhaps because Dutch was not a widely read or spoken language and tempeh was not known in countries more famous for soyfoods such as Japan and China, tempeh was rarely mentioned in the numerous articles about soyfoods published in French, German, and English prior to the 1950s. Nor are there any records of tempeh being made in Europe during this time. The only two European works in English that mentioned tempeh during this period were those by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), and both were encyclopedic works about the foods and plants of Malaysia and Indonesia; Ochse's work was originally published in Dutch.
Relatively little was published about tempeh in Europe between 1940 and 1959, and most articles focused on its role in prisoner of war camps in Southeast Asia. There were articles by van Veen (1946, in Dutch), Roelofsen (1946, in Dutch), de Bruyn et al. (1947, in Dutch), Tammes (1950, in Dutch), van Veen and Schaefer (1950), Smith and Woodruff (1951), Grant (1951), Dupont (1954), and Autret and van Veen (1955); the latter five articles were all in English. Most of these have been discussed earlier at Indonesia. Boedijn (1958) reported that Rhizopus oligosporus can always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it is the primary organism in tempeh.
All of the first tempeh companies in Europe were started in the Netherlands by immigrants from Indonesia. The earliest of these, called ENTI, was founded in April 1946 by a Dutch couple whose last name was Wedding. While living in Indonesia, they had learned to make tempeh. Bringing their starter culture and recipe to the Netherlands, they began to make Europe's earliest known tempeh there on a home scale for friends and relatives. Gradually ENTI grew and became a commercial operation. By the early 1970s they were making 2,000 lb of tempeh a day. In about 1974 they sold the company (located in Zevenhuizen) to Mrs. L.J. Duson, who ran it until January 1984, when she closed it.
Firma E.S. Lembekker, founded in January 1959, was Europe's second tempeh company, and it may have been the first to sell tempeh commercially. In January 1984 it became Europe's oldest existing tempeh company.
Interest in tempeh in Europe began to increase starting in the 1960s. Articles were published by Roelofsen and Thalens (1964; changes in B vitamins), Stanton and Wallbridge (1969; a tempeh-like product made from cassava but with improved nutritional value), Thio (1972, 1975; small scale production and recipes), Jensen and Djurtoft (1976; a large report from Denmark on legume and cereal grain tempehs), Djurtoft and Jensen (1977, tempeh from various African grains and beans), Andersson (1977, volatile components and yellow pea tempeh, from Sweden), and Bahi El-Din et al. (1977; Sudanese researchers at Wageningen, Netherlands). Among these researchers, Thio Goan Loo from Indonesia was especially active in teaching people in Third World countries about tempeh. In 1972 he wrote about tempeh for use in Zambia (Africa) and spent three months in 1979 teaching tempeh production and recipes in Sri Lanka.
Europe's earliest known popular article on tempeh was an excellent 7-page feature story with nine photographs published in 1982 in Le Compas in French. In 1982 Soja Total , a translation of The Farm Vegetarian Cookbook (Hagler 1978), containing 13 pages of information on tempeh, was published in Germany. In 1985 Das Tempeh Buch , an updated and expanded translation of The Book of Tempeh (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979), was also published in Germany. Thus by 1984 there was more information on tempeh available in German than in any other continental European language, including Dutch. However the absence of a center of focused research efforts and a good source of low-cost tempeh cultures, such as the centers at Geneva and Peoria in the US, restricted the development of widespread popular interest in tempeh in Europe. Fortunately in 1984 the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures in Baarn, Netherlands, began to promote their tempeh cultures quite actively.
Europe's largest tempeh company, Tempé Produkten B.V. (Tempe Products Inc., named Handelsonderneming van Dappern until April 1983) was founded in 1969 by Robert van Dappern, with the help of his Dutch father (Herman), his Indonesian mother (Aveline), and his Dutch-Indonesian wife. He paid a Dutch-Indonesian man named Mr. Remmert a substantial sum of money to teach him how to make tempeh. By 1970 they were making tempeh in a small warehouse in Rotterdam. Initially they sold all of their tempeh to a couple of Holland's many Indonesian stores, but then they hired his wife's father, a well-known Indonesian, to deliver to the wider Indonesian community. The company began to grow, but all of the tempeh was being consumed by Indonesians living in the Netherlands. In January 1972 they moved the thriving company to Kerkrade, in southern Holland near the family home in Heerlen, rented a bigger building, and started mass production. Ed van Dappern, the second brother, joined the company as an equal partner. In 1979 Robert sent his wife's brother, Ike van Gessel, to Los Angeles to set up a tempeh plant there. Ike rented a building but, because of the European recession during the early 1980s and the need for capital to expand the business in the Netherlands, he had to cancel the lease and call off the project, at a substantial financial loss. In June 1980 the company bought a $1,000,000 modern factory in Kerkrade and expanded again. By mid-1982 Tempé Produkten was producing 6,000 to 8,000 pounds of tempeh a week, making it the largest tempeh company in the world. By early 1984 production had increased to 13,200 pounds (6,000 kg) a week, and an estimated 10% of this was consumed by non-Indonesians. By Dec. 1992 the company was producing 11,000 pounds (5,000 kg) of tempeh a week.
The family developed their own proprietary method for making tempeh starter culture. They developed a leaflet on tempeh, gave demonstrations on making and cooking with tempeh, and got tempeh to be sold at the Central Market, with the result that more and more of the greengrocers, who buy their vegetables there early each morning, started selling tempeh (and tofu). The company exported tempeh and tempeh products to England, Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg via a major distributor. Robert's Indonesian mother, Aveline, was in charge of preparing these (van Gessel 1982; Welters 1982; van Dappern 1984, each personal communications). By 1984 Tempé Produkten was the world's second largest tempeh manufacturer, after Marusan-Ai in Japan.
In June 1985, Tempé Producten added a new soyfood product to its line - tofu, and by 1991 the company was the largest tofu producer in The Netherlands.
Prior to early 1981 all of Europe's tempeh companies were located in the Netherlands and run by older Dutchmen catering largely to an Indonesian clientele. Europe's first generation of "New Age" tempeh shops was started from 1981 by young people interested in natural foods and/or macrobiotics. Europe's earliest known New Age tempeh company was Paul's Tofu & Tempeh, which was in operation by January 1981 at 155 Archway Rd., Highgate, in London. JAKSO, the first New Age shop in the Netherlands, started in July 1981. By January 1982 there were 7 tempeh shops operating in Europe; by January 1984 there were 18. Of these, 7 were in the Netherlands, 3 in Austria, 2 each in England and West Germany, and 1 each in Belgium, France, Italy, and Sweden. Total tempeh production in the Netherlands was about 4,500 kg a week (10,000 cakes of 1 pound each) in 1982, rising to 12,000 kg a week in 1984.
By 1980 another center of interest in tempeh had developed at the Department of Botany and Microbiology, University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, Wales, UK. There Dr. J. Hedger and Mr. T. Basuki (from Indonesia) were planning?? to start a tempeh factory, had produced a 4-page leaflet on "Tempe--An Indonesian Fermented Soybean Food," and had written a script for a BBC program "Tomorrow's World," on tempeh, which was broadcast in the summer of 1979. At that time tempeh was also occasionally sold in London, but the name of the manufacturer was not given (O'Neill 1980). In 1982 Hedger wrote a brief article on tempeh production.
History of Tempeh in Australia . Australian interest in tempeh began in about 1977, when McComb published an excellent BS thesis on the use of sweet narrow-leafed lupins to make tempeh. It contained one of the best summaries of the literature to date, plus much original research. A summary of this work was given by Kidby et al. (1977). The earliest known Australian tempeh companies were started in about 1980, and by March 1981 there were three small ones, all run by young "New Age" people, interested in natural foods, meatless diets, and alternative lifestyles. The first two to start were Dharma, part of Earth Foods in Waverley, run by Swami Veetdharma, and a small shop at Bodhi Farm in Channon, New South Wales, run by John Seed. Cyril and Elly Cain founded Beancoast Soyfoods in Eumundi, Queensland, and started making tempeh in July 1982. In March 1982 Ziruiz magazine published a long popular article "Terrific Tempeh" by Shurtleff and Aoyagi. By early 1983 Earth Angel was making okara tempeh. By 1984 there were five tempeh companies in Australia, all quite small.
Because of Australia's proximity to Indonesia, both countries could learn much from each other about traditional and modern tempeh making.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA
Early Years in America (1954-1969) . Interest in tempeh in the United States began at a surprisingly late date. As noted previously, early English-language articles on tempeh had been written by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), both published outside the US. The earliest known reference to tempeh in a US publication appeared in 1946, when an article by Gerold Stahel, writing from Surinam in South America about tempeh in Surinam and in New Guinea, was published in the Journal of the New York Botanical Garden . A summary appeared in November of that year in Soybean Digest . These articles appeared just 50 years after the first reference to tempeh was published in Europe by Prinsen Geerligs. In 1955 Autret and van Veen (both working for the Nutrition Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, outside the USA) published "Possible Sources of Proteins for Child Feeding in Underdeveloped Countries" in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition . They were the first suggest tempeh as a protein-rich, nutritious, and low-cost food for infants and children in Third World countries. They mentioned tempeh only briefly and noted that soymilk would probably be better suited for feeding children.
Research on tempeh in the US was started in 1954 by Dr. Paul György, a pediatrician and researcher at the Philadelphia General Hospital, and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. György had been to Indonesia many times, knew tempeh well, and (like Autret and van Veen) thought that it offered a way of improving the diets of infants and children in Third World countries. György received his first tempeh from Indonesia and Southern Rhodesian in 1954 and 1955. Ms. Kiku Murata of Japan worked with Gyorgy in the US investigating tempeh during 1959 and 1960. Following largely futile attempts to make tempeh in his own laboratory and lacking adequate facilities for making larger quantities of fermented foods, György worked out a cooperative arrangement in 1959 to have the tempeh made under the supervision of Dr. Hand and Dr. Steinkraus at New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, Cornell University, Geneva, New York. The first publication from this work did not appear until 1961, when György wrote "The Nutritive Value of Tempeh." György gradually moved his research away from a focus on child feeding programs toward the more narrow study of antioxidants in tempeh, which might prevent rancidification of tempeh or other foods.
As noted earlier at Indonesia, a great expansion of interest in tempeh began in the early 1960s, largely because of the pioneering, in-depth research at two centers: Cornell University's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station at Geneva, New York, under the leadership of Dr. Keith H. Steinkraus; and the USDA Northern Regional Research Center at Peoria, Illinois, under the leadership of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine. Each center became actively interested in tempeh because of the arrival of an Indonesian researcher. Whereas approximately 15 scientific on tempeh had been published worldwide before 1960, more than 60 were published from 1960 to 1979. Important, original investigations were done on pure culture fermentations, microbiological and biochemical changes during tempeh fermentation, tempeh's nutritional value, and industrial production of tempeh. This research awakened a new interest in tempeh among microbiologists and food scientists worldwide. Moreover, with this research, the world center of interest in and research on tempeh shifted from Indonesia and the Netherlands to the USA.
In the summer of 1958, when Miss YAP Bwee Hwa from Indonesia started her research on tempeh in New York. Active in nutritional circles in Indonesia, she was the first Indonesian to study tempeh in America; she brought her own little bottle of dried tempeh inoculum with her. She did her course work and rat feeding experiments under the direction of Prof. Louise Daniel and Dr. Richard Barnes in the Graduate School of Nutrition at Cornell University, while pursuing her investigations of tempeh production under Dr. Steinkraus in the allied Department of Food Science and Technology at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station. Dr. Hand, then head of the latter Department, was very active in nutritional circles and knew of the United Nations' interest in tempeh. In early 1959 Steinkraus, while on a trip to check the UNICEF-supported Saridele soymilk plant in Indonesia, visited a number of tempeh shops, thus becoming the first American ever to study tempeh in its homeland. Also in 1959 Steinkraus' Cornell University group began making tempeh for Dr. György in Pennsylvania.
The first article on tempeh by Americans was written in 1960 when Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Provvidenti, and Hand published their now classic "Studies on Tempeh--An Indonesian Fermented Food." This paper (submitted for publication in September 1959) incorporated Miss Yap's tempeh research, plus additional investigations by Steinkraus' group on essential microorganisms, mycelial penetration of the soybeans, etc. In 1961 this paper appeared in a publication by the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences. In June 1960 Miss Yap, as part of her graduate degree in nutrition, submitted her MS thesis titled "Nutritional and Chemical Studies on Tempeh, an Indonesian Soybean Product." Innovations in tempeh production described in these papers included use of lactic acid instead of a prefermentation to acidify the soybean soak water, incubation of the tempeh in stainless steel trays, dehulling the soybeans mechanically (with an electric vegetable peeler), growing the starter spores on bran, and dehydration of the tempeh in a circulating hot air oven. Yap found the PER of tempeh to be 2.5, midway between soybeans (2.3) and casein (2.7). Rats ate 1.5 times as much tempeh as cooked soybeans, and grew almost as fast as those fed casein. Changes in temperature, soluble solids, and soluble nitrogen, and pH during tempeh fermentation were measured and plotted. Yap left the US in April 1962 for Germany, where she worked as a researcher, first for a wine institute, then after 1970 for a chemical-pharmaceutical company.
During the 1960s the Cornell University Group, consisting of interdisciplinary scientists from both the Agricultural Experiment Station and Cornell University, worked together to publish at least 13 original scientific articles on all aspects of tempeh. The group included Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Wagenknecht, Provvidenti, Hand, Hackler, Stillings, van Veen, and Shallenberger. Steinkraus was the senior author of 6 papers during this period. Particularly important for the coming new generation of US tempeh manufacturers were his "Pilot Plant Studies on Tempeh" (1962), "Research on Tempeh Technology in the United States" (1964), and "A Pilot Plant Process for the Production of Dehydrated Tempeh" (1965), in which all of the necessary equipment and its manufacturers was described. These represented the first attempts to develop a process for making tempeh in an industrialized country with a temperate climate. Changes during the tempeh fermentation were studied in detail, including changes in lipids (Wagenknecht et al. 1961), in amino acids (Stillings and Hackler 1965), and in carbohydrates (Shallenberger 1967). Hackler et al. (1964) studied utilization of tempeh protein by rats. Van Veen, who had done pioneering research on tempeh in Indonesia as early as 1932 and had arrived at Cornell in 1962 as a professor of International Nutrition, was senior author of seven papers related to tempeh between 1962 and 1970, including an original 1968 study on peanut tempeh.
In 1960 a second US tempeh research program was started under the direction of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center (NRRC) at Peoria, Illinois. As early as May 1948 the NRRC had been sent a tempeh culture ( Rhizopus nigricans ) from Central Sugar Society (N.V. Centrale Suiker Maatschappij) in Amsterdam, together with instructions for making tempeh, but apparently nothing was done with it. Hesseltine first learned of tempeh from papers by Stahel (1946) and van Veen and Schaefer (1950). Much of the interest in tempeh starting in 1960 developed because KO Swan Djien of the Bandung Institute of Technology's Laboratory of Microbiology arrived at the NRRC that year to study industrial fermentations. Hesseltine suggested that he study tempeh; Ko showed Hesseltine and his group how to prepare it. The first publications appeared in 1961 with Ko and Hesseltine's "Indonesian Fermented Foods" and 1962 with Hesseltine's "Research at Northern Regional Research Laboratory on Fermented Foods." From the early 1960s on an interdisciplinary team of researchers at Peoria began to study many facets of tempeh and to develop new types of tempeh and processing techniques. Key figures in this team, in addition to Hesseltine and Ko were H.L. Wang, A.K. Smith, A.F. Martinelli, Mable Smith, W.G. Sorenson, and E.W. Swain. During the 1960s they published 17 original scientific papers (including two public service patents) about tempeh, plus four derivative articles; Hesseltine was senior author of 12 of these, Wang of four, Ko and A.K. Smith of two each, and Martinelli and Sorenson of one each.
In 1963 Hesseltine and co-workers published their first major tempeh study "Investigations of Tempeh, an Indonesian Food." That same year they discovered a mold inhibitor in soybeans. In 1963 and 1964 A.K. Smith and co-workers published pioneering studies on the nutritive value of tempeh in relation to various processing techniques. In 1964 Dr. Martinelli (a Brazilian scientist studying tempeh at the NRRC) and Hesseltine developed a new method for incubating tempeh in perforated plastic bags. It soon became widely used by commercial tempeh producers in both Indonesia and North America, a nice example of cultural cross-fertilization. In the same paper they described fermentation of tempeh in metal and wooden trays, the dry dehulling of soybeans, and the preparation of tempeh from full-fat soy grits. In 1965 Hesseltine wrote a review and history of research on tempeh microbiology and biochemistry. In 1966 and 1967 Hesseltine and Wang published the world's first studies showing that delicious tempeh containing higher quality protein could be prepared using soy-and-grain mixtures (including wheat and rice) or cereal grains alone. In 1969 Wang and co-workers discovered that Rhizopus oligosporus in tempeh produces an antibacterial compound or antibiotic, which is very active against a number of Gram-positive bacteria, including Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus subtilis , and which retains its activity even after cooking. This supports the view of natives and of some scientists that those who eat tempeh daily have fewer intestinal infections. Hesseltine and Wang sent samples of their tempeh to Dr. Doris Calloway at the University of California, Berkeley. She found in 1971 that tempeh, unlike most foods made from beans, does not cause flatulence. David and Verma (1981) suggested that the antibacterial substance in tempeh may be the cause of this lack of flatulence; it might inhibit the growth of gram-positive Clostridium bacteria, which are known to produce gas in the intestines. News of the NRRC discoveries on tempeh was disseminated by Soybean Digest (1965, 1967) and the USDA's Agricultural Research (1966, 1969).
A key component of the tempeh research at the NRRC concerned identification of the main microorganisms in the fermentation. It has never been clear what the original source of these molds in Indonesia was. Smith and Woodruff (1951) reported that prisoners in Japanese camps in Indonesia during World War II obtained their original tempeh mold culture from the withered petals of the hibiscus plant. Others have said that they came from banana leaves. The genus Rhizopus was discovered and named in 1820 by Ehrenberg. In 1895 Went and Prinsen Geerligs first described the species Rhizopus oryzae , which was investigated in detail by Wehmer in 1900 and 1901. Until the mid-1960s many microbiologists worldwide (Vorderman 1902; Stahel 1946; van Veen and Schaefer 1950; Dupont 1954; Steinkraus et al. 1960) thought R. oryzae was the primary microorganism responsible for the tempeh fermentation. In 1936 Lockwood and co-workers had studied the physiology of R. oryzae at the NRRC. In 1905 the Japanese mycologist Kendo Saito first described Rhizopus oligosporus on rice meal cakes which came from Shantung province in China, where they were used in making a rice-based fermented alcoholic beverage. Saito did not mention tempeh. In 1958 Boedijn reported that R. oligosporus could always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it was the primary fermentation organism. In 1962, after observing 50 tempeh strains from various tempeh sources, Hesseltine identified R. oligosporus as the chief tempeh mold. Ko (1965) reported collecting 81 samples of tempeh from various places in Java and Sumatra. Isolation of 116 pure cultures revealed that R. oligosporus was always present in good quality tempeh, thereby establishing without a doubt that it was the typical dominant species used. Indonesian researchers, however, maintain that the best quality tempeh contains a mixed culture. By the late 1970s the most widely used tempeh culture in the Western world was R. oligosporus strain NRRL 2710. This strain, brought to the US from Indonesia by MS. Yap in 1957, isolated by Steinkraus' group, and first identified in Hesseltine's lab, continued to be widely distributed from the NRRC culture collection.
