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Soy and legumes from Central and East Java, Indonesia

Tempe gembus (okara tempeh)tempe gembus

Tempe gembus is tempeh made from ampas tahu, the cooked pulp left after tofu making. The pulp is pressed under stones, steamed, mixed with ordinary tempeh starter and kept under banana leaves for about two days, until white Rhizopus mould binds it into a soft, sliceable cake.

Fully documentedSoy and legumes2.1 days – 3.9 days

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedTraditional practice has no fixed amounts. The lab trials of Gandjar and Slamet (1972) steamed about 1 kg of pressed okara per batch.
Cooked okara (ampas tahu)From tofu works that boil the soy slurry before straining; greyish-green with bits of hull[gandjar1972]
Laru (tempeh starter)The same starter used for soybean tempeh; 0.03 % gave a good cake in the lab, about a tenth of the soybean dose[gandjar1972]
Banana leavesTo wrap the cakes, or to cover them on a woven tray[gandjar1972]
Starterlaru tempe (Rhizopus starter for soybean tempeh)

Total time across the recorded steps: 2.1 days – 3.9 days

Start
Drag the bar or press Play
shapes, not to countRhizopus oligosporusRhizopus arrhizus

What changes: Stones squeeze the water out of the okara in a sack

Step 1 of 5
Press the okara under stones
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Rhizopus oligosporus
Rhizopus arrhizus
Rhizopus mycelium
Moulds

Output: pressed okara.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Tempe gembus is tempeh made from ampas tahu, the cooked pulp left after tofu making. The pulp is pressed under stones, steamed, mixed with ordinary tempeh starter and kept under banana leaves for about two days, until white Rhizopus mould binds it into a soft, sliceable cake. Made in 5 steps over 2.1 days – 3.9 days. The longest step, wrap in banana leaves and let the mould grow, takes 22 h – 2 days (Gandjar I 1972) and runs at 29–31 °C (Gandjar I 1972). Rhizopus oligosporus and Rhizopus arrhizus does most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step22 h – 2 daysReported[gandjar1972]Wrap in banana leaves and let the mould grow
Temperature29–31 °CMeasured[gandjar1972]Wrap in banana leaves and let the mould grow
AciditypH 5.9–6 → 7Measured[gandjar1972]Sell and eat it fast

What makes this one different

Tempe gembus uses tofu pulp, not whole beans. Because the pulp is already broken up, the mould grows faster and needs about a tenth of the starter, but the cake also spoils sooner than soybean tempeh.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Oncom tahu (oncom merah)The same tofu pulp grown with the orange mould Neurospora instead of Rhizopus.

Safety

In one test from 1972, Gandjar and Slamet found no aflatoxin B1, B2, G1 or G2 in tempe gembus fermented by Rhizopus; that is not a guarantee for other batches. Okara that is too wet rots instead of fermenting, and the cake keeps less well than soybean tempeh.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

Older informants told Gandjar and Slamet in 1972 that tempe gembus was unknown before the Second World War. It began to be eaten around 1943, when village food stocks in Java ran low, and was sold mainly to poorer buyers because it cost much less than soybean tempeh. A 2026 study notes that okara fermented with Rhizopus is known as tempeh gembus or black oncom, and with Neurospora as red oncom (Farniga 2026).

  1. [gandjar1972] Gandjar I., Slamet D.S. 1972, Tempe gembus hasil fermentasi ampas tahu, Penelitian Gizi dan Makanan 2 (1972) (Ministry of Health nutrition research units, Jakarta and Bogor)paper
  2. [agatha2025] Agatha M.A. (supervisor Ilmi M.) 2025, Dinamika komunitas mikroorganisme pada proses fermentasi tempe gembus asal Yogyakarta, undergraduate thesis in biology, Universitas Gadjah Mada (abstract)other
  3. [farniga2026] Farniga A., Pinsirodom P., Wattanachaisaereekul S. 2026, Fungal biotransformation of okara into functional food, comparative species-dependent metabolomic and antioxidant profiles, Current Research in Food Science 12:101396paper