Shrimp kletek — Jambi, Indonesia

Shrimp kletek is a thin, crisp fritter built from small shrimp bound in a batter of rice or tapioca flour, spread thinly and deep-fried until it turns brittle and pale golden. The name is said to echo the sharp, crackling sound the fritter makes when bitten into or snapped in half. It is reported from Jambi, on the eastern coast of Sumatra, a province with easy access to river and coastal shrimp, where this kind of thin fritter is sold as a snack alongside meals or on its own, often at markets and roadside stalls. To prepare it, small shrimp are mixed into a thin batter of rice flour, tapioca starch, water and seasoning, sometimes with a little garlic or turmeric for colour and flavour. A ladleful of the batter is spread thinly over the surface of hot oil, so that it spreads into a lacy, uneven sheet, and fried until the edges curl and the whole fritter turns crisp and golden. It is lifted out, drained, and left to cool before it is broken into pieces. What sets this fritter apart from other Indonesian shrimp crackers is that it is fried directly from a wet batter rather than from pre-dried chips, which gives it a lacier, more irregular shape and a shrimp flavour spread through the batter rather than concentrated in whole pieces. Cooks vary the ratio of rice flour to tapioca and the amount of shrimp, which changes how crisp or how chewy the result is.