I'm just a cassava guy... Do the readers remember the song entitled “Singkong dan Keju” (Cassava and Cheese) launched by Bill & Brod in 1986? The song's lyrics are intriguing with the depiction of the disparity between cassava and cheese. It is clear in the listener's mind that there is a gap between a cassava guy with an image of simplicity and the cheese girl with an image of the upper class glamor and prestige. In the final conclusion of the song, it is stated that cassava and cheese are things with different level, so this song accidently instills a sense not to proud of cassava, which in Latin is called Manihot esculenta or Manihot utillissima.
The description above is a kind of paradox when we visited the D-9 cassava cheese outlet in Ledok-Ngaglik Village, Salatiga. With a modern design, the D-9 cassava cheese cafe is never lack of visitors who want to enjoy delicious processed cassava such as fried cassava cheese, ‘cemplon’, ‘combro’, ‘klenyem’, pastel, and various other cassava-based products. Visitors can feel full even without eating rice as the daily consumption.
Together
with the women of RT 59, who like challenges, I explored the cassava village
where D-9 cheese cassava is produced. The directions at the corner of the
T-junction illustrate that this village is thriving with cassava production,
there are directions to 'telo' brownies, cassava nuggets, cassava kriwil,
gethuk, and ‘semesta’ (processed cassava). The production house is just about
300 meters from the cafe which can be reached on foot. There is a large house
where employees start the production activities, from soaking, cutting,
peeling, washing, sorting, frying and making various cassava production. Six
and a half tons of cassava every day as the raw material is consumed by the D-9
cassava cheese cafe. It is not just a casual cassava business, but it could be
said as ‘octopus business’ of the cassava business, started by Hardadi selling fried cassava from his cart at
the Pancasila field in Salatiga in 2009, which is currently able to
recruit 120 employees with decent wages, even many female workers are recruited
here. ‘The cassava guy’ has become king in Salatiga and even the echo of his
business has made Kick Andi and Dedy Corbuzier (national presenter) invite him
to Jakarta to tell about the success of his cassava business.
The D-9 cassava cheese cafe not only sells processed cassava, but also offers educational tours telling how the cassava is processed, as well as cassava cooking practice. A large hall above the cafe accommodated all of us to hear the history of the D-9's initiatives. The most interesting thing is that the name D-9, which is currently quite popular trade mark, is the name of a prison room where Hardadi lived for several months because of drugs abuse, which was a turning point in his extraordinary life change. Repentance, hard work, sincerity and collaboration with local agencies such as the Industry and MSMEs agency, tourism agency, agriculture ministry and other parties have made this business grow rapidly.
Being proud of local potency is the first step to develop everything. Please discover the local potency of each region and become a king, like the cassava guy who is currently a real king. ***
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