It is not known for sure when the first commercial tempeh was made in the US. After the long and bloody war that drove the Dutch out of Indonesia and led to Indonesian independence in 1949, tens of thousands of Dutch and Dutch-Indonesian families were uprooted. Most tried to go to Holland, but the country was too small and the native Indonesians found it too cold. The United States set a quota in 1950 allowing 25,000 of these refugees to immigrate. Only about 10% were culturally native Indonesian; the rest were "Indos," i.e. Dutch-Indonesians or Chinese-Indonesians. Most went to warm areas such as California and Florida. In 1950 an estimated 500 of these settlers arrived in California. The first of these known to have started a tempeh shop was Mary Otten, who in 1961 began making tempeh in her basement on Stannage Avenue in Albany, California. She sold it to her friends and served it at parties that she catered. For starter culture she used ragi (an Indonesian starter that comes in small cakes) flown in from Java, until she learned how to make her own in 1973. In 1967 she started Java Restaurant and served many tempeh dishes. Then in 1974 she and her daughter, Irene, started Otten's Indonesian Foods, which by 1981 was making tempeh plus a full line of Indonesian tempeh-based foods under the brand name Joy of Java. These foods included Sweet & Sour Tempeh and Sayur Lodeh Tempeh.
The second earliest known tempeh shop in California (and in the USA) was Runnels Foods, which opened in Los Angeles, California in 1962. Also in Los Angeles, Toko Baru started in 1969 and Bali Foods started in 1975. Thus America's first generation of tempeh shops were all located in California and all run by Indonesian-Americans.
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New Interest in Tempeh (1960-82) Continued
Starting in the late 1960s and early 1970s a number of changes began to take place in the process for making tempeh in Indonesia. The most noticeable of these was the use of polyethylene bags (and, to a more limited extent, wooden trays lined with plastic sheeting) in place of banana leaves as the container in which the tempeh was incubated and sold. These techniques were developed in 1964 by Martinelli and Hesseltine at the USDA/NRRC in Peoria, Illinois. The oldest method for making tempeh inoculum was the sandwiched hibiscus leaf method, in which inoculated soybeans were sandwiched between hibiscus leaves and incubated until the molds sporulated. The finished inoculum was known as laru , waru , or usar . Finally, the spores on the leaves were rubbed over warm soybeans requiring inoculation. In 1895 Prinsen Geerligs reported that kechap ( katjap ) and taucho ( Tao-Tjiong ) were both inoculated with Hibiscus tiliaceus leaves, in Java called "waroe." A sporulated substrate (typically a previous batch of tempeh) was also used. But starting in mid-1960s research began in Indonesia to improve traditional starters. Ko (1964) described an improved soybean-based starter, then in 1967-68 developed and tested a semi-pure culture inoculum based on cooked rice, incubated in aluminum trays, then dried, pulverized, and stored sealed in a cool place. The process required no sophisticated equipment (Rusmin and Ko 1974). Hermana and Roedjito (1971) were the first to publish a method for the use of steamed rice (plus cassava and soy flour) as a tempeh inoculum substrate. By the mid-1970s a pre-prepared rice-based tempeh inoculum started to be used by some larger manufacturers; a key supplier was the Department of Microbiology at Bandung Institute of Technology (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979; Jutono 1979; Hartadi 1980). By 1982 tempeh starter was being sold in Indonesian supermarkets.
Traditionally all of the soybeans used to make tempeh were grown domestically; presumably they had been selected over the years for their suitability to tempeh production. But imports of soybeans, largely from the USA, increased dramatically during the 1970s, reaching 156,000 tonnes in 1976 (about 25% of domestic production) then rising to roughly 365,000 tonnes in 1983 (59% of domestic production). US soybeans were larger, cleaner, and about 15-20% less expensive, but the Indonesian soybeans were found (by whom??) to have a higher content of isoflavones, which retards rancidification of the tempeh when it stands at ambient temperatures. Larger manufacturers began to dehull their soybeans with a motor-driven stone mill, then remove the hulls using a semi-automatic flotation device. However, the abundance of low-cost labor and the high cost of fuel, energy, and imported equipment, prevented widespread mechanization of the process. By 1977 a 75-minute color film had been made on tempeh; it was available from the Jakarta Management Institute (Shurtleff & Aoyagi 1979).
The first detailed and comprehensive survey of the tempeh industry in Indonesia was published by Winarno and co-workers in 1976. It reported that, at that time, tempeh was the nation's most popular soyfood, making use of 64% of the country's total soybean production and imports. There were 41,201 tempeh manufacturers, mostly small, family-run enterprises, which made fresh tempeh daily. They employed a total of 128,000 workers, who produced each year 153,895 metric tons of tempeh having a retail value of US$85.5 million. Most companies were small, run out of the home. The largest companies used no more than 100 kg of soybeans a day to make 175 kg (385 lb) of tempeh. (This would be 1,050 kg (2,310 lb) of tempeh per 6-day week.) Tempeh was an important source of high-quality, low-cost protein and vitamins in the diet of all Indonesian socio-economic groups, and especially in the diet of low-income families. Yet its importance should not be exaggerated. Per capita consumption for all Indonesians in 1976 was about 16 gm a day or 5.8 kg (12.8 lb) a year. Tempeh was typically consumed in amounts of 100-200 gm per person per meal. A summary and analysis of Winarno's findings on the Indonesian tempeh industry is given in the professional edition of The Book of Tempeh (1979) by Shurtleff and Aoyagi.
The remarkable versatility of the tempeh fermentation process allows the preparation of many different types. Traditionally in Indonesia the great majority of all tempeh was soy tempeh ( témpé kedelé ) and by the mid-1970s it constituted an estimated 90% of all tempeh produced. Well-known varieties of soy tempeh included thick Malang tempeh and one-bean-thick Purwokerto tempeh. Other traditional types of tempeh included: okara tempeh ( tempe gembus or onchom hitau ; Gandjar and Slamet 1972; Gandjar 1977), soybean-hulls tempeh ( tempe mata kedele ; Gandjar and Hermana 1972), peanut presscake tempeh ( onchom hitam ; van Veen et al. 1968), the occasionally poisonous coconut presscake tempeh ( tempe bongkrek ; van Veen 1950-73; Harsono 1970; Gandjar and Hermana 1972; Arbianto 1977), velvet-bean tempeh ( tempe benguk ; Gandjar 1977), leucaena tempeh ( tempe lamtoro ), mung bean tempeh ( tempe kacang hijau ), mung bean pulp tempeh (Gandjar 1977), plus several other minor varieties (Vorderman 1902; Ko and Hesseltine 1979; Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979). The okara tempeh, presscake tempehs, and other non-soy tempehs were consumed more by lower-income groups. Starting in the late 1970s, however, the use of new seeds and grains for tempeh-making began to be investigated. Gandjar (1977, 1978) did several studies on winged bean tempeh. Tanuwidjaja (1977) studied the fortification of low-cost presscake tempehs with soy flour to improve the diets of the very poor. And bulgur wheat was reported to be mixed with soybeans to make tempeh (Hesseltine and Wang 1972).
Poisonings from tempeh bongkrek (made with coconut rather than the usual soybeans) continued to be a problem. From 1951 (when detailed records first began to be kept) until 1976, some 7,216 cases of bongkrek poisoning were reported in Central Java and 86 of these people (1.2%) died. In 1958 Harsono showed that the use of the acidic leaves of an Oxalis species (which grows everywhere as a weed in Banyumas) could be used to prevent toxicity in bongkrek. Unfortunately, this simple safety measure has not been adopted (van Veen 1967). In 1960 van Damme et al. elucidated the structure of toxoflavin. Laws have been passed to try to prevent production of tempeh bongkrek by unlicensed amateurs, but these too have not worked. So the periodic poisonings have continued into the 1980s. Fortunately soybeans are not involved.
On 11 March 1979 a key event took place in Indonesia with the organization of KOPTI, the Cooperative of Tempeh and Tofu Producers of Indonesia, with Achmad Rouzni Noor as director in Jakarta. Noor had a deep personal interest in helping tempeh makers to grow, modernize, and thrive. And national laws passed in 1979?? governing import and distribution of soybeans virtually compelled most tempeh makers to join KOPTI. By 1983 KOPTI had over 28,000 members in Java; 72% of these ran home industries. KOPTI's main functions were: (1) to buy basic materials (soybeans, inoculum, oil, etc.) collectively for its members at lower prices, (2) to improve member's production by developing new processing equipment (such as dehulling machines), helping members improve the quantity and quality of their products through better sanitation and preservation practices, and developing new products, (3) to provide marketing services, (4) and to serve as a source of capital for loans and helping members to form cooperatives. In part because of KOPTI, tempeh production was on the upswing in Indonesia by the early 1980s and the industry was modernizing. In 1984 Ko Swan Djien was able to write: "From my recent visit to Indonesia I get the satisfactory feeling that our efforts to have fermented foods valued in their right proportion are not in vain. Tempe is no longer considered an inferior food. Nowadays Indonesians are as proud of THEIR tempe as Japanese are of their sake, and French of their wine...!" (personal communication).
Shurtleff and Aoyagi (1979) conducted an informal survey in Java to identify which were Indonesia's best known and best liked tempeh recipes. The number preceding each recipe name indicates the order of "best known," with (1) being the best known. The number after the English recipe name indicates the quality ranking with (1) being the best liked. 1. Tempeh Goreng (Deep-Fried Tempeh with Seasonings; 2) 2. Tempeh Bachem (Tempeh Cutlets; 4), 3. Keripik Tempeh (Tempeh Chips; 6), 4. Sayur Lodeh (Tempeh & Vegetables in Coconut Milk Soup; 7), 5. Sambal Goreng Tempeh (Spicy-Fried Tempeh in Coconut Milk; 3), 6. Terik Tempeh (Tempeh in Coconut Milk Sauce; 5), 7. Sambal Goreng Tempeh Kering (Crunchy Chili-Fried Tempeh Topping, 1). Surprisingly the least well known of the "Top Seven" was the best liked.
Java is still the Mecca of the tempeh world, yet over the centuries, wherever Javanese settlers have gone, they have taken tempeh with them. Today it is widely produced and consumed in Surinam (where 30% of the population is Indonesian), and on the west and south coasts of Peninsular Malaysia. To a lesser extent it is consumed in Singapore, New Caledonia, and the other Indonesian Islands (especially Sumatra). Tempeh is also increasingly popular in the Netherlands, where it was introduced by immigrants from Indonesia in the 1940s.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN EUROPE AND AUSTRALASIA
History of Tempeh in Europe . As noted previously, all of the references to and articles about tempeh written between 1875 and the early 1950s were written by Europeans, most of them Dutchmen. Senior authors of references prior to 1940 included Gericke and Roorda (1875, 1901), Prinsen Geerligs (1895, 1896), Boorsma (1900), Vorderman (1902), Heyne (1913), Jansen (1923, 1924), Ochse (1931), van Veen (1932, 1933, 1934, 1935, 1936, 1938), Mertens (1933), Amar and Grevenstuk (1935), and Burkill (1935). Yet, perhaps because Dutch was not a widely read or spoken language and tempeh was not known in countries more famous for soyfoods such as Japan and China, tempeh was rarely mentioned in the numerous articles about soyfoods published in French, German, and English prior to the 1950s. Nor are there any records of tempeh being made in Europe during this time. The only two European works in English that mentioned tempeh during this period were those by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), and both were encyclopedic works about the foods and plants of Malaysia and Indonesia; Ochse's work was originally published in Dutch.
Relatively little was published about tempeh in Europe between 1940 and 1959, and most articles focused on its role in prisoner of war camps in Southeast Asia. There were articles by van Veen (1946, in Dutch), Roelofsen (1946, in Dutch), de Bruyn et al. (1947, in Dutch), Tammes (1950, in Dutch), van Veen and Schaefer (1950), Smith and Woodruff (1951), Grant (1951), Dupont (1954), and Autret and van Veen (1955); the latter five articles were all in English. Most of these have been discussed earlier at Indonesia. Boedijn (1958) reported that Rhizopus oligosporus can always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it is the primary organism in tempeh.
All of the first tempeh companies in Europe were started in the Netherlands by immigrants from Indonesia. The earliest of these, called ENTI, was founded in April 1946 by a Dutch couple whose last name was Wedding. While living in Indonesia, they had learned to make tempeh. Bringing their starter culture and recipe to the Netherlands, they began to make Europe's earliest known tempeh there on a home scale for friends and relatives. Gradually ENTI grew and became a commercial operation. By the early 1970s they were making 2,000 lb of tempeh a day. In about 1974 they sold the company (located in Zevenhuizen) to Mrs. L.J. Duson, who ran it until January 1984, when she closed it.
Firma E.S. Lembekker, founded in January 1959, was Europe's second tempeh company, and it may have been the first to sell tempeh commercially. In January 1984 it became Europe's oldest existing tempeh company.
Interest in tempeh in Europe began to increase starting in the 1960s. Articles were published by Roelofsen and Thalens (1964; changes in B vitamins), Stanton and Wallbridge (1969; a tempeh-like product made from cassava but with improved nutritional value), Thio (1972, 1975; small scale production and recipes), Jensen and Djurtoft (1976; a large report from Denmark on legume and cereal grain tempehs), Djurtoft and Jensen (1977, tempeh from various African grains and beans), Andersson (1977, volatile components and yellow pea tempeh, from Sweden), and Bahi El-Din et al. (1977; Sudanese researchers at Wageningen, Netherlands). Among these researchers, Thio Goan Loo from Indonesia was especially active in teaching people in Third World countries about tempeh. In 1972 he wrote about tempeh for use in Zambia (Africa) and spent three months in 1979 teaching tempeh production and recipes in Sri Lanka.
Europe's earliest known popular article on tempeh was an excellent 7-page feature story with nine photographs published in 1982 in Le Compas in French. In 1982 Soja Total , a translation of The Farm Vegetarian Cookbook (Hagler 1978), containing 13 pages of information on tempeh, was published in Germany. In 1985 Das Tempeh Buch , an updated and expanded translation of The Book of Tempeh (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979), was also published in Germany. Thus by 1984 there was more information on tempeh available in German than in any other continental European language, including Dutch. However the absence of a center of focused research efforts and a good source of low-cost tempeh cultures, such as the centers at Geneva and Peoria in the US, restricted the development of widespread popular interest in tempeh in Europe. Fortunately in 1984 the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures in Baarn, Netherlands, began to promote their tempeh cultures quite actively.
Europe's largest tempeh company, Tempé Produkten B.V. (Tempe Products Inc., named Handelsonderneming van Dappern until April 1983) was founded in 1969 by Robert van Dappern, with the help of his Dutch father (Herman), his Indonesian mother (Aveline), and his Dutch-Indonesian wife. He paid a Dutch-Indonesian man named Mr. Remmert a substantial sum of money to teach him how to make tempeh. By 1970 they were making tempeh in a small warehouse in Rotterdam. Initially they sold all of their tempeh to a couple of Holland's many Indonesian stores, but then they hired his wife's father, a well-known Indonesian, to deliver to the wider Indonesian community. The company began to grow, but all of the tempeh was being consumed by Indonesians living in the Netherlands. In January 1972 they moved the thriving company to Kerkrade, in southern Holland near the family home in Heerlen, rented a bigger building, and started mass production. Ed van Dappern, the second brother, joined the company as an equal partner. In 1979 Robert sent his wife's brother, Ike van Gessel, to Los Angeles to set up a tempeh plant there. Ike rented a building but, because of the European recession during the early 1980s and the need for capital to expand the business in the Netherlands, he had to cancel the lease and call off the project, at a substantial financial loss. In June 1980 the company bought a $1,000,000 modern factory in Kerkrade and expanded again. By mid-1982 Tempé Produkten was producing 6,000 to 8,000 pounds of tempeh a week, making it the largest tempeh company in the world. By early 1984 production had increased to 13,200 pounds (6,000 kg) a week, and an estimated 10% of this was consumed by non-Indonesians. By Dec. 1992 the company was producing 11,000 pounds (5,000 kg) of tempeh a week.
The family developed their own proprietary method for making tempeh starter culture. They developed a leaflet on tempeh, gave demonstrations on making and cooking with tempeh, and got tempeh to be sold at the Central Market, with the result that more and more of the greengrocers, who buy their vegetables there early each morning, started selling tempeh (and tofu). The company exported tempeh and tempeh products to England, Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg via a major distributor. Robert's Indonesian mother, Aveline, was in charge of preparing these (van Gessel 1982; Welters 1982; van Dappern 1984, each personal communications). By 1984 Tempé Produkten was the world's second largest tempeh manufacturer, after Marusan-Ai in Japan.
In June 1985, Tempé Producten added a new soyfood product to its line - tofu, and by 1991 the company was the largest tofu producer in The Netherlands.
Prior to early 1981 all of Europe's tempeh companies were located in the Netherlands and run by older Dutchmen catering largely to an Indonesian clientele. Europe's first generation of "New Age" tempeh shops was started from 1981 by young people interested in natural foods and/or macrobiotics. Europe's earliest known New Age tempeh company was Paul's Tofu & Tempeh, which was in operation by January 1981 at 155 Archway Rd., Highgate, in London. JAKSO, the first New Age shop in the Netherlands, started in July 1981. By January 1982 there were 7 tempeh shops operating in Europe; by January 1984 there were 18. Of these, 7 were in the Netherlands, 3 in Austria, 2 each in England and West Germany, and 1 each in Belgium, France, Italy, and Sweden. Total tempeh production in the Netherlands was about 4,500 kg a week (10,000 cakes of 1 pound each) in 1982, rising to 12,000 kg a week in 1984.
By 1980 another center of interest in tempeh had developed at the Department of Botany and Microbiology, University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, Wales, UK. There Dr. J. Hedger and Mr. T. Basuki (from Indonesia) were planning?? to start a tempeh factory, had produced a 4-page leaflet on "Tempe--An Indonesian Fermented Soybean Food," and had written a script for a BBC program "Tomorrow's World," on tempeh, which was broadcast in the summer of 1979. At that time tempeh was also occasionally sold in London, but the name of the manufacturer was not given (O'Neill 1980). In 1982 Hedger wrote a brief article on tempeh production.
History of Tempeh in Australia . Australian interest in tempeh began in about 1977, when McComb published an excellent BS thesis on the use of sweet narrow-leafed lupins to make tempeh. It contained one of the best summaries of the literature to date, plus much original research. A summary of this work was given by Kidby et al. (1977). The earliest known Australian tempeh companies were started in about 1980, and by March 1981 there were three small ones, all run by young "New Age" people, interested in natural foods, meatless diets, and alternative lifestyles. The first two to start were Dharma, part of Earth Foods in Waverley, run by Swami Veetdharma, and a small shop at Bodhi Farm in Channon, New South Wales, run by John Seed. Cyril and Elly Cain founded Beancoast Soyfoods in Eumundi, Queensland, and started making tempeh in July 1982. In March 1982 Ziruiz magazine published a long popular article "Terrific Tempeh" by Shurtleff and Aoyagi. By early 1983 Earth Angel was making okara tempeh. By 1984 there were five tempeh companies in Australia, all quite small.
