bakwan

Bakwan () are vegetable fritters or gorengan commonly found in Indonesia. Bakwan are usually sold by traveling street vendors. The ingredients are vegetables—usually bean sprouts, shredded cabbage and carrots—battered and deep-fried in cooking oil. To achieve a crispy texture, the batter uses a mixture of flour, corn starch and sago or tapioca. In West Java bakwan is known as bala-bala and in Semarang is called badak. It is similar to Japanese yasai tenpura (vegetable tempura), Korean pajeon, Bruneian cucur, Indian pakora, Burmese a-kyaw, Caribbean pholourie or Filipino ukoy.

==Variations== Bakwan usually consists of vegetables; however, another variation called 'bakwan udang' adds whole shrimp to the batter and is sold in snack stands at the marketplace. Because of its similarity, the term 'bakwan' is often interchangeable with 'perkedel'. For example, Indonesian corn fritters are often called either 'perkedel jagung' or 'bakwan jagung'.