The Reinforcement of Women's Role in Baluwarti as Part of Gastronomic Tourism and Cultural Heritage Preservation

Abstract

Surakarta has the potential of gastronomic heritage tourism. The diversity of cuisine becomes the power of Surakarta as a tourist attraction. Municipality of Surakarta stated that their Long Term Development Plan for 2005-2025 will develop cultural heritage tourism and traditional values, historical tourism, shopping and culinary tourism that is part of gastronomic tourism. The study was conducted with the aim to identifying traditional food in Baluwarti along with its historical, tradition, and philosophical values. This area is selected because it is located inside the walls of the second fortress. Other than that, it is the closest area to the center of Kasunanan Palace. The participation of Baluwarti women in the activity of processing traditional food has become the part of gastronomic tourism and cultural heritage preservation. This study uses a qualitative approach because the collected data comes in the form of history and values in society, which demands the depth of data. The data obtained and then sorted into groups to be reduced and analyzed. The selection of informants was done by doing snowball sampling, which means the informants were chosen in accordance with the criteria of sought data and then scrolled from one informant to another. The informants are limited to public figures who understand the history and values of the food as well as the women in Baluwarti who have the skill to cook signature food and participate in Baluwarti's food festival. The data searching will be stopped after the same data obtained from several informants. There are some findings obtained from this study. The first is that Mentho and Penyon menu are almost extinct because they are not durable and must be consumed immediately. Second, Baluwarti is the origin area of Sega Liwet, which has become the signature dish of Surakarta. Third, the implementation of the Baluwarti gastronomic festival is expected to successfully reintroduce the endangered foods that have traditional and philosophical values. Fourth, the society recognizes Bubur Suran menu that is only served in Sura, one of the months in Javanese calendar. Fifth, woman in Baluwarti has role in tourism and cultural heritage preservation, especially the gastronomic heritage of Surakarta.

Indonesian Culinary History and Values: Exploration Study in Solo City, Indonesia

“…The food is not only served as the main meal but also at other important events. Other foods that are no less popular in Solo are nasi liwet, timlo, tengkleng, manten soup, serabi, jenang jadah, and other types of food [35].…”