Because of Australia's proximity to Indonesia, both countries could learn much from each other about traditional and modern tempeh making.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA
Early Years in America (1954-1969) . Interest in tempeh in the United States began at a surprisingly late date. As noted previously, early English-language articles on tempeh had been written by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), both published outside the US. The earliest known reference to tempeh in a US publication appeared in 1946, when an article by Gerold Stahel, writing from Surinam in South America about tempeh in Surinam and in New Guinea, was published in the Journal of the New York Botanical Garden . A summary appeared in November of that year in Soybean Digest . These articles appeared just 50 years after the first reference to tempeh was published in Europe by Prinsen Geerligs. In 1955 Autret and van Veen (both working for the Nutrition Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, outside the USA) published "Possible Sources of Proteins for Child Feeding in Underdeveloped Countries" in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition . They were the first suggest tempeh as a protein-rich, nutritious, and low-cost food for infants and children in Third World countries. They mentioned tempeh only briefly and noted that soymilk would probably be better suited for feeding children.
Research on tempeh in the US was started in 1954 by Dr. Paul György, a pediatrician and researcher at the Philadelphia General Hospital, and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. György had been to Indonesia many times, knew tempeh well, and (like Autret and van Veen) thought that it offered a way of improving the diets of infants and children in Third World countries. György received his first tempeh from Indonesia and Southern Rhodesian in 1954 and 1955. Ms. Kiku Murata of Japan worked with Gyorgy in the US investigating tempeh during 1959 and 1960. Following largely futile attempts to make tempeh in his own laboratory and lacking adequate facilities for making larger quantities of fermented foods, György worked out a cooperative arrangement in 1959 to have the tempeh made under the supervision of Dr. Hand and Dr. Steinkraus at New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, Cornell University, Geneva, New York. The first publication from this work did not appear until 1961, when György wrote "The Nutritive Value of Tempeh." György gradually moved his research away from a focus on child feeding programs toward the more narrow study of antioxidants in tempeh, which might prevent rancidification of tempeh or other foods.
As noted earlier at Indonesia, a great expansion of interest in tempeh began in the early 1960s, largely because of the pioneering, in-depth research at two centers: Cornell University's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station at Geneva, New York, under the leadership of Dr. Keith H. Steinkraus; and the USDA Northern Regional Research Center at Peoria, Illinois, under the leadership of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine. Each center became actively interested in tempeh because of the arrival of an Indonesian researcher. Whereas approximately 15 scientific on tempeh had been published worldwide before 1960, more than 60 were published from 1960 to 1979. Important, original investigations were done on pure culture fermentations, microbiological and biochemical changes during tempeh fermentation, tempeh's nutritional value, and industrial production of tempeh. This research awakened a new interest in tempeh among microbiologists and food scientists worldwide. Moreover, with this research, the world center of interest in and research on tempeh shifted from Indonesia and the Netherlands to the USA.
In the summer of 1958, when Miss YAP Bwee Hwa from Indonesia started her research on tempeh in New York. Active in nutritional circles in Indonesia, she was the first Indonesian to study tempeh in America; she brought her own little bottle of dried tempeh inoculum with her. She did her course work and rat feeding experiments under the direction of Prof. Louise Daniel and Dr. Richard Barnes in the Graduate School of Nutrition at Cornell University, while pursuing her investigations of tempeh production under Dr. Steinkraus in the allied Department of Food Science and Technology at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station. Dr. Hand, then head of the latter Department, was very active in nutritional circles and knew of the United Nations' interest in tempeh. In early 1959 Steinkraus, while on a trip to check the UNICEF-supported Saridele soymilk plant in Indonesia, visited a number of tempeh shops, thus becoming the first American ever to study tempeh in its homeland. Also in 1959 Steinkraus' Cornell University group began making tempeh for Dr. György in Pennsylvania.
The first article on tempeh by Americans was written in 1960 when Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Provvidenti, and Hand published their now classic "Studies on Tempeh--An Indonesian Fermented Food." This paper (submitted for publication in September 1959) incorporated Miss Yap's tempeh research, plus additional investigations by Steinkraus' group on essential microorganisms, mycelial penetration of the soybeans, etc. In 1961 this paper appeared in a publication by the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences. In June 1960 Miss Yap, as part of her graduate degree in nutrition, submitted her MS thesis titled "Nutritional and Chemical Studies on Tempeh, an Indonesian Soybean Product." Innovations in tempeh production described in these papers included use of lactic acid instead of a prefermentation to acidify the soybean soak water, incubation of the tempeh in stainless steel trays, dehulling the soybeans mechanically (with an electric vegetable peeler), growing the starter spores on bran, and dehydration of the tempeh in a circulating hot air oven. Yap found the PER of tempeh to be 2.5, midway between soybeans (2.3) and casein (2.7). Rats ate 1.5 times as much tempeh as cooked soybeans, and grew almost as fast as those fed casein. Changes in temperature, soluble solids, and soluble nitrogen, and pH during tempeh fermentation were measured and plotted. Yap left the US in April 1962 for Germany, where she worked as a researcher, first for a wine institute, then after 1970 for a chemical-pharmaceutical company.
During the 1960s the Cornell University Group, consisting of interdisciplinary scientists from both the Agricultural Experiment Station and Cornell University, worked together to publish at least 13 original scientific articles on all aspects of tempeh. The group included Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Wagenknecht, Provvidenti, Hand, Hackler, Stillings, van Veen, and Shallenberger. Steinkraus was the senior author of 6 papers during this period. Particularly important for the coming new generation of US tempeh manufacturers were his "Pilot Plant Studies on Tempeh" (1962), "Research on Tempeh Technology in the United States" (1964), and "A Pilot Plant Process for the Production of Dehydrated Tempeh" (1965), in which all of the necessary equipment and its manufacturers was described. These represented the first attempts to develop a process for making tempeh in an industrialized country with a temperate climate. Changes during the tempeh fermentation were studied in detail, including changes in lipids (Wagenknecht et al. 1961), in amino acids (Stillings and Hackler 1965), and in carbohydrates (Shallenberger 1967). Hackler et al. (1964) studied utilization of tempeh protein by rats. Van Veen, who had done pioneering research on tempeh in Indonesia as early as 1932 and had arrived at Cornell in 1962 as a professor of International Nutrition, was senior author of seven papers related to tempeh between 1962 and 1970, including an original 1968 study on peanut tempeh.
In 1960 a second US tempeh research program was started under the direction of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center (NRRC) at Peoria, Illinois. As early as May 1948 the NRRC had been sent a tempeh culture ( Rhizopus nigricans ) from Central Sugar Society (N.V. Centrale Suiker Maatschappij) in Amsterdam, together with instructions for making tempeh, but apparently nothing was done with it. Hesseltine first learned of tempeh from papers by Stahel (1946) and van Veen and Schaefer (1950). Much of the interest in tempeh starting in 1960 developed because KO Swan Djien of the Bandung Institute of Technology's Laboratory of Microbiology arrived at the NRRC that year to study industrial fermentations. Hesseltine suggested that he study tempeh; Ko showed Hesseltine and his group how to prepare it. The first publications appeared in 1961 with Ko and Hesseltine's "Indonesian Fermented Foods" and 1962 with Hesseltine's "Research at Northern Regional Research Laboratory on Fermented Foods." From the early 1960s on an interdisciplinary team of researchers at Peoria began to study many facets of tempeh and to develop new types of tempeh and processing techniques. Key figures in this team, in addition to Hesseltine and Ko were H.L. Wang, A.K. Smith, A.F. Martinelli, Mable Smith, W.G. Sorenson, and E.W. Swain. During the 1960s they published 17 original scientific papers (including two public service patents) about tempeh, plus four derivative articles; Hesseltine was senior author of 12 of these, Wang of four, Ko and A.K. Smith of two each, and Martinelli and Sorenson of one each.
In 1963 Hesseltine and co-workers published their first major tempeh study "Investigations of Tempeh, an Indonesian Food." That same year they discovered a mold inhibitor in soybeans. In 1963 and 1964 A.K. Smith and co-workers published pioneering studies on the nutritive value of tempeh in relation to various processing techniques. In 1964 Dr. Martinelli (a Brazilian scientist studying tempeh at the NRRC) and Hesseltine developed a new method for incubating tempeh in perforated plastic bags. It soon became widely used by commercial tempeh producers in both Indonesia and North America, a nice example of cultural cross-fertilization. In the same paper they described fermentation of tempeh in metal and wooden trays, the dry dehulling of soybeans, and the preparation of tempeh from full-fat soy grits. In 1965 Hesseltine wrote a review and history of research on tempeh microbiology and biochemistry. In 1966 and 1967 Hesseltine and Wang published the world's first studies showing that delicious tempeh containing higher quality protein could be prepared using soy-and-grain mixtures (including wheat and rice) or cereal grains alone. In 1969 Wang and co-workers discovered that Rhizopus oligosporus in tempeh produces an antibacterial compound or antibiotic, which is very active against a number of Gram-positive bacteria, including Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus subtilis , and which retains its activity even after cooking. This supports the view of natives and of some scientists that those who eat tempeh daily have fewer intestinal infections. Hesseltine and Wang sent samples of their tempeh to Dr. Doris Calloway at the University of California, Berkeley. She found in 1971 that tempeh, unlike most foods made from beans, does not cause flatulence. David and Verma (1981) suggested that the antibacterial substance in tempeh may be the cause of this lack of flatulence; it might inhibit the growth of gram-positive Clostridium bacteria, which are known to produce gas in the intestines. News of the NRRC discoveries on tempeh was disseminated by Soybean Digest (1965, 1967) and the USDA's Agricultural Research (1966, 1969).
A key component of the tempeh research at the NRRC concerned identification of the main microorganisms in the fermentation. It has never been clear what the original source of these molds in Indonesia was. Smith and Woodruff (1951) reported that prisoners in Japanese camps in Indonesia during World War II obtained their original tempeh mold culture from the withered petals of the hibiscus plant. Others have said that they came from banana leaves. The genus Rhizopus was discovered and named in 1820 by Ehrenberg. In 1895 Went and Prinsen Geerligs first described the species Rhizopus oryzae , which was investigated in detail by Wehmer in 1900 and 1901. Until the mid-1960s many microbiologists worldwide (Vorderman 1902; Stahel 1946; van Veen and Schaefer 1950; Dupont 1954; Steinkraus et al. 1960) thought R. oryzae was the primary microorganism responsible for the tempeh fermentation. In 1936 Lockwood and co-workers had studied the physiology of R. oryzae at the NRRC. In 1905 the Japanese mycologist Kendo Saito first described Rhizopus oligosporus on rice meal cakes which came from Shantung province in China, where they were used in making a rice-based fermented alcoholic beverage. Saito did not mention tempeh. In 1958 Boedijn reported that R. oligosporus could always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it was the primary fermentation organism. In 1962, after observing 50 tempeh strains from various tempeh sources, Hesseltine identified R. oligosporus as the chief tempeh mold. Ko (1965) reported collecting 81 samples of tempeh from various places in Java and Sumatra. Isolation of 116 pure cultures revealed that R. oligosporus was always present in good quality tempeh, thereby establishing without a doubt that it was the typical dominant species used. Indonesian researchers, however, maintain that the best quality tempeh contains a mixed culture. By the late 1970s the most widely used tempeh culture in the Western world was R. oligosporus strain NRRL 2710. This strain, brought to the US from Indonesia by MS. Yap in 1957, isolated by Steinkraus' group, and first identified in Hesseltine's lab, continued to be widely distributed from the NRRC culture collection.
It is not known for sure when the first commercial tempeh was made in the US. After the long and bloody war that drove the Dutch out of Indonesia and led to Indonesian independence in 1949, tens of thousands of Dutch and Dutch-Indonesian families were uprooted. Most tried to go to Holland, but the country was too small and the native Indonesians found it too cold. The United States set a quota in 1950 allowing 25,000 of these refugees to immigrate. Only about 10% were culturally native Indonesian; the rest were "Indos," i.e. Dutch-Indonesians or Chinese-Indonesians. Most went to warm areas such as California and Florida. In 1950 an estimated 500 of these settlers arrived in California. The first of these known to have started a tempeh shop was Mary Otten, who in 1961 began making tempeh in her basement on Stannage Avenue in Albany, California. She sold it to her friends and served it at parties that she catered. For starter culture she used ragi (an Indonesian starter that comes in small cakes) flown in from Java, until she learned how to make her own in 1973. In 1967 she started Java Restaurant and served many tempeh dishes. Then in 1974 she and her daughter, Irene, started Otten's Indonesian Foods, which by 1981 was making tempeh plus a full line of Indonesian tempeh-based foods under the brand name Joy of Java. These foods included Sweet & Sour Tempeh and Sayur Lodeh Tempeh.
The second earliest known tempeh shop in California (and in the USA) was Runnels Foods, which opened in Los Angeles, California in 1962. Also in Los Angeles, Toko Baru started in 1969 and Bali Foods started in 1975. Thus America's first generation of tempeh shops were all located in California and all run by Indonesian-Americans.
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selengkapnya baca sendiri deh di :
http://www.soyinfocenter.com/index.php
* Danau Tempe, sebuah danau di Provinsi Sulawesi Selatan.
* Kecamatan Tempe di Kabupaten Wajo, Sulawesi Selatan.
* Desa Tempe di Kecamatan Tempe, Kabupaten Wajo, Sulawesi Selatan.
Macam-macam tempe sebagai makanan :
- Tempe mendoan (tempe yang diiris agak tipis, dan setelah itu digoreng dengan adonan yang terdiri dari tepung beras, tepung kanji, ketumbar, bawang putih, kunyit dan garam sehingga rasanya gurih dan renyah).
- Tempe kemul (digoreng dengan dibalut gandum).
- Tempe penyet Jawa Timur (tempe yang direndam di air kaldu dengan bumbu garam dan ketumbar, digoreng dan dikasi sambal)
- Tempe penyet Jogjakarta (tempe yang digoreng terus dilumatkan [dihancurkan kasar / tidak sampai halus] lalu dicampur sambal).
Kurasa Tempe ga murni berasal dari Indonesia. Ini salah satu komentarku di Miss Morgan. Akhirnya ketemu juga tulisan bahwa Tempe berasal dari China. Tempe sudah dikenal lama di Jawa, terutama Jogjakarta dan Surakarta. Sudah disebut dalam "Serat Centhini" yang di abad ke-16. Serat Centhini adalah kitab/buku yang disebut juga Suluk Tambanglaras atau Suluk Tambangraras-Amongraga, merupakan karya sastra Jawa yang menghimpun segala macam ilmu pengetahuan dan kebudayaan Jawa.
Coba simak tulisan dari beberapa situs di bawah ini :
Ini tulisan dari :
http://bumisegoro.wordpress.com/2007/09/06/sejarah-tempe/
Penasaran dengan sejarah tempe versi Onghokham, penulis iseng googling dan menemukan sejarah tempe dari official blog of Taschanfood . Berikut kopiannya:
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Sejarah Tempe
Indonesia
Proses pembuatan tempe boleh jadi menjadi teknologi pengolahan makanan yang tertua dalam sejarah masyarakat Jawa. Serat Centhini, sebuah buku yang diterbitkan pada abad ke-16, mengindikasikan bahwa tempe sudah dibuat dan dikonsumsi masyarakat pada masa itu. Tempe mungkin diperkenalkan oleh orang Cina yang memproduksi makanan sejenis yaitu Soybean Koji, yang merupakan hasil fermentasi kedelai dengan jamur Aspergillus. Pemakaian Rhizopus sebagai ragi tempe di Indonesia kemungkinan karena adaptasinya yang lebih baik dengan iklim Indonesia. Referensi pertama oleh orang Eropa tentang tempe pada tahun 1875 yaitu dalam Kamus Bahasa Jawa - Belanda. meningkatnya popularitas tempe di pulau Jawa, dan kemudian menyebar ke daerah-daerah lain di Indonesia serta negara-negara lain di dunia dimulai pada abad ke-20. Pada era tahun 70-an, daun pisang yang digunakan sebagai pembungkus tempe muali diganti dengan plastik.
Eropa
DI Eropa, tempe diperkenalkan oleh orang Belanda yang dahulu menjajah Indonesia. Pada tahun 1895 ahli mikrobiologi Belanda and ahli Kimia bernama Prinsen Geerlings mengadakan penelitian pertama untuk mengidentifikasi jamur tempe. Pabrik Tempe pertama di Eropa didirikan di Belanda oleh para pendatang dari Indonesia. Artikel berbahasa Inggris pertama (yang menyebut tentang tempe) muncul pada tahun 1931 dalam buku “Vegetables of the Dutch East Indies “, yang ditulis oleh J.J. Ochse. Artikel yang populer tentang tempeterdiri dai 7 halaman diterbikan di Perancis tahun 1982 dalam Le Compas.
USA
Di Amerika Serikat, tempe mulai dikenal baru pada tahun 1946 dengan diterbitkannya “Possible Sources of Proteins for Child Feeding in Underdeveloped Countries”, dalam American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Pada era tahun 60-an da ketertarikan baru tentang tempe dengan adanya penelitian di Cornell University (New York) dan di USDA Northern Regional Research Center (Illinois). Pada tahun 1961 Mary Otten menjadi yang pertama memproduksi tempe. Jasa terbesar dalam memperkenalkan tempe pada masyarakat Amerika adalah pada The Farm, sebuah komunitas spiritual dan pertanian besar di Summertown, Tennessee. Toko tempe pertama didirikan pada tahun 1975 oleh Mr. Gale Randall di Undadilla, Nebraska. Sebuah artikel yang ditulis oleh R. Rodale dalam “Prevention” tahun 1977 membuat dirinya dan tokonya terkenal secara nasional. Pada era tahun 80-an pada saat Industri tempe makin meluas, media mulai menunjukan ketertarikan dan muncul berbagai artikel di jurnal-jurnal sains. Selama tahun 1983 sekitar 1 juta tempe diproduksi untuk dipasarkan.
Negara Berkembang lainnya
Tahun 1940-an Van Veen mencoba untuk memperkenalkan tempe di Zimbabwe. Tetapi segala usaha untuk memperkenalkan tempe sebagai sumber protein yang murah di Zimbabwe dan negara berkembang lainnya di Afrika dan Amerika Selatan mengalami kegagalan karena penduduk setempat tidak terbiasa dengan makanan yang difermentasikan oleh jamur.
Tren Terkini
Di Eropa, Amerika Serikat dan Negara-negara Industri lainnya ketertarikan terhadap tempe terus meningkat seiring dengan meningkatnya kepedulian dalam kesehatan, gizi dan vegetarisme.
Diambil dari http://pecintatempe.multiply.com
Sumber foto : http://www.soytempeh.com
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Dilihat dari isinya, mirip sekali dengan tempeh-info .
ternyata di amazon juga banyak loh buku tentang tempeh (begitu dunia internasional menuliskan tempe). dengan kata kunci tempeh terdapat 2,503 Results untuk kategori books. kalau di indonesia ada berapa buku ya yang judulnya memakai kata kunci tempe?
Dua buku yang sering menjadi rujukan adalah The Book of Tempeh dan History of Tempeh: A Fermented Soyfood from Indonesia (Soyfoods History Series).
Sebagian dari buku yang kedua dapat dibaca di sini.
Selama ini dunia mengenal tempe sebagai makanan fermentasi dari Indonesia. Hal ini barangkali terkait dengan riset yang orang Eropa (dalam hal ini Belanda) dilakukan di negara koloninya. Sementara China sendiri saat itu cenderung tertutup dalam pergaulan dengan Eropa. Dalam Wikipedia disebutkan “In fact, tempeh is an adaptation of tofu to the tropical climates of Indonesia.” Wikipedia versi indonesia juga memuat tulisan tentang sejarah tempe secara cukup mendalam.
