Hed Chef: Sambal hijau (Green sambal)
Tickle your taste buds with this tangy condiment
Refreshingly different, sambal hijau (green sambal) holds its own against its more fiery red-hot cousins.
Gather ingredients and make this green sambal which you can cook with chicken or fish.
Or for that rustic flavour, eat it with boiled sweet potato - a tip from my colleague.
If you have trouble getting green tomatoes, the next best option is to get tomatoes which are less ripe.
TANGY
Sambal hijau is more tangy than spicy.
But if you find that the green finger chilli or even the green chilli padi is not spicy enough to impress dad, throw in some sliced red chilli padi when you are frying up the mixture.
Don't worry if you cannot get kencur (sand ginger).
This aromatic ginger is not readily available at most wet markets. It does add a unique fragrance to the mix, but you can do without.
INGREDIENTS
- 200g green chillies
- 80g green bird's eye chillies
- 3 red bird's eye chillies, finely sliced
- 150g shallots
- 3 garlic cloves
- 2 green tomatoes, pulpy core removed
- 5 whole limes, halved and deseeded
- Juice of 8 limes
- 2 lemon grass stalks, use 5cm of root end
- 1 thumb-sized piece galangal
- 1 piece kencur (sand ginger)
- 4 kaffir lime leaves
- 40g belacan powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tbsp sugar
- Cooking oil
- 60g dried whitebait
METHOD
1. Grind the galangal, kencur, lemon grass, shallots, garlic, limes and kaffir lime leaves.
(A)
2. Add lime juice, green tomato, belacan powder, green chillies and green bird's eye chillies. Grind coarsely.
3. Season with salt and sugar.
(B)
4. Heat 4 tablespoons of cooking oil. Add the red bird's eye chillies and fry the green chilli paste for 10 minutes.
(C)
5. Allow to cool.
6. Store in jars in the fridge.
For the whitebait:
1. Rinse the whitebait. Allow to dry.
2. Heat wok with enough oil to deep-fry the whitebait.
3. Deep-fry the whitebait until golden.
4. Allow to cool. Store in an air-tight container in the fridge.
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