Twelve Indonesian dishes worth planning a trip around

Beef cooked for hours in coconut milk, galangal, lemongrass and chilli until the liquid is gone and the meat is dark and almost dry. The version served in Padang restaurants is a household dish; the version cooked for a wedding can be black and intensely concentrated. Eat it in Bukittinggi, where the highland air makes the slow cooking seem logical.

The most misunderstood meal in Indonesia. You sit down, and a server places a tower of small plates in front of you: rendang, fried chicken, cassava leaves, aubergine, sambal, a bowl of thin curry. You eat what you want and pay for what you eat. The rest goes back. It is a buffet that comes to the table.

The etiquette is simple: do not take a plate you do not want, and do not be shy about asking for less. A good nasi Padang is one of the great cheap meals on earth, and the best ones look like a bus station canteen.

Beef or tongue skewers, grilled over charcoal, then drenched in a thick yellow sauce made from rice flour, turmeric and offal broth. It is nothing like the peanut satay you know from Bali. It is earthy, spicy and slightly sour, and it is best eaten for breakfast, which is when the good stalls open.

Fish paste and tapioca, shaped into cylinders or balls, fried and served with a dark vinegar sauce called cuko that is sweet, sour and hot in equal measure. Palembang's riverfront stalls do it best. It is a snack, a meal and a regional identity all at once.

Young jackfruit stewed for hours with palm sugar, coconut milk and teak leaves until it turns dark brown and sweet. Served with rice, chicken, an egg and a spoonful of sambal. It is the city's breakfast, its comfort food and its argument with the rest of Java about whether sweet is a legitimate flavour profile.

The full Yogyakarta eating route, including where to find gudeg at noon when the famous places have sold out, is in four days in Yogyakarta.

Lamb skewers, grilled over charcoal with nothing but salt, served with a bowl of thin curry and rice. The skewer is a bicycle spoke. The meat is cooked fast and hot, so the outside chars while the inside stays pink. It is the best satay in Indonesia, and the best places are in the villages south of Yogyakarta.

The national dish, and the one most often ruined by hotel buffets. A good nasi goreng is cooked to order in a wok with day-old rice, egg, shallot, chilli and kecap manis, and served with pickles and crackers. The best version is from a street cart at night, when the wok is hot and the cook has done it ten thousand times.

Beef soup with coconut milk, cinnamon, clove and a squeeze of lime. Jakarta's version is richer than the clear soto of Solo or the turmeric-yellow soto ayam of the east. Eat it with rice, a plate of fried shallots and a glass of sweet tea. It is a hangover cure and a history lesson: Betawi is the creole culture of the capital.

A whole pig stuffed with betel leaf, lemongrass, garlic and turmeric, then roasted on a spit for hours. The skin is glass, the meat is fragrant, and the plate that comes with it includes lawar, sausage and a spoonful of blood-rich broth. It is a Hindu ceremonial dish that became a commercial lunch, and the best versions are still made for ceremonies.

Beef and offal simmered in a thick, spiced broth with peanuts, coriander and cumin, served with rice cakes and a chilli sambal. It is a morning dish in Makassar, eaten before the heat arrives. The offal is not optional; it is the point.

A vegetable porridge of rice, pumpkin, corn, spinach and beans, usually eaten for breakfast with a side of fried fish and sambal. It is vegetarian by accident, faintly sweet, and one of the healthiest things you will eat in Indonesia. Manado's cuisine is the most herbal in the country — lemongrass, basil, torch ginger — and tinutuan is the gentle introduction.

Sago starch cooked into a translucent, gluey porridge, eaten with fish in a yellow turmeric broth. It has no flavour of its own; it is a texture, a vehicle. The first mouthful is strange, the second is better, and by the end you understand why it feeds half the east. Eat it in Ambon or Sorong, where the sago is local.