Sementara heboh masyarakat kita mengenai HAKI terkait tempe dapat dibaca di sini.
satu lagi, penasaran aja dengan nama danau di Wajo (Sulawesi), danau tempe. ada hubungannya ga ya?
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Ini tulisan dari :
http://cahyoga.net/wpress/?p=9
Berita dipatenkannya tempe di Jepang dan Amerika sempat menghebohkan masyarakat Indonesia. Di antara komentar-komentar yang muncul adalah bahwa kita akan sangat dirugikan oleh paten tersebut, karena tempe merupakan makanan asli Indonesia, yang akan sangat menyengsarakan bagi industri rumah tangga tempe apabila harus membayar royalti ke Jepang untuk setiap potong tempe yang diproduksi dan dijemur di pekarangan rumahnya sendiri. Komentar lain yang mengemuka adalah penimpaan kesalahan kepada masyarakat (bukan pemerintah) Indonesia yang sedemikian bodohnya sampai tidak melakukan proses sanggah terhadap paten tersebut.
Beberapa hal terkait dengan berita paten tempe tersebut layak untuk kita jadikan bahan guna mempelajari kondisi HaKI di Indonesia. Yang pertama bahwa klaim bahwa tempe merupakan produk asli Indonesia dan khas Indonesia seharusnya diluruskan terlebih dahulu. Menurut catatan sejarah, tempe tidak hanya berkembang di Indonesia namun juga di Jepang, Cina, dan Nepal. Sehingga wajar sebenarnya apabila Jepang juga dianggap memiliki hak berdasarkan sejarah atas tempe sebagaimana masyarakat Indonesia.
Yang kedua, bahwa ternyata yang dipaten di Jepang bukan proses pembuatan tempe melainkan proses pembuatan tempe menjadi bahan kosmetik. Demikian pula yang dilakukan di Amerika, ternyata adalah paten untuk proses pembuatan obat-obatan dari tempe. Dari dua hal dia atas, dapat disimpulkan betapa minimnya informasi dan pengetahuan yang kita miliki mengenai paten di luar negeri, baik dalam hal apa yang dipatenkan maupun keterkaitan dan dampak paten tersebut terhadap kita.
Hal ketiga yang perlu kita perhatikan adalah mengenai komentar yang menimpakan kesalahan kepada masyarakat Indonesia yang tidak melakukan proses sanggah terhadap paten yang juga masih kabur intinya tersebut. Kesalahan tersebut seharusnya tidak ditimpakan kepada masyarakat Indonesia mengingat pihak-pihak pengelola tempe umumnya bukanlah kalangan yang memiliki sistem manajerial mapan, melainkan industri rumah tangga sederhana yang menjalankan usaha industri tempe sekedar untuk memenuhi kehidupan sehari-hari. Bagaimana mungkin kondisi masyarakat industri tempe yang demikian diharapkan untuk dapat mengetahui adanya proses pematenan tempe di Jepang dan Amerika, sekaligus melakukan proses sanggah di sana.
Kesalahan dalam kasus ini seandainyapun ada seharusnya lebih dibebankan kepada pemerintah daripada masyarakat. Pemerintah adalah institusi yang secara konsepsi merupakan perwujudan masyarakat yang bertugas melayani masyarakat. Sebagai institusi yang juga dapat dipastikan sanggup berinteraksi dengan dunia intenasional secara baik, maka pemerintahlah yang seharusnya paling bertanggung jawab apabila sampai industri rumah tangga tempe Indonesia harus terkekang dengan paten dari Jepang tersebut. Kasus paten tempe di atas seharusnya menjadi pelajaran penting bagi pemerintah untuk aktif melindungi perekonomian nasional dalam hal HaKI dari paten yang terdapat di luar negeri yang berpotensi mengancam perekonomian nasional khususnya pada skala kecil dan menengah. Dan bukan justru hanya berperan seperti pemerintah negara maju yang bersifat pasif dengan resiko menghalangi perkembangan perekonomian nasional.
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History of Tempeh - Page 1
A Special Report on The History of Traditional Fermented Soyfoods
A Chapter from the Unpublished Manuscript, History of Soybeans and Soyfoods: 1100 B.C. to the 1980s
by William Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi
Copyright 2007 Soyinfo Center, Lafayette, California
Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4
Tempeh (pronounced TEM-pay) is an Indonesian word referring collectively to a variety of fermented foods (typically tender-cooked legumes) bound together by a dense mycelium of fragrant white Rhizopus mold into compact cakes (Ko and Hesseltine 1979). The most popular of these is soy tempeh, and hereafter we will use the term "tempeh" to refer to soy tempeh, unless otherwise noted. In the West tempeh is usually sold in cakes 6 by 8 by 3/4 inch thick (15 x 20 x 2 cm). These are sliced then served fried, baked, or steamed. When fried, tempeh's flavor and texture are meaty, resembling those of southern fried chicken or fish sticks. Before cooking, soy tempeh contains 19.5% protein, compared with 17.9% for hamburger and 21% for chicken, on average.
To make tempeh, cooked and dehulled soybean cotyledons (which may be lightly acidified with a traditional lactic acid prefermentation or, nowadays, with lactic acid or vinegar) are well drained then inoculated with spores of Rhizopus oligosporus mold, packed into perforated containers (polyethylene bags or banana leaves, holding about 8 ounces) and incubated at 30-31*C (86-88*F) for about 24 hours, until the beans are bound together tightly by the mycelium. The tempeh is then ready to sell or to cook.
Tempeh is unique among major traditional soyfoods in that it is the only one that did not originate in China or Japan. It originated in today's Indonesia, almost certainly in Central or East Java, almost certainly prior to 1800, and perhaps as long ago as a thousand years or more. Tempeh is also distinctive in that less is known about its origins and early history than about those of any other soyfood.
Etymology . In Indonesia, traditionally and in dictionaries since at least 1875, the name for this food was written témpé , with various accents being used, especially to indicate the ay pronunciation of the final letter "e." Soy tempeh was called témpé kedelé . In August 1972, when Indonesia modernized its language as part of an Indonesian-Malaysian effort to make the two similar languages even more similar, the accents were dropped and the word came to be spelled tempe (still pronounced TEM-pay).
In English and other European languages, the word has come to be spelled "tempeh," the final "h" being added to prevent the word from being pronounced "temp." Most Westerners feel that the correct pronunciation is more important than the correct spelling. The first Westerner to use the spelling tempeh was the Dutchman H.C Prinsen Geerligs in an 1896 German article about soyfoods. But other early Western authors (especially the Dutch) wrote the word as témpé (Gericke and Roorda 1875; Heyne 1913), tempé (Boorsma 1900; Stahel 1946), or tèmpé (Vorderman 1902). The earliest English language references to this food, both translations of Dutch publications (Ochse 1931, Burkill 1935), referred to it as témpé . Van Veen and Schaefer (1950) were the first to spell it tempeh in an English language article. The new spelling quickly caught on. Steinkraus et al. (1960) were the first in the US to spell it tempeh . Since the early 1960s, the word has consistently been spelled this way in European languages, except in a few Dutch and English language articles written by Indonesians.
In Japanese, Nakazawa (1928) first wrote the word in Roman letters as tempeh. Nakano (1959) wrote temupe , in katakana. Ohta et al. in 1964 started writing it as tenpe , which thereafter became the standard katakana form, although a few reports have written it as tenpei .
World Overview . Tempeh probably originated several centuries ago on the island of Java, in today's Indonesia. The earliest know reference there was in 1875. Much early research and publication was done by Dutch scientists, in Dutch. Tempeh was first produced commercially in Europe sometime between 1946 and 1959 and by 1984 there were 18 tempeh companies in Europe. The earliest known reference to tempeh in the United States was by Stahel in 1946. Extensive research work on tempeh began in the early 1960s at Cornell University (under Dr. Steinkraus) and at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center (under Dr. C.W. Hesseltine and Dr. H.L. Wang). America's first commercial tempeh was produced in 1961 by Indonesian immigrants, and the first commercial production by a Caucasian started in 1975. The number of tempeh companies in America increased from 13 in 1979 to 53 in 1984. The earliest known reference to tempeh in Japan was by Nakazawa in 1928. Starting in 1983, with the soymilk boom in full swing, Japanese food companies started to make tempeh in large quantities. By early 1984 the world's largest tempeh companies were:
Avg. Weekly Production
Company Name Country Year Started lb/week kg/week
1. Marusan-Ai Japan 1983 15,148 6,885
2. Tempe Production Inc. Netherlands 1969 13,200 6,000
3. Quong Hop/Pacific Tempeh USA/CA 1980 7,000 3,182
4. White Wave USA/CO 1979 5,850 2,659
5. Soyfoods Unlimited USA/CA 1981 5,800 2,636
6. Torigoe Flour Milling Japan 1983 5770 2,623
7. The Tempeh Works USA/MA 1979 5,500 2,500
8. Marukin Foods Japan 1983 4,620 2,100
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN INDONESIA
Early History (pre 1875) . Tempeh probably originated on the island of Java at least several centuries ago. At that time the people of Java, without formal training in microbiology or chemistry, developed a remarkable family of fermented foods called tempeh. Today we might call these products meat analogs, since they have much the same texture, flavor, and high protein content as various flesh foods. The people also learned to make tempeh from oilseed presscakes (the protein-rich cakes left after pressing the oil from oilseeds such as peanuts or coconuts), okara (the soy pulp remaining after making soymilk or tofu), and other agricultural wastes, whose high fiber content and relative indigestibility make them otherwise suited only for livestock feeds (Steinkraus 1983).
Since ancient times the Malay language has been the lingua franca of the archipelago that includes today's Malaysia and Indonesia. The people of Java have had a written language since antiquity, with existing stone inscriptions dating from the seventh century A.D. This early literature concerned primarily religion, philosophy, and culture, with very little information about food.
The world's earliest known reference to tempeh appeared in the Serat Centini , which was probably written around A.D. 1815 on the orders of Sunan Sugih, then Crown Prince and later Pakubuwana V of Surakarta, in today's eastern Central Java. The main author was probably Rangga Sutrasna. This classic work of Modern Javanese literature contains a line mentioning "onions and uncooked témpé ."
Although the Serat Centini was written in about 1815, it is quite possibly based on much older sources; the story is set in the reign of Sultan Agung (1613-45), and the descriptions purport to be of that time. Thus tempeh may well have existed in the early 1600s. However the actual document in which this reference appears (Codex Orientalis 1814 of the Leiden University Library) bears the date 1846, making it conceivable (but highly unlikely) that reference to tempeh was added just prior to publication.
The Serat Centini , written in verse, tells of the adventures of "students" wandering in the Javanese countryside in search of truth. In the course of the story, detailed information is given on many subjects including Javanese culture and life. The passage mentioning tempeh occurs in a description of Wanamarta, a prosperous place, in the context of a reception given to Jayengwesti, and involving all sorts of foods. These, including "onions and uncooked témpé ," are simply listed without further information.
Conservative estimates that tempeh originated at least several centuries ago are also supported by evidence based on the food's present widespread geographical distribution, popularity, and large number of varieties. Tempeh is known in even the most remote rural areas throughout most of Java, is an integral part of the cuisine served in a wide variety of popular dishes (90 named Indonesian recipes are given in our Book of Tempeh ), and by the mid-1970s it was being made from at least 17 indigenous seeds and presscakes by more than 41,000 shops, using simple, traditional methods.
But where did tempeh come from? The earliest known written record of soybeans in Indonesia was by the Dutch botanist Rumphius (1747), who reported that they were being used in Java for food and as green manure. Yet soybeans may well have been introduced to Indonesia at the time that regular trade started with south China in about 1000 A.D. One Sundanese (West Javan) name for soybeans is kachang jepun (Japanese bean), which may be historically significant. At least one East Asian scholar (Anderson 1983, personal communication) believes that tempeh developed from an application to soybeans of an earlier fermentation used on coconuts, perhaps the now famous coconut presscake tempeh ( tempeh bongkrek ). The well-traveled Indonesian Dr. Sastroamijoyo (1971) feels that tempeh may have originated over 2,000 years ago. He has pointed out that even before that time the Chinese were making a similar product, the soybean koji for their soy sauce, produced by inoculating cooked dehulled soybeans with wild molds such as Aspergillus oryzae . This method could have been brought to Java from China by early traders and modified to suit Javanese tastes; the use of Rhizopus may have been due to its better adaptation to the Indonesian climate. The rise of tempeh's popularity in West Java (where the culture is Sundanese), and its spread to other Indonesian islands and other countries of the world, probably began in the 20th century. We hope that Indonesian scholars will soon begin a serious search of their literature to help us construct a more reliable picture of tempeh's early history.
Another possible lead may lie in China. In 1931, in Beijing (Peking), William Morse observed a fermented soyfood closely resembling tempeh and called tou chiah ping ("soybean fried cake"; Morse 1928-31). Details on this product are given later at China. No other reference to such a product has been found in European-language soyfoods literature. If this is a type of tempeh, it is probable that it was taken to China from Indonesia (the East Indies) by Chinese traders and that it became established on a local scale in China. There is the possibility, however, that the product originated in China and migrated to Indonesia, where it was developed, perhaps because of a similar existing product made from coconut (tempeh bongkrek). It would be very interesting to know more about tou chiah ping : Is it fermented with Rhizopus ? What is known of its history? There are no known references to it after 1931.
There is a great need for more research on the origins and early history of tempeh. Promising areas for additional searching include early Malay-Dutch dictionaries, the classical Malay literature of the 18th and 19th centuries, the writings of foreign travelers to Java (especially European missionaries, botanists and naturalists, or Dutch or Japanese traders or explorers), and perhaps even Chinese historical records. Professors of Malaysian literature have told us that they think they have seen reference to tempeh in the classical Indonesian literature of the 18th and 19th centuries, but we have been unable to find a specific reference. In 1928 the Malay language was declared the official language of the future Indonesia. Despite the long history of written documents in Indonesia, no known records of tempeh's origin or early history have yet been found in the native language. In fact, the earliest records in Indonesian seem to date from the 1950s!
Early European References (1895-1939) . Since Indonesia (formerly the Dutch or Netherlands East Indies) had been a Dutch colony since the late 1600s, it was only natural that the first Westerners to study tempeh came from Holland. The earliest known reference to tempeh (actually témpé) in Indonesia by a European appeared in 1875 in a Javanese-Dutch dictionary, the Javaansch-Nederduitsch Handwoordenboek by J.F.C. Gericke and T. Roorda. The term was defined as "Fermented soybeans or presscake ( bunkil ) baked or fried in flat pressed cakes. It is well-liked as a side dish with rice." The term does not appear in Marsden's dictionary of 1812, but then he was in Sumatra and tempeh was most widely found in Java. In 1895 the Dutch microbiologist and chemist H.C Prinsen Geerligs made the first attempt to identify the tempeh mold in his classic article titled "Eenige Chineesche voedingsmiddelen uit Sojaboonen bereid" (Some Chinese Foods Made with Soybeans). After describing Indonesian soy sauce, and miso ( taucho ), he noted: "In a similar way, in Java, other molds are used to make leguminous seeds into more digestible foods. Thus the presscake, which remains after making peanut oil and would be indigestible without further preparation, is subjected to the action of molds. In central and eastern Java Chlamydomucor Oryzae [now known as Amylomyces rouxii ] is used, whereas in western Java an orange mold of the family Oospore (Neurospora) is used. In the former case, the food is called `bongkrek,' and in the latter `ontjom.' If soybeans are molded with Chlamydomucor the spice is called `tempets.' In the preparation the seeds are boiled, spread, mixed with a little molded cake from a former batch, and left alone for a while, until the mass is bound into a solid cake." A year later, when this article was published in German, he corrected two mistakes he had made in the 1895 Dutch version. He changed the name of the mold from Chlamydomucor Oryzae to Rhizopus Oryzae and he changed the name of the product from "tempets" to "tempeh." He added in conclusion that "it was finally sliced and enjoyed, mold and all." But he continued, apparently mistakenly, to refer to tempeh as a Chinese soyfood. Prinsen Geerligs' two articles ushered in the era of scientific research on tempeh by European microbiologists and food scientists.
Prinsen Geerligs and his Dutch colleague F.A. Went were particularly interested in the utilization of by-products from Java's expanding new sugar industry (Went and Prinsen Geerligs 1895, 1896). They wrote many articles about sugar, but also studied tapeh, arak, and other Indonesian fermented foods. In 1901 Went, then at Utrecht, the Netherlands, described onchom (formerly spelled "ontjom," a close relative of tempeh) and studied the mold involved, which he called Monilia sitophila ; it is now called Neurospora . In 1900 and 1901 the German Wehmer studied Javanese ragi (starter culture cakes, also called "Chinese yeast") occasionally used for making tempeh. In 1917 Prinsen Geerligs discussed tempeh as a food made using natural enzymes in East Asian home industries.
In 1900 the Dutchman Dr. P.A. Boorsma, who lived in Java and did original laboratory tests, published an excellent 13-page article on soybeans. In a detailed 4-page description of the traditional process for making Tempe kedeleh , Boorsma reported that the soybeans were parboiled, soaked in water for 2-3 days, drained, steamed in a steamer, spread in a layer several centimeters thick on woven bamboo trays in shelves, and covered completely with banana leaves. They were then inoculated by mixing in "mold-containing residues of a previous preparation" and covered lightly with banana leaves. "In the evening the mass is remolded a little and after two 24-hour periods one will obtain a coherent cake, which is cut into pieces and taken as is to the market." Boorsma then described the rise in temperature to 10-12*C above ambient temperature during the tempeh fermentation, the formation of ammonia in tempeh after 3 days of fermentation, and the likelihood that stories about nonsoy tempehs causing food poisoning were true. After microscopic examination, he concluded that Prinsen Geerligs and others were mistaken in stating that (1) the mold hyphae penetrate and dissolve the hard soybean cell walls and (2) cellulose is decreased during tempeh fermentation. He studied the chemical and compositional changes at four different stages during a 3-day tempeh fermentation, observing that fats and soluble carbohydrates decreased substantially, while nitrogen decreased only slightly. He also discussed the hydrolysis of soybean lipids and why tempeh is easier to digest than whole soybeans.
In 1893 the Dutch microbiologist Vorderman had described ragi, a traditional tempeh inoculum (though he did not mention tempeh), then in 1902 he discussed in detail two processes he observed for wrapping and fermenting soy tempeh. In the first and best-known way the soybeans were incubated between banana leaves; in the second the soybeans were wrapped in banana leaves to form a packet 20 cm long and 7 cm wide, then wrapped in a jati leaf. The packets were stacked in a bamboo basket for 24 hours covered with bags, then removed to prevent overheating and spread on the floor for 24 hours more. He noted (as Prinsen Geerligs had in 1896) that tempeh was fermented with Rhizopus oryzae . Vorderman (1902) was the first to describe other varieties of Indonesian tempeh and their close relatives. Ontjom beureum was made in West Java from peanut presscake fermented with the orange mold Monilia sitophila . Tempe bongkrek katjang and ontjom bodas , made in Banyumas in central Java, were each like peanut presscake tempeh but fermented with Rhizopus molds. Tempe bongkrek kelapa , from south Banyumas, was made from pressed coconut, inoculated with and in leaves already used for making soy tempeh. Low in price, it was eaten mostly by poor people. Tempe morrie , from Banyumas, was made from a mixture of soybeans and coconut milk residue, which had been washed and steamed. After inoculation with ground bibit leaves, on which were Rhizopus oryzae spores, the mixture was packed in the sheaf of the banana tree stem to form small long packages, then incubated. Tempe enthoe and tempe tjenggereng were made with steamed coconut oil presscake and coconut milk residue. The latter contained steamed corn bran and both were fermented packed in the sheaf of the banana tree stem for 48 hours. He concluded noting that tempe tjenggereng , like tempe bongkrek kelapa , had led to several cases of fatal food poisoning.
In 1913, K. Heyne published a lengthy review of earlier literature on tempeh. In 1923 the Dutchman Jansen wrote "The Need of the Animal Organism for the Anti-beriberi Vitamin and the Amount of this Vitamin in Various Foodstuffs." He showed that in tempeh the content of anti-beriberi vitamin (first isolated by Jansen and Donath in 1926, and later named vitamin B-1 or thiamine) was reduced during fermentation. Jansen and Donath (1924), in "Metabolic Experiments on Rats and Digestibility of the Proteins of Some Foodstuffs" showed that tempeh protein is of good quality and makes a good supplement to the protein in rice. The vitamin A content was about the same as that of raw soybeans. The content of vitamins B-1 and B-2 in tempeh was further investigated by A.G. van Veen (1932, 1935); he found it to be a good source of both.
One of Indonesia's most famous (or infamous) types of tempeh is tempeh bongkrek, which is made from coconut presscake or the residue from homemade coconut milk, rather than from the usual soybeans. When contaminated it becomes toxic, and for as long as the local people can remember, it has periodically caused food poisoning and death in Central Java, mainly in the province of Banyumas and surrounding areas. The first outbreak of bongkrek poisoning was recorded by Dutch authorities 1895. Vorderman described several types of tempeh bongkrek in 1902 and noted that they caused fatal food poisoning. During Indonesia's economic depression between 1931 and 1937, when villagers tried to make bongkrek themselves rather than buying it from experienced producers, the poisonings became very numerous, up to 10 or 12 a year. There were few survivors. The local villagers believed that the poisonings were due to evil spirits or to the Goddess of the Indian Ocean in an angry mood! Starting in the early 1930s a group of Dutch scientists, starting with W.K. Mertens and A.G. van Veen from the Eijkman Institute in Jakarta, began to investigate the causes of bongkrek poisoning (van Veen 1967). Between 1933 and 1938 Mertens and van Veen published nine studies in Dutch and German on the bongkrek poisonings in Banyumas and the toxicology of bongkrek . In about 1933 they found the cause of the poisonings and discovered that the bacterium Pseudomonas cocovenenans was producing the toxins. Soon thereafter they isolated and named the two poisonous substances (toxoflavin and bongkrek acid). Amar?? and Grevenstuk (1935) and Baars and van Veen (1937) also published on bongkrek poisoning. In 1950 van Veen showed that at least one of the poisons is also a strong antibiotic for tempeh's Rhizopus mold. After 1950 many more investigations were conducted on tempeh bongkrek.
The first English-language information about tempeh appeared in 1931 in J.J. Ochse's Vegetables of the Dutch East Indies , an excellent 1005-page tome published in Buitenzorg (today's Bogor), Java. Ochse, a Dutchman, described the tempeh-making process in detail, saying that the mold used was Rhizopus oryzae , and that it was obtained from a former batch of tempeh. The next English-language reference appeared in 1935 in I.H. Burkill's A Dictionary of the Economic Products of the Malay Peninsula , a two-volume, 2,400-page work published in England. It contained six pages of information about tempeh and other soyfoods, including a description of the tempeh-making process. Burkill was a British authority on the flora of southern and southeastern Asia.
Tempeh During World War II and the Postwar Era (1940-1959) . During World War II almost the entire Malay archipelago was brought under Japanese control. Tempeh served as an important food in Indonesia and surrounding countries during the war, both for the native population and for foreigners in Japanese prisoner of war (POW) camps there.
The first English-language article specifically about tempeh was written in 1946 by Gerold Stahel, director of the Agricultural Experiment Station in Paramaribo, Surinam (a Dutch colony). Stahel described how, during World War II, the United States shipped soybeans to New Guinea in order to feed the Europeans and Indonesians living there. The shippers did not realize that residents of Indonesia, accustomed to eating fermented soyfoods, considered plain boiled soybeans to be unpalatable. Moreover, during the Japanese occupation of New Guinea, tempeh production had stopped and the local New Guinea starter cultures had, therefore, all been lost. Stahel, asked to furnish new cultures from Surinam, sent both fresh tempeh cakes and pure-culture starters to the Netherlands Indies Civil Administration (NICA) in New Guinea. Soon NICA kitchens all over the territory started using the US soybeans to make tempeh for the people.
As a result of his involvement in this project, Stahel's interest in tempeh grew, and in 1946 he wrote a detailed description of the way Javanese women in Surinam made and sold tempeh. He was the first to report on the bacterial acid fermentation of the soybeans during soaking that preceded the basic mold fermentation. Roelofsen, a Dutchman, was a prisoner of war (POW) in Japanese camps in Indonesia, where many Europeans were starving. Their basic foods were corn, sweet potatoes, chilies, and soybeans. Roelofsen made the soybeans into tempeh there and in 1946 reported the great shortage of protein in the camps and the important role played by tempeh in reducing deaths. He was the first to describe the use of pulverized dried tempeh as an inoculum. Roelofsen (1964) also did important nutritional studies of the food after his release. By a strange twist of fate, van Veen was made a POW during World War II and held in Indonesian camps where tempeh was widely served. In 1946 he reported that even POWs suffering from dysentery and oedema, who could not digest cooked whole soybeans, were able to assimilate tempeh. Fuel was sometimes so short in the camps that the soybeans, served as whole beans or for tempeh, were not adequately cooked. Yet the tempeh process helped to make these undercooked soybeans much more digestible. Van Veen concluded that many POWs owed their very survival to tempeh. De Bruyn, van Dulst, and van Veen (1947) came to the same conclusion. In 1951 Smith and Woodruff and in 1952 Grant wrote articles on "Deficiency Diseases in Japanese Prison Camps." They reported that the POWs, apparently in Hong Kong and Singapore, had made soybeans (often inadequately cooked) into tempeh to make them more palatable and digestible.
The first study in English on the chemical and microbiological changes occurring during tempeh fermentation, was published in 1950 by the Dutch microbiologists van Veen and Schaefer. This classic paper, based partly on van Veen's experiences in a POW camp, was more extensive than that published by Boorsma in Dutch in 1900. It described the tempeh-making process then attempted to show why tempeh was so much more digestible than soybeans. Also in 1950 Tammes published a detailed description of how tempeh was made in Java, including a description of how tempeh starter (ragi) was made.
Other than the Serat Centini (1815, 1846), the earliest known reference to tempeh in Indonesian or by an Indonesian appeared in 1956 (any earlier??) when Soetan mentioned it briefly in a booklet entitled Kedelai (Soybeans).
It is curious to note that, despite the fact that tempeh has long been a very important and widely used Indonesian food, all of the scientific studies on tempeh from 1895 to 1960 (and virtually all of the references to it in any language) were done by Europeans living in Indonesia. There are several reasons for this: First, while Indonesia was a Dutch colony, very few Indonesians were able to attend a university or to do scientific research of any type. There were very few Indonesian food scientists or microbiologists, and these were not encouraged to study indigenous foods. Second, during Dutch colonial rule, public opinion was strongly influenced by the Dutch emphasis on Western values and lifestyles, and the devaluation of indigenous values and lifestyles. Consequently a food such as tempeh, which was unknown in the West, and which was a low-priced food of the common people, acquired the image of an inferior, lower-class, or even poor-people's food, even though it was consumed by people of all classes. No Indonesian scientists felt it was worthy of their attention or research. Unfortunately, this attitude persisted even after independence. Sukarno, President of the Indonesian Republic from 1945-1967, admonished his fellow citizens on numerous occasions, saying "Don't be a tempeh nation," or "Don't be a tempeh scientist," implying that tempeh was somehow second class or inferior. Only by the mid-1960s did that image begin to change. And third, there was little interest in tempeh outside of Indonesia to stimulate interest inside.
New Interest in Tempeh (1960-82) . A new wave of worldwide interest in tempeh began in the early 1960s, sparked largely by the initiation of tempeh research on the part of two groups of American microbiologists and food scientists: one at Cornell University's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, New York, and the other at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center at Peoria, Illinois. Each group had an Indonesian as a catalyst and co-worker for its tempeh research. The Cornell group, under the leadership of Dr. Keith H. Steinkraus, worked with Ms. YAP Bwee Hwa, starting in 1958. This group did extensive, original research on tempeh and from 1960 published a series of pioneering scientific papers on all aspects of the new-found fermented soyfood. The USDA group, under the leadership of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine, got interested in tempeh as soon as the Indonesian microbiologist KO Swan Djien arrived in Peoria in 1960 to study industrial fermentations. There Hesseltine encouraged him to start by studying the tempeh fermentation.
The first Indonesian to do scientific research on tempeh, and to write a post-graduate thesis on the subject was Ms. Yap Bwee Hwa - a Chinese Indonesian whose name comes from the Hokkian dialect of Fujian (Fukien) province. After graduating from the Fakultet Ilmu Pasti dan Alam (Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics) in Bandung with a major in biochemistry (degree equivalent of MSc), she went to work in Jakarta at the Nutrition Institute under Dr. Poorwo Sudarmo, a progressive physician interested in nutritious, low-cost foods for infants. She then won a Fulbright scholarship to the United States and Sudarmo encouraged her to study tempeh. After reading an article by van Veen on the value of tempeh in prisoner of war camps, she made up her mind. The Fulbright committee suggested that she study at Cornell University, so she wrote Dr. Hand, head of the Department of Food Science and Technology at Cornell's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station. She visited plants tempeh plants in Indonesia to study the process, collected tempeh from the Jakarta market, then dried it and put it in a little brown bottle for later use as tempeh starter. She left Indonesia for the USA in August 1957. In the summer of 1958 she started to work in Dr. Steinkraus' laboratory at Geneva, New York, where, for the first time, she prepared tempeh. This was probably the first tempeh ever made in America. A graduate student in nutrition and food science, Ms. Yap pursued her interest in tempeh as a nutritious food for infants and children, in part because of the high rate of infant mortality in Indonesia caused by undernutrition (Yap 1984, personal communication). In 1960 she wrote her MS thesis titled Nutritional and Chemical Studies on Tempeh, an Indonesian Soybean Product . That same year she co-authored the Cornell group's first tempeh publication "Studies on Tempeh--An Indonesian Fermented Food" (Steinkraus et al. 1960). It is also interesting to note that it was from the pulverized sample of tempeh that Yap brought with her from Indonesia that the group isolated the culture of Rhizopus oligosporus , which Dr. Hesseltine later identified and gave the number NRRL 2710. This is still the most widely used tempeh culture strain in the USA.
Other early but brief descriptions of the tempeh process were given by Prawiranegara (1960) and Hardjo (1964, in Indonesian).
In 1961 Ko Swan Djien became the second Indonesian to publish scientific research on tempeh. Like Yap Bwee Hwa, he was a Chinese Indonesian whose name comes from the Hokkian dialect of Fujian (Fukien) province. By authoring or co-authoring at least six important articles about tempeh, Ko played a key role in introducing this food to the West, and in giving it a better image in Indonesia. Ko studied at the University of Wisconsin at Madison from August 1959, then did research at the NRRC from February to August 1960. Thereafter, he returned to the Bandung Institute of Technology, where his Laboratory for Microbiology began doing cooperative research on tempeh with the Cornell and USDA groups. Ko's first article, co-authored with Hesseltine in 1961, was about "Indonesian Fermented Foods;" it contained detailed information about tempeh making and recipes in Indonesia. Ko noted that there were thousands of tempeh shops in Indonesia and estimated that half or more of the country's 1959 soybean production of 17 million bushels (463,000 metric tons) was used to make tempeh.
Ko's most important and original article, presented in May 1964 at the International Symposium on Oilseed Proteins in Tokyo (and unfortunately never published) was "Tempe, A Fermented Food Made from Soybeans." The best report to date on tempeh in Indonesia, it discussed tempeh's history, traditional production methods, inoculum, packaging, chemistry and microbiology, contamination, shelf life, recipes, and price, plus a review of other research (including the best English-language bibliography of Dutch research to date) and a description of a tempeh pilot plant being developed in Bandung (complete with a mechanical roller-mill dehuller, water flotation hull removal, heated incubator and trays, and improved inocula). It was the first English-language publication to refer to the use of okara (soy pulp) in tempeh. In this article Ko signaled what he hoped would be the beginning of a new image for tempeh in Indonesia: "But there is no doubt that the time will come when Indonesians will be proud of their tempe, in the same way as the Japanese are proud of their sake, the French people of their wine, Italians of their macaroni, Indians of their curry, Russians of their caviar, the Dutch of their cheese, etc."
During the 1960s at the microbiology laboratory in Bandung, Ko worked to stimulate new research on and interest in tempeh. When Indonesian newspaper reporters finally discovered that he had studied tempeh at a University and in the United States, they were simply astonished. Articles with bold headlines such as "Tempeh Steps to a Higher Throne" appeared in several widely read Indonesian newspapers in September 1965. This marked the beginning of a change in attitude toward tempeh in Indonesia. In 1965 a summary of Ko's work on tempeh was published in Indonesian; it included details of an extensive survey proving that Rhizopus oligosporus was the main tempeh microorganism. In 1968 Ko joined the Department of Food Science at the Agricultural University, Wageningen, in the Netherlands. There he began to stimulate new interest in tempeh in Europe. In 1974 Rusmin and Ko wrote an article on rice-grown tempeh inoculum and Ko (1974) showed that the tempeh mold prevented aflatoxin production by Aspergillus flavus . In 1979 Ko and Hesseltine wrote "Tempeh and Related Foods," an excellent expanded and updated version of Ko's unpublished 1964 paper, with more details on previous Dutch tempeh research. There Ko reported that, following the change in attitude towards tempeh in Indonesia from the mid-1960s, studies by universities and by government agencies during the 1970s had paid more attention to tempeh. Ko insisted on using the Indonesian spelling for tempeh, even in English-language articles.
Yap and Ko had pioneered the way for Indonesians to do research on tempeh in the United States. Many others followed in their footsteps. The next Indonesian to study tempeh was Nasruddin Iljas, who wrote his MS and PhD theses on tempeh at Ohio State University in 1969 and 1972. His was the first PhD dissertation ever to be written on tempeh. In 1970 and 1973 he published two studies with Peng and Gould at Ohio State; the first was a short article on ways of preserving tempeh and the second, "Tempeh: An Indonesian Fermented Soybean Food," was one of the best and most extensive works to date, containing a lengthy review of the literature. In 1970 Dwidjoseputra wrote her PhD thesis on the microbiology of ragi (starter) at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee. In 1975 Sudarmadji wrote his PhD thesis on tempeh at Michigan State University, and by 1978 had authored or co-authored five publications on the subject. He found that the phytic acid in soybeans (which can bind dietary minerals) was significantly reduced during the tempeh fermentation. In 1980 Rivai wrote his MS thesis on tempeh at the University of Minnesota.
Interest in and publications about tempeh in Indonesia increased rapidly after the late 1960s. In 1967 the Indonesian Department of Agriculture published Mustika Rasa ("Gems of Taste"), a huge (1,123-page) cookbook of the best recipes from throughout the Indonesian archipelago. Referred to as the "Bible" of local cooks, it contained 35 Indonesian tempeh recipes and seven onchom recipes. Also in 1967 several types of tempeh were included in the official Indonesian Food Composition Tables (Direktorat GIZI 1967). Dwidjoseputra and Wolf (1970) studied the microorganisms in tempeh inocula. Sastroamijoyo (1971) was the first Indonesian to suggest that tempeh offered an answer to the world food crisis. Hermana was senior author of six important articles between 1970 and 1974, and Indrawati Gandjar wrote the first two of her many publications on tempeh in 1972. In 1972 and 1975 Thio published on tempeh. Winarno was the senior author of three publications written between 1973 and 1976. The most important of these was The Present Status of Soybean in Indonesia (1976), compiled as part of the ASEAN Project on Soybeans and Protein-Rich Foods by an interdisciplinary team of Indonesia's top authorities on soybeans. It contained the first detailed analysis of the tempeh industry in Indonesia. This ASEAN Protein Project served as a major stimulus for additional research on tempeh by Indonesians, and numerous papers were published in its periodical progress reports (Saono et al. 1974, 1976, 1977; Suhadi 1979; Jutono 1979; Hartadi 1980). Tempeh was discussed extensively at workshops on Solid Substrate Fermentation sponsored by the ASEAN Sub-Committee on Protein, held in Bandung, Indonesia, in 1978, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in 1980. Other studies on soy tempeh were published by Noor (1975), Khumaidi (1976), Loegito (1977), and others.
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New Interest in Tempeh (1960-82) Continued
Starting in the late 1960s and early 1970s a number of changes began to take place in the process for making tempeh in Indonesia. The most noticeable of these was the use of polyethylene bags (and, to a more limited extent, wooden trays lined with plastic sheeting) in place of banana leaves as the container in which the tempeh was incubated and sold. These techniques were developed in 1964 by Martinelli and Hesseltine at the USDA/NRRC in Peoria, Illinois. The oldest method for making tempeh inoculum was the sandwiched hibiscus leaf method, in which inoculated soybeans were sandwiched between hibiscus leaves and incubated until the molds sporulated. The finished inoculum was known as laru , waru , or usar . Finally, the spores on the leaves were rubbed over warm soybeans requiring inoculation. In 1895 Prinsen Geerligs reported that kechap ( katjap ) and taucho ( Tao-Tjiong ) were both inoculated with Hibiscus tiliaceus leaves, in Java called "waroe." A sporulated substrate (typically a previous batch of tempeh) was also used. But starting in mid-1960s research began in Indonesia to improve traditional starters. Ko (1964) described an improved soybean-based starter, then in 1967-68 developed and tested a semi-pure culture inoculum based on cooked rice, incubated in aluminum trays, then dried, pulverized, and stored sealed in a cool place. The process required no sophisticated equipment (Rusmin and Ko 1974). Hermana and Roedjito (1971) were the first to publish a method for the use of steamed rice (plus cassava and soy flour) as a tempeh inoculum substrate. By the mid-1970s a pre-prepared rice-based tempeh inoculum started to be used by some larger manufacturers; a key supplier was the Department of Microbiology at Bandung Institute of Technology (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979; Jutono 1979; Hartadi 1980). By 1982 tempeh starter was being sold in Indonesian supermarkets.
Traditionally all of the soybeans used to make tempeh were grown domestically; presumably they had been selected over the years for their suitability to tempeh production. But imports of soybeans, largely from the USA, increased dramatically during the 1970s, reaching 156,000 tonnes in 1976 (about 25% of domestic production) then rising to roughly 365,000 tonnes in 1983 (59% of domestic production). US soybeans were larger, cleaner, and about 15-20% less expensive, but the Indonesian soybeans were found (by whom??) to have a higher content of isoflavones, which retards rancidification of the tempeh when it stands at ambient temperatures. Larger manufacturers began to dehull their soybeans with a motor-driven stone mill, then remove the hulls using a semi-automatic flotation device. However, the abundance of low-cost labor and the high cost of fuel, energy, and imported equipment, prevented widespread mechanization of the process. By 1977 a 75-minute color film had been made on tempeh; it was available from the Jakarta Management Institute (Shurtleff & Aoyagi 1979).
The first detailed and comprehensive survey of the tempeh industry in Indonesia was published by Winarno and co-workers in 1976. It reported that, at that time, tempeh was the nation's most popular soyfood, making use of 64% of the country's total soybean production and imports. There were 41,201 tempeh manufacturers, mostly small, family-run enterprises, which made fresh tempeh daily. They employed a total of 128,000 workers, who produced each year 153,895 metric tons of tempeh having a retail value of US$85.5 million. Most companies were small, run out of the home. The largest companies used no more than 100 kg of soybeans a day to make 175 kg (385 lb) of tempeh. (This would be 1,050 kg (2,310 lb) of tempeh per 6-day week.) Tempeh was an important source of high-quality, low-cost protein and vitamins in the diet of all Indonesian socio-economic groups, and especially in the diet of low-income families. Yet its importance should not be exaggerated. Per capita consumption for all Indonesians in 1976 was about 16 gm a day or 5.8 kg (12.8 lb) a year. Tempeh was typically consumed in amounts of 100-200 gm per person per meal. A summary and analysis of Winarno's findings on the Indonesian tempeh industry is given in the professional edition of The Book of Tempeh (1979) by Shurtleff and Aoyagi.
The remarkable versatility of the tempeh fermentation process allows the preparation of many different types. Traditionally in Indonesia the great majority of all tempeh was soy tempeh ( témpé kedelé ) and by the mid-1970s it constituted an estimated 90% of all tempeh produced. Well-known varieties of soy tempeh included thick Malang tempeh and one-bean-thick Purwokerto tempeh. Other traditional types of tempeh included: okara tempeh ( tempe gembus or onchom hitau ; Gandjar and Slamet 1972; Gandjar 1977), soybean-hulls tempeh ( tempe mata kedele ; Gandjar and Hermana 1972), peanut presscake tempeh ( onchom hitam ; van Veen et al. 1968), the occasionally poisonous coconut presscake tempeh ( tempe bongkrek ; van Veen 1950-73; Harsono 1970; Gandjar and Hermana 1972; Arbianto 1977), velvet-bean tempeh ( tempe benguk ; Gandjar 1977), leucaena tempeh ( tempe lamtoro ), mung bean tempeh ( tempe kacang hijau ), mung bean pulp tempeh (Gandjar 1977), plus several other minor varieties (Vorderman 1902; Ko and Hesseltine 1979; Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979). The okara tempeh, presscake tempehs, and other non-soy tempehs were consumed more by lower-income groups. Starting in the late 1970s, however, the use of new seeds and grains for tempeh-making began to be investigated. Gandjar (1977, 1978) did several studies on winged bean tempeh. Tanuwidjaja (1977) studied the fortification of low-cost presscake tempehs with soy flour to improve the diets of the very poor. And bulgur wheat was reported to be mixed with soybeans to make tempeh (Hesseltine and Wang 1972).
Poisonings from tempeh bongkrek (made with coconut rather than the usual soybeans) continued to be a problem. From 1951 (when detailed records first began to be kept) until 1976, some 7,216 cases of bongkrek poisoning were reported in Central Java and 86 of these people (1.2%) died. In 1958 Harsono showed that the use of the acidic leaves of an Oxalis species (which grows everywhere as a weed in Banyumas) could be used to prevent toxicity in bongkrek. Unfortunately, this simple safety measure has not been adopted (van Veen 1967). In 1960 van Damme et al. elucidated the structure of toxoflavin. Laws have been passed to try to prevent production of tempeh bongkrek by unlicensed amateurs, but these too have not worked. So the periodic poisonings have continued into the 1980s. Fortunately soybeans are not involved.
On 11 March 1979 a key event took place in Indonesia with the organization of KOPTI, the Cooperative of Tempeh and Tofu Producers of Indonesia, with Achmad Rouzni Noor as director in Jakarta. Noor had a deep personal interest in helping tempeh makers to grow, modernize, and thrive. And national laws passed in 1979?? governing import and distribution of soybeans virtually compelled most tempeh makers to join KOPTI. By 1983 KOPTI had over 28,000 members in Java; 72% of these ran home industries. KOPTI's main functions were: (1) to buy basic materials (soybeans, inoculum, oil, etc.) collectively for its members at lower prices, (2) to improve member's production by developing new processing equipment (such as dehulling machines), helping members improve the quantity and quality of their products through better sanitation and preservation practices, and developing new products, (3) to provide marketing services, (4) and to serve as a source of capital for loans and helping members to form cooperatives. In part because of KOPTI, tempeh production was on the upswing in Indonesia by the early 1980s and the industry was modernizing. In 1984 Ko Swan Djien was able to write: "From my recent visit to Indonesia I get the satisfactory feeling that our efforts to have fermented foods valued in their right proportion are not in vain. Tempe is no longer considered an inferior food. Nowadays Indonesians are as proud of THEIR tempe as Japanese are of their sake, and French of their wine...!" (personal communication).
Shurtleff and Aoyagi (1979) conducted an informal survey in Java to identify which were Indonesia's best known and best liked tempeh recipes. The number preceding each recipe name indicates the order of "best known," with (1) being the best known. The number after the English recipe name indicates the quality ranking with (1) being the best liked. 1. Tempeh Goreng (Deep-Fried Tempeh with Seasonings; 2) 2. Tempeh Bachem (Tempeh Cutlets; 4), 3. Keripik Tempeh (Tempeh Chips; 6), 4. Sayur Lodeh (Tempeh & Vegetables in Coconut Milk Soup; 7), 5. Sambal Goreng Tempeh (Spicy-Fried Tempeh in Coconut Milk; 3), 6. Terik Tempeh (Tempeh in Coconut Milk Sauce; 5), 7. Sambal Goreng Tempeh Kering (Crunchy Chili-Fried Tempeh Topping, 1). Surprisingly the least well known of the "Top Seven" was the best liked.
Java is still the Mecca of the tempeh world, yet over the centuries, wherever Javanese settlers have gone, they have taken tempeh with them. Today it is widely produced and consumed in Surinam (where 30% of the population is Indonesian), and on the west and south coasts of Peninsular Malaysia. To a lesser extent it is consumed in Singapore, New Caledonia, and the other Indonesian Islands (especially Sumatra). Tempeh is also increasingly popular in the Netherlands, where it was introduced by immigrants from Indonesia in the 1940s.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN EUROPE AND AUSTRALASIA
History of Tempeh in Europe . As noted previously, all of the references to and articles about tempeh written between 1875 and the early 1950s were written by Europeans, most of them Dutchmen. Senior authors of references prior to 1940 included Gericke and Roorda (1875, 1901), Prinsen Geerligs (1895, 1896), Boorsma (1900), Vorderman (1902), Heyne (1913), Jansen (1923, 1924), Ochse (1931), van Veen (1932, 1933, 1934, 1935, 1936, 1938), Mertens (1933), Amar and Grevenstuk (1935), and Burkill (1935). Yet, perhaps because Dutch was not a widely read or spoken language and tempeh was not known in countries more famous for soyfoods such as Japan and China, tempeh was rarely mentioned in the numerous articles about soyfoods published in French, German, and English prior to the 1950s. Nor are there any records of tempeh being made in Europe during this time. The only two European works in English that mentioned tempeh during this period were those by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), and both were encyclopedic works about the foods and plants of Malaysia and Indonesia; Ochse's work was originally published in Dutch.
Relatively little was published about tempeh in Europe between 1940 and 1959, and most articles focused on its role in prisoner of war camps in Southeast Asia. There were articles by van Veen (1946, in Dutch), Roelofsen (1946, in Dutch), de Bruyn et al. (1947, in Dutch), Tammes (1950, in Dutch), van Veen and Schaefer (1950), Smith and Woodruff (1951), Grant (1951), Dupont (1954), and Autret and van Veen (1955); the latter five articles were all in English. Most of these have been discussed earlier at Indonesia. Boedijn (1958) reported that Rhizopus oligosporus can always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it is the primary organism in tempeh.
All of the first tempeh companies in Europe were started in the Netherlands by immigrants from Indonesia. The earliest of these, called ENTI, was founded in April 1946 by a Dutch couple whose last name was Wedding. While living in Indonesia, they had learned to make tempeh. Bringing their starter culture and recipe to the Netherlands, they began to make Europe's earliest known tempeh there on a home scale for friends and relatives. Gradually ENTI grew and became a commercial operation. By the early 1970s they were making 2,000 lb of tempeh a day. In about 1974 they sold the company (located in Zevenhuizen) to Mrs. L.J. Duson, who ran it until January 1984, when she closed it.
Firma E.S. Lembekker, founded in January 1959, was Europe's second tempeh company, and it may have been the first to sell tempeh commercially. In January 1984 it became Europe's oldest existing tempeh company.
Interest in tempeh in Europe began to increase starting in the 1960s. Articles were published by Roelofsen and Thalens (1964; changes in B vitamins), Stanton and Wallbridge (1969; a tempeh-like product made from cassava but with improved nutritional value), Thio (1972, 1975; small scale production and recipes), Jensen and Djurtoft (1976; a large report from Denmark on legume and cereal grain tempehs), Djurtoft and Jensen (1977, tempeh from various African grains and beans), Andersson (1977, volatile components and yellow pea tempeh, from Sweden), and Bahi El-Din et al. (1977; Sudanese researchers at Wageningen, Netherlands). Among these researchers, Thio Goan Loo from Indonesia was especially active in teaching people in Third World countries about tempeh. In 1972 he wrote about tempeh for use in Zambia (Africa) and spent three months in 1979 teaching tempeh production and recipes in Sri Lanka.
Europe's earliest known popular article on tempeh was an excellent 7-page feature story with nine photographs published in 1982 in Le Compas in French. In 1982 Soja Total , a translation of The Farm Vegetarian Cookbook (Hagler 1978), containing 13 pages of information on tempeh, was published in Germany. In 1985 Das Tempeh Buch , an updated and expanded translation of The Book of Tempeh (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979), was also published in Germany. Thus by 1984 there was more information on tempeh available in German than in any other continental European language, including Dutch. However the absence of a center of focused research efforts and a good source of low-cost tempeh cultures, such as the centers at Geneva and Peoria in the US, restricted the development of widespread popular interest in tempeh in Europe. Fortunately in 1984 the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures in Baarn, Netherlands, began to promote their tempeh cultures quite actively.
Europe's largest tempeh company, Tempé Produkten B.V. (Tempe Products Inc., named Handelsonderneming van Dappern until April 1983) was founded in 1969 by Robert van Dappern, with the help of his Dutch father (Herman), his Indonesian mother (Aveline), and his Dutch-Indonesian wife. He paid a Dutch-Indonesian man named Mr. Remmert a substantial sum of money to teach him how to make tempeh. By 1970 they were making tempeh in a small warehouse in Rotterdam. Initially they sold all of their tempeh to a couple of Holland's many Indonesian stores, but then they hired his wife's father, a well-known Indonesian, to deliver to the wider Indonesian community. The company began to grow, but all of the tempeh was being consumed by Indonesians living in the Netherlands. In January 1972 they moved the thriving company to Kerkrade, in southern Holland near the family home in Heerlen, rented a bigger building, and started mass production. Ed van Dappern, the second brother, joined the company as an equal partner. In 1979 Robert sent his wife's brother, Ike van Gessel, to Los Angeles to set up a tempeh plant there. Ike rented a building but, because of the European recession during the early 1980s and the need for capital to expand the business in the Netherlands, he had to cancel the lease and call off the project, at a substantial financial loss. In June 1980 the company bought a $1,000,000 modern factory in Kerkrade and expanded again. By mid-1982 Tempé Produkten was producing 6,000 to 8,000 pounds of tempeh a week, making it the largest tempeh company in the world. By early 1984 production had increased to 13,200 pounds (6,000 kg) a week, and an estimated 10% of this was consumed by non-Indonesians. By Dec. 1992 the company was producing 11,000 pounds (5,000 kg) of tempeh a week.
The family developed their own proprietary method for making tempeh starter culture. They developed a leaflet on tempeh, gave demonstrations on making and cooking with tempeh, and got tempeh to be sold at the Central Market, with the result that more and more of the greengrocers, who buy their vegetables there early each morning, started selling tempeh (and tofu). The company exported tempeh and tempeh products to England, Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg via a major distributor. Robert's Indonesian mother, Aveline, was in charge of preparing these (van Gessel 1982; Welters 1982; van Dappern 1984, each personal communications). By 1984 Tempé Produkten was the world's second largest tempeh manufacturer, after Marusan-Ai in Japan.
In June 1985, Tempé Producten added a new soyfood product to its line - tofu, and by 1991 the company was the largest tofu producer in The Netherlands.
Prior to early 1981 all of Europe's tempeh companies were located in the Netherlands and run by older Dutchmen catering largely to an Indonesian clientele. Europe's first generation of "New Age" tempeh shops was started from 1981 by young people interested in natural foods and/or macrobiotics. Europe's earliest known New Age tempeh company was Paul's Tofu & Tempeh, which was in operation by January 1981 at 155 Archway Rd., Highgate, in London. JAKSO, the first New Age shop in the Netherlands, started in July 1981. By January 1982 there were 7 tempeh shops operating in Europe; by January 1984 there were 18. Of these, 7 were in the Netherlands, 3 in Austria, 2 each in England and West Germany, and 1 each in Belgium, France, Italy, and Sweden. Total tempeh production in the Netherlands was about 4,500 kg a week (10,000 cakes of 1 pound each) in 1982, rising to 12,000 kg a week in 1984.
By 1980 another center of interest in tempeh had developed at the Department of Botany and Microbiology, University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, Wales, UK. There Dr. J. Hedger and Mr. T. Basuki (from Indonesia) were planning?? to start a tempeh factory, had produced a 4-page leaflet on "Tempe--An Indonesian Fermented Soybean Food," and had written a script for a BBC program "Tomorrow's World," on tempeh, which was broadcast in the summer of 1979. At that time tempeh was also occasionally sold in London, but the name of the manufacturer was not given (O'Neill 1980). In 1982 Hedger wrote a brief article on tempeh production.
History of Tempeh in Australia . Australian interest in tempeh began in about 1977, when McComb published an excellent BS thesis on the use of sweet narrow-leafed lupins to make tempeh. It contained one of the best summaries of the literature to date, plus much original research. A summary of this work was given by Kidby et al. (1977). The earliest known Australian tempeh companies were started in about 1980, and by March 1981 there were three small ones, all run by young "New Age" people, interested in natural foods, meatless diets, and alternative lifestyles. The first two to start were Dharma, part of Earth Foods in Waverley, run by Swami Veetdharma, and a small shop at Bodhi Farm in Channon, New South Wales, run by John Seed. Cyril and Elly Cain founded Beancoast Soyfoods in Eumundi, Queensland, and started making tempeh in July 1982. In March 1982 Ziruiz magazine published a long popular article "Terrific Tempeh" by Shurtleff and Aoyagi. By early 1983 Earth Angel was making okara tempeh. By 1984 there were five tempeh companies in Australia, all quite small.
Because of Australia's proximity to Indonesia, both countries could learn much from each other about traditional and modern tempeh making.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA
Early Years in America (1954-1969) . Interest in tempeh in the United States began at a surprisingly late date. As noted previously, early English-language articles on tempeh had been written by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), both published outside the US. The earliest known reference to tempeh in a US publication appeared in 1946, when an article by Gerold Stahel, writing from Surinam in South America about tempeh in Surinam and in New Guinea, was published in the Journal of the New York Botanical Garden . A summary appeared in November of that year in Soybean Digest . These articles appeared just 50 years after the first reference to tempeh was published in Europe by Prinsen Geerligs. In 1955 Autret and van Veen (both working for the Nutrition Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, outside the USA) published "Possible Sources of Proteins for Child Feeding in Underdeveloped Countries" in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition . They were the first suggest tempeh as a protein-rich, nutritious, and low-cost food for infants and children in Third World countries. They mentioned tempeh only briefly and noted that soymilk would probably be better suited for feeding children.
Research on tempeh in the US was started in 1954 by Dr. Paul György, a pediatrician and researcher at the Philadelphia General Hospital, and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. György had been to Indonesia many times, knew tempeh well, and (like Autret and van Veen) thought that it offered a way of improving the diets of infants and children in Third World countries. György received his first tempeh from Indonesia and Southern Rhodesian in 1954 and 1955. Ms. Kiku Murata of Japan worked with Gyorgy in the US investigating tempeh during 1959 and 1960. Following largely futile attempts to make tempeh in his own laboratory and lacking adequate facilities for making larger quantities of fermented foods, György worked out a cooperative arrangement in 1959 to have the tempeh made under the supervision of Dr. Hand and Dr. Steinkraus at New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, Cornell University, Geneva, New York. The first publication from this work did not appear until 1961, when György wrote "The Nutritive Value of Tempeh." György gradually moved his research away from a focus on child feeding programs toward the more narrow study of antioxidants in tempeh, which might prevent rancidification of tempeh or other foods.
As noted earlier at Indonesia, a great expansion of interest in tempeh began in the early 1960s, largely because of the pioneering, in-depth research at two centers: Cornell University's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station at Geneva, New York, under the leadership of Dr. Keith H. Steinkraus; and the USDA Northern Regional Research Center at Peoria, Illinois, under the leadership of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine. Each center became actively interested in tempeh because of the arrival of an Indonesian researcher. Whereas approximately 15 scientific on tempeh had been published worldwide before 1960, more than 60 were published from 1960 to 1979. Important, original investigations were done on pure culture fermentations, microbiological and biochemical changes during tempeh fermentation, tempeh's nutritional value, and industrial production of tempeh. This research awakened a new interest in tempeh among microbiologists and food scientists worldwide. Moreover, with this research, the world center of interest in and research on tempeh shifted from Indonesia and the Netherlands to the USA.
In the summer of 1958, when Miss YAP Bwee Hwa from Indonesia started her research on tempeh in New York. Active in nutritional circles in Indonesia, she was the first Indonesian to study tempeh in America; she brought her own little bottle of dried tempeh inoculum with her. She did her course work and rat feeding experiments under the direction of Prof. Louise Daniel and Dr. Richard Barnes in the Graduate School of Nutrition at Cornell University, while pursuing her investigations of tempeh production under Dr. Steinkraus in the allied Department of Food Science and Technology at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station. Dr. Hand, then head of the latter Department, was very active in nutritional circles and knew of the United Nations' interest in tempeh. In early 1959 Steinkraus, while on a trip to check the UNICEF-supported Saridele soymilk plant in Indonesia, visited a number of tempeh shops, thus becoming the first American ever to study tempeh in its homeland. Also in 1959 Steinkraus' Cornell University group began making tempeh for Dr. György in Pennsylvania.
The first article on tempeh by Americans was written in 1960 when Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Provvidenti, and Hand published their now classic "Studies on Tempeh--An Indonesian Fermented Food." This paper (submitted for publication in September 1959) incorporated Miss Yap's tempeh research, plus additional investigations by Steinkraus' group on essential microorganisms, mycelial penetration of the soybeans, etc. In 1961 this paper appeared in a publication by the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences. In June 1960 Miss Yap, as part of her graduate degree in nutrition, submitted her MS thesis titled "Nutritional and Chemical Studies on Tempeh, an Indonesian Soybean Product." Innovations in tempeh production described in these papers included use of lactic acid instead of a prefermentation to acidify the soybean soak water, incubation of the tempeh in stainless steel trays, dehulling the soybeans mechanically (with an electric vegetable peeler), growing the starter spores on bran, and dehydration of the tempeh in a circulating hot air oven. Yap found the PER of tempeh to be 2.5, midway between soybeans (2.3) and casein (2.7). Rats ate 1.5 times as much tempeh as cooked soybeans, and grew almost as fast as those fed casein. Changes in temperature, soluble solids, and soluble nitrogen, and pH during tempeh fermentation were measured and plotted. Yap left the US in April 1962 for Germany, where she worked as a researcher, first for a wine institute, then after 1970 for a chemical-pharmaceutical company.
During the 1960s the Cornell University Group, consisting of interdisciplinary scientists from both the Agricultural Experiment Station and Cornell University, worked together to publish at least 13 original scientific articles on all aspects of tempeh. The group included Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Wagenknecht, Provvidenti, Hand, Hackler, Stillings, van Veen, and Shallenberger. Steinkraus was the senior author of 6 papers during this period. Particularly important for the coming new generation of US tempeh manufacturers were his "Pilot Plant Studies on Tempeh" (1962), "Research on Tempeh Technology in the United States" (1964), and "A Pilot Plant Process for the Production of Dehydrated Tempeh" (1965), in which all of the necessary equipment and its manufacturers was described. These represented the first attempts to develop a process for making tempeh in an industrialized country with a temperate climate. Changes during the tempeh fermentation were studied in detail, including changes in lipids (Wagenknecht et al. 1961), in amino acids (Stillings and Hackler 1965), and in carbohydrates (Shallenberger 1967). Hackler et al. (1964) studied utilization of tempeh protein by rats. Van Veen, who had done pioneering research on tempeh in Indonesia as early as 1932 and had arrived at Cornell in 1962 as a professor of International Nutrition, was senior author of seven papers related to tempeh between 1962 and 1970, including an original 1968 study on peanut tempeh.
In 1960 a second US tempeh research program was started under the direction of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center (NRRC) at Peoria, Illinois. As early as May 1948 the NRRC had been sent a tempeh culture ( Rhizopus nigricans ) from Central Sugar Society (N.V. Centrale Suiker Maatschappij) in Amsterdam, together with instructions for making tempeh, but apparently nothing was done with it. Hesseltine first learned of tempeh from papers by Stahel (1946) and van Veen and Schaefer (1950). Much of the interest in tempeh starting in 1960 developed because KO Swan Djien of the Bandung Institute of Technology's Laboratory of Microbiology arrived at the NRRC that year to study industrial fermentations. Hesseltine suggested that he study tempeh; Ko showed Hesseltine and his group how to prepare it. The first publications appeared in 1961 with Ko and Hesseltine's "Indonesian Fermented Foods" and 1962 with Hesseltine's "Research at Northern Regional Research Laboratory on Fermented Foods." From the early 1960s on an interdisciplinary team of researchers at Peoria began to study many facets of tempeh and to develop new types of tempeh and processing techniques. Key figures in this team, in addition to Hesseltine and Ko were H.L. Wang, A.K. Smith, A.F. Martinelli, Mable Smith, W.G. Sorenson, and E.W. Swain. During the 1960s they published 17 original scientific papers (including two public service patents) about tempeh, plus four derivative articles; Hesseltine was senior author of 12 of these, Wang of four, Ko and A.K. Smith of two each, and Martinelli and Sorenson of one each.
In 1963 Hesseltine and co-workers published their first major tempeh study "Investigations of Tempeh, an Indonesian Food." That same year they discovered a mold inhibitor in soybeans. In 1963 and 1964 A.K. Smith and co-workers published pioneering studies on the nutritive value of tempeh in relation to various processing techniques. In 1964 Dr. Martinelli (a Brazilian scientist studying tempeh at the NRRC) and Hesseltine developed a new method for incubating tempeh in perforated plastic bags. It soon became widely used by commercial tempeh producers in both Indonesia and North America, a nice example of cultural cross-fertilization. In the same paper they described fermentation of tempeh in metal and wooden trays, the dry dehulling of soybeans, and the preparation of tempeh from full-fat soy grits. In 1965 Hesseltine wrote a review and history of research on tempeh microbiology and biochemistry. In 1966 and 1967 Hesseltine and Wang published the world's first studies showing that delicious tempeh containing higher quality protein could be prepared using soy-and-grain mixtures (including wheat and rice) or cereal grains alone. In 1969 Wang and co-workers discovered that Rhizopus oligosporus in tempeh produces an antibacterial compound or antibiotic, which is very active against a number of Gram-positive bacteria, including Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus subtilis , and which retains its activity even after cooking. This supports the view of natives and of some scientists that those who eat tempeh daily have fewer intestinal infections. Hesseltine and Wang sent samples of their tempeh to Dr. Doris Calloway at the University of California, Berkeley. She found in 1971 that tempeh, unlike most foods made from beans, does not cause flatulence. David and Verma (1981) suggested that the antibacterial substance in tempeh may be the cause of this lack of flatulence; it might inhibit the growth of gram-positive Clostridium bacteria, which are known to produce gas in the intestines. News of the NRRC discoveries on tempeh was disseminated by Soybean Digest (1965, 1967) and the USDA's Agricultural Research (1966, 1969).
A key component of the tempeh research at the NRRC concerned identification of the main microorganisms in the fermentation. It has never been clear what the original source of these molds in Indonesia was. Smith and Woodruff (1951) reported that prisoners in Japanese camps in Indonesia during World War II obtained their original tempeh mold culture from the withered petals of the hibiscus plant. Others have said that they came from banana leaves. The genus Rhizopus was discovered and named in 1820 by Ehrenberg. In 1895 Went and Prinsen Geerligs first described the species Rhizopus oryzae , which was investigated in detail by Wehmer in 1900 and 1901. Until the mid-1960s many microbiologists worldwide (Vorderman 1902; Stahel 1946; van Veen and Schaefer 1950; Dupont 1954; Steinkraus et al. 1960) thought R. oryzae was the primary microorganism responsible for the tempeh fermentation. In 1936 Lockwood and co-workers had studied the physiology of R. oryzae at the NRRC. In 1905 the Japanese mycologist Kendo Saito first described Rhizopus oligosporus on rice meal cakes which came from Shantung province in China, where they were used in making a rice-based fermented alcoholic beverage. Saito did not mention tempeh. In 1958 Boedijn reported that R. oligosporus could always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it was the primary fermentation organism. In 1962, after observing 50 tempeh strains from various tempeh sources, Hesseltine identified R. oligosporus as the chief tempeh mold. Ko (1965) reported collecting 81 samples of tempeh from various places in Java and Sumatra. Isolation of 116 pure cultures revealed that R. oligosporus was always present in good quality tempeh, thereby establishing without a doubt that it was the typical dominant species used. Indonesian researchers, however, maintain that the best quality tempeh contains a mixed culture. By the late 1970s the most widely used tempeh culture in the Western world was R. oligosporus strain NRRL 2710. This strain, brought to the US from Indonesia by MS. Yap in 1957, isolated by Steinkraus' group, and first identified in Hesseltine's lab, continued to be widely distributed from the NRRC culture collection.
It is not known for sure when the first commercial tempeh was made in the US. After the long and bloody war that drove the Dutch out of Indonesia and led to Indonesian independence in 1949, tens of thousands of Dutch and Dutch-Indonesian families were uprooted. Most tried to go to Holland, but the country was too small and the native Indonesians found it too cold. The United States set a quota in 1950 allowing 25,000 of these refugees to immigrate. Only about 10% were culturally native Indonesian; the rest were "Indos," i.e. Dutch-Indonesians or Chinese-Indonesians. Most went to warm areas such as California and Florida. In 1950 an estimated 500 of these settlers arrived in California. The first of these known to have started a tempeh shop was Mary Otten, who in 1961 began making tempeh in her basement on Stannage Avenue in Albany, California. She sold it to her friends and served it at parties that she catered. For starter culture she used ragi (an Indonesian starter that comes in small cakes) flown in from Java, until she learned how to make her own in 1973. In 1967 she started Java Restaurant and served many tempeh dishes. Then in 1974 she and her daughter, Irene, started Otten's Indonesian Foods, which by 1981 was making tempeh plus a full line of Indonesian tempeh-based foods under the brand name Joy of Java. These foods included Sweet & Sour Tempeh and Sayur Lodeh Tempeh.
The second earliest known tempeh shop in California (and in the USA) was Runnels Foods, which opened in Los Angeles, California in 1962. Also in Los Angeles, Toko Baru started in 1969 and Bali Foods started in 1975. Thus America's first generation of tempeh shops were all located in California and all run by Indonesian-Americans.
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New Interest in Tempeh (1960-82) Continued
Starting in the late 1960s and early 1970s a number of changes began to take place in the process for making tempeh in Indonesia. The most noticeable of these was the use of polyethylene bags (and, to a more limited extent, wooden trays lined with plastic sheeting) in place of banana leaves as the container in which the tempeh was incubated and sold. These techniques were developed in 1964 by Martinelli and Hesseltine at the USDA/NRRC in Peoria, Illinois. The oldest method for making tempeh inoculum was the sandwiched hibiscus leaf method, in which inoculated soybeans were sandwiched between hibiscus leaves and incubated until the molds sporulated. The finished inoculum was known as laru , waru , or usar . Finally, the spores on the leaves were rubbed over warm soybeans requiring inoculation. In 1895 Prinsen Geerligs reported that kechap ( katjap ) and taucho ( Tao-Tjiong ) were both inoculated with Hibiscus tiliaceus leaves, in Java called "waroe." A sporulated substrate (typically a previous batch of tempeh) was also used. But starting in mid-1960s research began in Indonesia to improve traditional starters. Ko (1964) described an improved soybean-based starter, then in 1967-68 developed and tested a semi-pure culture inoculum based on cooked rice, incubated in aluminum trays, then dried, pulverized, and stored sealed in a cool place. The process required no sophisticated equipment (Rusmin and Ko 1974). Hermana and Roedjito (1971) were the first to publish a method for the use of steamed rice (plus cassava and soy flour) as a tempeh inoculum substrate. By the mid-1970s a pre-prepared rice-based tempeh inoculum started to be used by some larger manufacturers; a key supplier was the Department of Microbiology at Bandung Institute of Technology (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979; Jutono 1979; Hartadi 1980). By 1982 tempeh starter was being sold in Indonesian supermarkets.
Traditionally all of the soybeans used to make tempeh were grown domestically; presumably they had been selected over the years for their suitability to tempeh production. But imports of soybeans, largely from the USA, increased dramatically during the 1970s, reaching 156,000 tonnes in 1976 (about 25% of domestic production) then rising to roughly 365,000 tonnes in 1983 (59% of domestic production). US soybeans were larger, cleaner, and about 15-20% less expensive, but the Indonesian soybeans were found (by whom??) to have a higher content of isoflavones, which retards rancidification of the tempeh when it stands at ambient temperatures. Larger manufacturers began to dehull their soybeans with a motor-driven stone mill, then remove the hulls using a semi-automatic flotation device. However, the abundance of low-cost labor and the high cost of fuel, energy, and imported equipment, prevented widespread mechanization of the process. By 1977 a 75-minute color film had been made on tempeh; it was available from the Jakarta Management Institute (Shurtleff & Aoyagi 1979).
The first detailed and comprehensive survey of the tempeh industry in Indonesia was published by Winarno and co-workers in 1976. It reported that, at that time, tempeh was the nation's most popular soyfood, making use of 64% of the country's total soybean production and imports. There were 41,201 tempeh manufacturers, mostly small, family-run enterprises, which made fresh tempeh daily. They employed a total of 128,000 workers, who produced each year 153,895 metric tons of tempeh having a retail value of US$85.5 million. Most companies were small, run out of the home. The largest companies used no more than 100 kg of soybeans a day to make 175 kg (385 lb) of tempeh. (This would be 1,050 kg (2,310 lb) of tempeh per 6-day week.) Tempeh was an important source of high-quality, low-cost protein and vitamins in the diet of all Indonesian socio-economic groups, and especially in the diet of low-income families. Yet its importance should not be exaggerated. Per capita consumption for all Indonesians in 1976 was about 16 gm a day or 5.8 kg (12.8 lb) a year. Tempeh was typically consumed in amounts of 100-200 gm per person per meal. A summary and analysis of Winarno's findings on the Indonesian tempeh industry is given in the professional edition of The Book of Tempeh (1979) by Shurtleff and Aoyagi.
The remarkable versatility of the tempeh fermentation process allows the preparation of many different types. Traditionally in Indonesia the great majority of all tempeh was soy tempeh ( témpé kedelé ) and by the mid-1970s it constituted an estimated 90% of all tempeh produced. Well-known varieties of soy tempeh included thick Malang tempeh and one-bean-thick Purwokerto tempeh. Other traditional types of tempeh included: okara tempeh ( tempe gembus or onchom hitau ; Gandjar and Slamet 1972; Gandjar 1977), soybean-hulls tempeh ( tempe mata kedele ; Gandjar and Hermana 1972), peanut presscake tempeh ( onchom hitam ; van Veen et al. 1968), the occasionally poisonous coconut presscake tempeh ( tempe bongkrek ; van Veen 1950-73; Harsono 1970; Gandjar and Hermana 1972; Arbianto 1977), velvet-bean tempeh ( tempe benguk ; Gandjar 1977), leucaena tempeh ( tempe lamtoro ), mung bean tempeh ( tempe kacang hijau ), mung bean pulp tempeh (Gandjar 1977), plus several other minor varieties (Vorderman 1902; Ko and Hesseltine 1979; Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979). The okara tempeh, presscake tempehs, and other non-soy tempehs were consumed more by lower-income groups. Starting in the late 1970s, however, the use of new seeds and grains for tempeh-making began to be investigated. Gandjar (1977, 1978) did several studies on winged bean tempeh. Tanuwidjaja (1977) studied the fortification of low-cost presscake tempehs with soy flour to improve the diets of the very poor. And bulgur wheat was reported to be mixed with soybeans to make tempeh (Hesseltine and Wang 1972).
Poisonings from tempeh bongkrek (made with coconut rather than the usual soybeans) continued to be a problem. From 1951 (when detailed records first began to be kept) until 1976, some 7,216 cases of bongkrek poisoning were reported in Central Java and 86 of these people (1.2%) died. In 1958 Harsono showed that the use of the acidic leaves of an Oxalis species (which grows everywhere as a weed in Banyumas) could be used to prevent toxicity in bongkrek. Unfortunately, this simple safety measure has not been adopted (van Veen 1967). In 1960 van Damme et al. elucidated the structure of toxoflavin. Laws have been passed to try to prevent production of tempeh bongkrek by unlicensed amateurs, but these too have not worked. So the periodic poisonings have continued into the 1980s. Fortunately soybeans are not involved.
On 11 March 1979 a key event took place in Indonesia with the organization of KOPTI, the Cooperative of Tempeh and Tofu Producers of Indonesia, with Achmad Rouzni Noor as director in Jakarta. Noor had a deep personal interest in helping tempeh makers to grow, modernize, and thrive. And national laws passed in 1979?? governing import and distribution of soybeans virtually compelled most tempeh makers to join KOPTI. By 1983 KOPTI had over 28,000 members in Java; 72% of these ran home industries. KOPTI's main functions were: (1) to buy basic materials (soybeans, inoculum, oil, etc.) collectively for its members at lower prices, (2) to improve member's production by developing new processing equipment (such as dehulling machines), helping members improve the quantity and quality of their products through better sanitation and preservation practices, and developing new products, (3) to provide marketing services, (4) and to serve as a source of capital for loans and helping members to form cooperatives. In part because of KOPTI, tempeh production was on the upswing in Indonesia by the early 1980s and the industry was modernizing. In 1984 Ko Swan Djien was able to write: "From my recent visit to Indonesia I get the satisfactory feeling that our efforts to have fermented foods valued in their right proportion are not in vain. Tempe is no longer considered an inferior food. Nowadays Indonesians are as proud of THEIR tempe as Japanese are of their sake, and French of their wine...!" (personal communication).
Shurtleff and Aoyagi (1979) conducted an informal survey in Java to identify which were Indonesia's best known and best liked tempeh recipes. The number preceding each recipe name indicates the order of "best known," with (1) being the best known. The number after the English recipe name indicates the quality ranking with (1) being the best liked. 1. Tempeh Goreng (Deep-Fried Tempeh with Seasonings; 2) 2. Tempeh Bachem (Tempeh Cutlets; 4), 3. Keripik Tempeh (Tempeh Chips; 6), 4. Sayur Lodeh (Tempeh & Vegetables in Coconut Milk Soup; 7), 5. Sambal Goreng Tempeh (Spicy-Fried Tempeh in Coconut Milk; 3), 6. Terik Tempeh (Tempeh in Coconut Milk Sauce; 5), 7. Sambal Goreng Tempeh Kering (Crunchy Chili-Fried Tempeh Topping, 1). Surprisingly the least well known of the "Top Seven" was the best liked.
Java is still the Mecca of the tempeh world, yet over the centuries, wherever Javanese settlers have gone, they have taken tempeh with them. Today it is widely produced and consumed in Surinam (where 30% of the population is Indonesian), and on the west and south coasts of Peninsular Malaysia. To a lesser extent it is consumed in Singapore, New Caledonia, and the other Indonesian Islands (especially Sumatra). Tempeh is also increasingly popular in the Netherlands, where it was introduced by immigrants from Indonesia in the 1940s.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN EUROPE AND AUSTRALASIA
History of Tempeh in Europe . As noted previously, all of the references to and articles about tempeh written between 1875 and the early 1950s were written by Europeans, most of them Dutchmen. Senior authors of references prior to 1940 included Gericke and Roorda (1875, 1901), Prinsen Geerligs (1895, 1896), Boorsma (1900), Vorderman (1902), Heyne (1913), Jansen (1923, 1924), Ochse (1931), van Veen (1932, 1933, 1934, 1935, 1936, 1938), Mertens (1933), Amar and Grevenstuk (1935), and Burkill (1935). Yet, perhaps because Dutch was not a widely read or spoken language and tempeh was not known in countries more famous for soyfoods such as Japan and China, tempeh was rarely mentioned in the numerous articles about soyfoods published in French, German, and English prior to the 1950s. Nor are there any records of tempeh being made in Europe during this time. The only two European works in English that mentioned tempeh during this period were those by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), and both were encyclopedic works about the foods and plants of Malaysia and Indonesia; Ochse's work was originally published in Dutch.
Relatively little was published about tempeh in Europe between 1940 and 1959, and most articles focused on its role in prisoner of war camps in Southeast Asia. There were articles by van Veen (1946, in Dutch), Roelofsen (1946, in Dutch), de Bruyn et al. (1947, in Dutch), Tammes (1950, in Dutch), van Veen and Schaefer (1950), Smith and Woodruff (1951), Grant (1951), Dupont (1954), and Autret and van Veen (1955); the latter five articles were all in English. Most of these have been discussed earlier at Indonesia. Boedijn (1958) reported that Rhizopus oligosporus can always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it is the primary organism in tempeh.
All of the first tempeh companies in Europe were started in the Netherlands by immigrants from Indonesia. The earliest of these, called ENTI, was founded in April 1946 by a Dutch couple whose last name was Wedding. While living in Indonesia, they had learned to make tempeh. Bringing their starter culture and recipe to the Netherlands, they began to make Europe's earliest known tempeh there on a home scale for friends and relatives. Gradually ENTI grew and became a commercial operation. By the early 1970s they were making 2,000 lb of tempeh a day. In about 1974 they sold the company (located in Zevenhuizen) to Mrs. L.J. Duson, who ran it until January 1984, when she closed it.
Firma E.S. Lembekker, founded in January 1959, was Europe's second tempeh company, and it may have been the first to sell tempeh commercially. In January 1984 it became Europe's oldest existing tempeh company.
Interest in tempeh in Europe began to increase starting in the 1960s. Articles were published by Roelofsen and Thalens (1964; changes in B vitamins), Stanton and Wallbridge (1969; a tempeh-like product made from cassava but with improved nutritional value), Thio (1972, 1975; small scale production and recipes), Jensen and Djurtoft (1976; a large report from Denmark on legume and cereal grain tempehs), Djurtoft and Jensen (1977, tempeh from various African grains and beans), Andersson (1977, volatile components and yellow pea tempeh, from Sweden), and Bahi El-Din et al. (1977; Sudanese researchers at Wageningen, Netherlands). Among these researchers, Thio Goan Loo from Indonesia was especially active in teaching people in Third World countries about tempeh. In 1972 he wrote about tempeh for use in Zambia (Africa) and spent three months in 1979 teaching tempeh production and recipes in Sri Lanka.
Europe's earliest known popular article on tempeh was an excellent 7-page feature story with nine photographs published in 1982 in Le Compas in French. In 1982 Soja Total , a translation of The Farm Vegetarian Cookbook (Hagler 1978), containing 13 pages of information on tempeh, was published in Germany. In 1985 Das Tempeh Buch , an updated and expanded translation of The Book of Tempeh (Shurtleff and Aoyagi 1979), was also published in Germany. Thus by 1984 there was more information on tempeh available in German than in any other continental European language, including Dutch. However the absence of a center of focused research efforts and a good source of low-cost tempeh cultures, such as the centers at Geneva and Peoria in the US, restricted the development of widespread popular interest in tempeh in Europe. Fortunately in 1984 the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures in Baarn, Netherlands, began to promote their tempeh cultures quite actively.
Europe's largest tempeh company, Tempé Produkten B.V. (Tempe Products Inc., named Handelsonderneming van Dappern until April 1983) was founded in 1969 by Robert van Dappern, with the help of his Dutch father (Herman), his Indonesian mother (Aveline), and his Dutch-Indonesian wife. He paid a Dutch-Indonesian man named Mr. Remmert a substantial sum of money to teach him how to make tempeh. By 1970 they were making tempeh in a small warehouse in Rotterdam. Initially they sold all of their tempeh to a couple of Holland's many Indonesian stores, but then they hired his wife's father, a well-known Indonesian, to deliver to the wider Indonesian community. The company began to grow, but all of the tempeh was being consumed by Indonesians living in the Netherlands. In January 1972 they moved the thriving company to Kerkrade, in southern Holland near the family home in Heerlen, rented a bigger building, and started mass production. Ed van Dappern, the second brother, joined the company as an equal partner. In 1979 Robert sent his wife's brother, Ike van Gessel, to Los Angeles to set up a tempeh plant there. Ike rented a building but, because of the European recession during the early 1980s and the need for capital to expand the business in the Netherlands, he had to cancel the lease and call off the project, at a substantial financial loss. In June 1980 the company bought a $1,000,000 modern factory in Kerkrade and expanded again. By mid-1982 Tempé Produkten was producing 6,000 to 8,000 pounds of tempeh a week, making it the largest tempeh company in the world. By early 1984 production had increased to 13,200 pounds (6,000 kg) a week, and an estimated 10% of this was consumed by non-Indonesians. By Dec. 1992 the company was producing 11,000 pounds (5,000 kg) of tempeh a week.
The family developed their own proprietary method for making tempeh starter culture. They developed a leaflet on tempeh, gave demonstrations on making and cooking with tempeh, and got tempeh to be sold at the Central Market, with the result that more and more of the greengrocers, who buy their vegetables there early each morning, started selling tempeh (and tofu). The company exported tempeh and tempeh products to England, Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg via a major distributor. Robert's Indonesian mother, Aveline, was in charge of preparing these (van Gessel 1982; Welters 1982; van Dappern 1984, each personal communications). By 1984 Tempé Produkten was the world's second largest tempeh manufacturer, after Marusan-Ai in Japan.
In June 1985, Tempé Producten added a new soyfood product to its line - tofu, and by 1991 the company was the largest tofu producer in The Netherlands.
Prior to early 1981 all of Europe's tempeh companies were located in the Netherlands and run by older Dutchmen catering largely to an Indonesian clientele. Europe's first generation of "New Age" tempeh shops was started from 1981 by young people interested in natural foods and/or macrobiotics. Europe's earliest known New Age tempeh company was Paul's Tofu & Tempeh, which was in operation by January 1981 at 155 Archway Rd., Highgate, in London. JAKSO, the first New Age shop in the Netherlands, started in July 1981. By January 1982 there were 7 tempeh shops operating in Europe; by January 1984 there were 18. Of these, 7 were in the Netherlands, 3 in Austria, 2 each in England and West Germany, and 1 each in Belgium, France, Italy, and Sweden. Total tempeh production in the Netherlands was about 4,500 kg a week (10,000 cakes of 1 pound each) in 1982, rising to 12,000 kg a week in 1984.
By 1980 another center of interest in tempeh had developed at the Department of Botany and Microbiology, University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, Wales, UK. There Dr. J. Hedger and Mr. T. Basuki (from Indonesia) were planning?? to start a tempeh factory, had produced a 4-page leaflet on "Tempe--An Indonesian Fermented Soybean Food," and had written a script for a BBC program "Tomorrow's World," on tempeh, which was broadcast in the summer of 1979. At that time tempeh was also occasionally sold in London, but the name of the manufacturer was not given (O'Neill 1980). In 1982 Hedger wrote a brief article on tempeh production.
History of Tempeh in Australia . Australian interest in tempeh began in about 1977, when McComb published an excellent BS thesis on the use of sweet narrow-leafed lupins to make tempeh. It contained one of the best summaries of the literature to date, plus much original research. A summary of this work was given by Kidby et al. (1977). The earliest known Australian tempeh companies were started in about 1980, and by March 1981 there were three small ones, all run by young "New Age" people, interested in natural foods, meatless diets, and alternative lifestyles. The first two to start were Dharma, part of Earth Foods in Waverley, run by Swami Veetdharma, and a small shop at Bodhi Farm in Channon, New South Wales, run by John Seed. Cyril and Elly Cain founded Beancoast Soyfoods in Eumundi, Queensland, and started making tempeh in July 1982. In March 1982 Ziruiz magazine published a long popular article "Terrific Tempeh" by Shurtleff and Aoyagi. By early 1983 Earth Angel was making okara tempeh. By 1984 there were five tempeh companies in Australia, all quite small.
Because of Australia's proximity to Indonesia, both countries could learn much from each other about traditional and modern tempeh making.
HISTORY OF TEMPEH IN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA
Early Years in America (1954-1969) . Interest in tempeh in the United States began at a surprisingly late date. As noted previously, early English-language articles on tempeh had been written by Ochse (1931) and Burkill (1935), both published outside the US. The earliest known reference to tempeh in a US publication appeared in 1946, when an article by Gerold Stahel, writing from Surinam in South America about tempeh in Surinam and in New Guinea, was published in the Journal of the New York Botanical Garden . A summary appeared in November of that year in Soybean Digest . These articles appeared just 50 years after the first reference to tempeh was published in Europe by Prinsen Geerligs. In 1955 Autret and van Veen (both working for the Nutrition Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, outside the USA) published "Possible Sources of Proteins for Child Feeding in Underdeveloped Countries" in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition . They were the first suggest tempeh as a protein-rich, nutritious, and low-cost food for infants and children in Third World countries. They mentioned tempeh only briefly and noted that soymilk would probably be better suited for feeding children.
Research on tempeh in the US was started in 1954 by Dr. Paul György, a pediatrician and researcher at the Philadelphia General Hospital, and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. György had been to Indonesia many times, knew tempeh well, and (like Autret and van Veen) thought that it offered a way of improving the diets of infants and children in Third World countries. György received his first tempeh from Indonesia and Southern Rhodesian in 1954 and 1955. Ms. Kiku Murata of Japan worked with Gyorgy in the US investigating tempeh during 1959 and 1960. Following largely futile attempts to make tempeh in his own laboratory and lacking adequate facilities for making larger quantities of fermented foods, György worked out a cooperative arrangement in 1959 to have the tempeh made under the supervision of Dr. Hand and Dr. Steinkraus at New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, Cornell University, Geneva, New York. The first publication from this work did not appear until 1961, when György wrote "The Nutritive Value of Tempeh." György gradually moved his research away from a focus on child feeding programs toward the more narrow study of antioxidants in tempeh, which might prevent rancidification of tempeh or other foods.
As noted earlier at Indonesia, a great expansion of interest in tempeh began in the early 1960s, largely because of the pioneering, in-depth research at two centers: Cornell University's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station at Geneva, New York, under the leadership of Dr. Keith H. Steinkraus; and the USDA Northern Regional Research Center at Peoria, Illinois, under the leadership of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine. Each center became actively interested in tempeh because of the arrival of an Indonesian researcher. Whereas approximately 15 scientific on tempeh had been published worldwide before 1960, more than 60 were published from 1960 to 1979. Important, original investigations were done on pure culture fermentations, microbiological and biochemical changes during tempeh fermentation, tempeh's nutritional value, and industrial production of tempeh. This research awakened a new interest in tempeh among microbiologists and food scientists worldwide. Moreover, with this research, the world center of interest in and research on tempeh shifted from Indonesia and the Netherlands to the USA.
In the summer of 1958, when Miss YAP Bwee Hwa from Indonesia started her research on tempeh in New York. Active in nutritional circles in Indonesia, she was the first Indonesian to study tempeh in America; she brought her own little bottle of dried tempeh inoculum with her. She did her course work and rat feeding experiments under the direction of Prof. Louise Daniel and Dr. Richard Barnes in the Graduate School of Nutrition at Cornell University, while pursuing her investigations of tempeh production under Dr. Steinkraus in the allied Department of Food Science and Technology at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station. Dr. Hand, then head of the latter Department, was very active in nutritional circles and knew of the United Nations' interest in tempeh. In early 1959 Steinkraus, while on a trip to check the UNICEF-supported Saridele soymilk plant in Indonesia, visited a number of tempeh shops, thus becoming the first American ever to study tempeh in its homeland. Also in 1959 Steinkraus' Cornell University group began making tempeh for Dr. György in Pennsylvania.
The first article on tempeh by Americans was written in 1960 when Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Provvidenti, and Hand published their now classic "Studies on Tempeh--An Indonesian Fermented Food." This paper (submitted for publication in September 1959) incorporated Miss Yap's tempeh research, plus additional investigations by Steinkraus' group on essential microorganisms, mycelial penetration of the soybeans, etc. In 1961 this paper appeared in a publication by the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences. In June 1960 Miss Yap, as part of her graduate degree in nutrition, submitted her MS thesis titled "Nutritional and Chemical Studies on Tempeh, an Indonesian Soybean Product." Innovations in tempeh production described in these papers included use of lactic acid instead of a prefermentation to acidify the soybean soak water, incubation of the tempeh in stainless steel trays, dehulling the soybeans mechanically (with an electric vegetable peeler), growing the starter spores on bran, and dehydration of the tempeh in a circulating hot air oven. Yap found the PER of tempeh to be 2.5, midway between soybeans (2.3) and casein (2.7). Rats ate 1.5 times as much tempeh as cooked soybeans, and grew almost as fast as those fed casein. Changes in temperature, soluble solids, and soluble nitrogen, and pH during tempeh fermentation were measured and plotted. Yap left the US in April 1962 for Germany, where she worked as a researcher, first for a wine institute, then after 1970 for a chemical-pharmaceutical company.
During the 1960s the Cornell University Group, consisting of interdisciplinary scientists from both the Agricultural Experiment Station and Cornell University, worked together to publish at least 13 original scientific articles on all aspects of tempeh. The group included Steinkraus, Yap, van Buren, Wagenknecht, Provvidenti, Hand, Hackler, Stillings, van Veen, and Shallenberger. Steinkraus was the senior author of 6 papers during this period. Particularly important for the coming new generation of US tempeh manufacturers were his "Pilot Plant Studies on Tempeh" (1962), "Research on Tempeh Technology in the United States" (1964), and "A Pilot Plant Process for the Production of Dehydrated Tempeh" (1965), in which all of the necessary equipment and its manufacturers was described. These represented the first attempts to develop a process for making tempeh in an industrialized country with a temperate climate. Changes during the tempeh fermentation were studied in detail, including changes in lipids (Wagenknecht et al. 1961), in amino acids (Stillings and Hackler 1965), and in carbohydrates (Shallenberger 1967). Hackler et al. (1964) studied utilization of tempeh protein by rats. Van Veen, who had done pioneering research on tempeh in Indonesia as early as 1932 and had arrived at Cornell in 1962 as a professor of International Nutrition, was senior author of seven papers related to tempeh between 1962 and 1970, including an original 1968 study on peanut tempeh.
In 1960 a second US tempeh research program was started under the direction of Dr. Clifford W. Hesseltine at the USDA Northern Regional Research Center (NRRC) at Peoria, Illinois. As early as May 1948 the NRRC had been sent a tempeh culture ( Rhizopus nigricans ) from Central Sugar Society (N.V. Centrale Suiker Maatschappij) in Amsterdam, together with instructions for making tempeh, but apparently nothing was done with it. Hesseltine first learned of tempeh from papers by Stahel (1946) and van Veen and Schaefer (1950). Much of the interest in tempeh starting in 1960 developed because KO Swan Djien of the Bandung Institute of Technology's Laboratory of Microbiology arrived at the NRRC that year to study industrial fermentations. Hesseltine suggested that he study tempeh; Ko showed Hesseltine and his group how to prepare it. The first publications appeared in 1961 with Ko and Hesseltine's "Indonesian Fermented Foods" and 1962 with Hesseltine's "Research at Northern Regional Research Laboratory on Fermented Foods." From the early 1960s on an interdisciplinary team of researchers at Peoria began to study many facets of tempeh and to develop new types of tempeh and processing techniques. Key figures in this team, in addition to Hesseltine and Ko were H.L. Wang, A.K. Smith, A.F. Martinelli, Mable Smith, W.G. Sorenson, and E.W. Swain. During the 1960s they published 17 original scientific papers (including two public service patents) about tempeh, plus four derivative articles; Hesseltine was senior author of 12 of these, Wang of four, Ko and A.K. Smith of two each, and Martinelli and Sorenson of one each.
In 1963 Hesseltine and co-workers published their first major tempeh study "Investigations of Tempeh, an Indonesian Food." That same year they discovered a mold inhibitor in soybeans. In 1963 and 1964 A.K. Smith and co-workers published pioneering studies on the nutritive value of tempeh in relation to various processing techniques. In 1964 Dr. Martinelli (a Brazilian scientist studying tempeh at the NRRC) and Hesseltine developed a new method for incubating tempeh in perforated plastic bags. It soon became widely used by commercial tempeh producers in both Indonesia and North America, a nice example of cultural cross-fertilization. In the same paper they described fermentation of tempeh in metal and wooden trays, the dry dehulling of soybeans, and the preparation of tempeh from full-fat soy grits. In 1965 Hesseltine wrote a review and history of research on tempeh microbiology and biochemistry. In 1966 and 1967 Hesseltine and Wang published the world's first studies showing that delicious tempeh containing higher quality protein could be prepared using soy-and-grain mixtures (including wheat and rice) or cereal grains alone. In 1969 Wang and co-workers discovered that Rhizopus oligosporus in tempeh produces an antibacterial compound or antibiotic, which is very active against a number of Gram-positive bacteria, including Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus subtilis , and which retains its activity even after cooking. This supports the view of natives and of some scientists that those who eat tempeh daily have fewer intestinal infections. Hesseltine and Wang sent samples of their tempeh to Dr. Doris Calloway at the University of California, Berkeley. She found in 1971 that tempeh, unlike most foods made from beans, does not cause flatulence. David and Verma (1981) suggested that the antibacterial substance in tempeh may be the cause of this lack of flatulence; it might inhibit the growth of gram-positive Clostridium bacteria, which are known to produce gas in the intestines. News of the NRRC discoveries on tempeh was disseminated by Soybean Digest (1965, 1967) and the USDA's Agricultural Research (1966, 1969).
A key component of the tempeh research at the NRRC concerned identification of the main microorganisms in the fermentation. It has never been clear what the original source of these molds in Indonesia was. Smith and Woodruff (1951) reported that prisoners in Japanese camps in Indonesia during World War II obtained their original tempeh mold culture from the withered petals of the hibiscus plant. Others have said that they came from banana leaves. The genus Rhizopus was discovered and named in 1820 by Ehrenberg. In 1895 Went and Prinsen Geerligs first described the species Rhizopus oryzae , which was investigated in detail by Wehmer in 1900 and 1901. Until the mid-1960s many microbiologists worldwide (Vorderman 1902; Stahel 1946; van Veen and Schaefer 1950; Dupont 1954; Steinkraus et al. 1960) thought R. oryzae was the primary microorganism responsible for the tempeh fermentation. In 1936 Lockwood and co-workers had studied the physiology of R. oryzae at the NRRC. In 1905 the Japanese mycologist Kendo Saito first described Rhizopus oligosporus on rice meal cakes which came from Shantung province in China, where they were used in making a rice-based fermented alcoholic beverage. Saito did not mention tempeh. In 1958 Boedijn reported that R. oligosporus could always be isolated from tempeh, implying that it was the primary fermentation organism. In 1962, after observing 50 tempeh strains from various tempeh sources, Hesseltine identified R. oligosporus as the chief tempeh mold. Ko (1965) reported collecting 81 samples of tempeh from various places in Java and Sumatra. Isolation of 116 pure cultures revealed that R. oligosporus was always present in good quality tempeh, thereby establishing without a doubt that it was the typical dominant species used. Indonesian researchers, however, maintain that the best quality tempeh contains a mixed culture. By the late 1970s the most widely used tempeh culture in the Western world was R. oligosporus strain NRRL 2710. This strain, brought to the US from Indonesia by MS. Yap in 1957, isolated by Steinkraus' group, and first identified in Hesseltine's lab, continued to be widely distributed from the NRRC culture collection.
It is not known for sure when the first commercial tempeh was made in the US. After the long and bloody war that drove the Dutch out of Indonesia and led to Indonesian independence in 1949, tens of thousands of Dutch and Dutch-Indonesian families were uprooted. Most tried to go to Holland, but the country was too small and the native Indonesians found it too cold. The United States set a quota in 1950 allowing 25,000 of these refugees to immigrate. Only about 10% were culturally native Indonesian; the rest were "Indos," i.e. Dutch-Indonesians or Chinese-Indonesians. Most went to warm areas such as California and Florida. In 1950 an estimated 500 of these settlers arrived in California. The first of these known to have started a tempeh shop was Mary Otten, who in 1961 began making tempeh in her basement on Stannage Avenue in Albany, California. She sold it to her friends and served it at parties that she catered. For starter culture she used ragi (an Indonesian starter that comes in small cakes) flown in from Java, until she learned how to make her own in 1973. In 1967 she started Java Restaurant and served many tempeh dishes. Then in 1974 she and her daughter, Irene, started Otten's Indonesian Foods, which by 1981 was making tempeh plus a full line of Indonesian tempeh-based foods under the brand name Joy of Java. These foods included Sweet & Sour Tempeh and Sayur Lodeh Tempeh.
The second earliest known tempeh shop in California (and in the USA) was Runnels Foods, which opened in Los Angeles, California in 1962. Also in Los Angeles, Toko Baru started in 1969 and Bali Foods started in 1975. Thus America's first generation of tempeh shops were all located in California and all run by Indonesian-Americans.
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