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Tham Jiak
Tham Jiak means in some way "love to eat" in Hokkien. I am a Malaysian Hokkien and truly love to eat.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Guest Post, Again, by L: SOHO

Come weekend and with a friend from mainland visiting, the first thing that I wanted to do is EAT! Naturally - since my dream during my final year here in university is to review as many restaurants as I can. Although money is always a constraint, but dining out once a week should very much be allowed.

Soho, in the UK is well known to be a red-light district and boosts a similar name elsewhere across in New York. Here in Penang, it is very much a British concept pub, which serves food typical to the public houses in the UK. Located at Upper Penang road, Soho is a half club/half pub and a restaurant all in one. A hard to be missed double story building which is usually choked with tourists.

I had been there for drinks but never there for its food until recommended by a Penangnite who frequents it. So last Friday, I needed a place to eat and to review and decide to give Soho a try.

The lower floor has a bar, pool tables, dart boards and a dance floor and upstairs is mainly for dining purposes. I always loved the upstairs of Soho, with its lush interior wall carpeting, mini chandeliers, deep red curtains which boosts a very grand atmosphere, a solid wooden bar and my favorite part of it, an old fashioned balcony overlooking Upper Penang Road – the place where Penang’s party scene happens.

I was told that Fish & Chips lovers will not be disappointed with the one in Soho. Deep fried fish fillets to the scrumptious, in crisp yellow batter, with a dash of salt and pepper, - It is simply delicious. My friend ordered just that and another pal, ordered the roasted herb chicken. Roasted chicken that comes with a serving of homemade mashed potatoes and boosts thick gravy, a recipe by Soho itself.

I had Grilled lamb chop which honestly, the best lamb chop I had in years. Delicious lamb chops that is first marinated in their own concoction, served in mint sauce, chips and a garden salad. The chops are thick and succulent and grilled to perfection.

Soho is also the only pub in town that serves Kilkenny beer, all the way from Ireland and I was told that this waterhole probably boosts the cheapest beer in town. So if you are from out of Penang, looking for both cheap booze and the party scene, Soho is the best place to be.

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Guest Post by L: A Girl's Night Out

One of the exuberance of youth to me is going out on dates. It gives you this surge in self confidence as you know someone had actually asked you out and would like to know you better. It’s a great feeling when someone takes an extra interest to you and there’s the whole dressing up part for the wooing and dining which is always fun.

Sadly it had been a long time since I had dates and in an impulse attempt to revive it, I asked a friend out. A dear friend of mine, PY whom also had been a lil’ drained in the love department. There are so many reasons to ask her out, for one, she’s a great companion and then, there’s the part I know, there’s never a chance that she will bail on me.

So we went out. A day before, I asked my local Penangnites friends on where can I go for good food, good ambience and all must come with a fair price due to the constraints of being a student. I was then referred to this small restaurant located right in the middle of Georgetown called Pintail. It is on the same row as Cititel Hotel, right opposite Oriental Hotel.

Pintail, sandwiched between the old buildings is dimly lighted and with a signboard that isn’t too prominent for new diners to come to realize. My date with PY happens on a Wednesday evening where both of us took a little initiative to dress up for dinner and then, dancing later on.

It wasn’t hard locating it but it was not prominent like I mentioned. Just a shop lot on its own, and a very warm ambience upon arrival, it was pretty packed on a Wednesday night. We were lucky to get the final table and as I realized it was mostly backpackers, tourists and some locals dining there.

I ordered rosemary lamb with a serving of sautéed vegetables in butter and pepper and mashed potatoes. PY had a half done steak with diced potatoes and sautéed greens as well. I would give a lot of credits to their selection of drinks which were made up of fresh fruits juices, on its own or a mixture and even alcoholic beverages at a fair price. My honey lime got me hooked as it was made perfectly for the sweet tooth that I am.


I wasn’t too pleased that my lamb was all chopped up for me upon arrival but I love the vegetables and mashed potatoes. PY’s steak was a little chewy and her potatoes were rather blunt. It fascinated me that she could eat it all with her braces.

But overall, I love the ambience and the service is extremely friendly. Cozy, warm and serves good food at a fair deal, I will definitely go back to that place more often. The bill for our meal was a little over RM60. Last order of the day is at 10.45pm and the restaurant closes at 11.30pm.


Pintail restaurant
84, Penang Road
10000 Georgetown
Penang

For reservations call: 04 264 2694
Opens whole week except on Mondays. From noon till night.

Monday, August 07, 2006

It's Weekend Again

Well a week just flew by in a breeze. It is weekend again. Although I know the weekend breakfast blogging is meant for, well weekend cooking, which means taking more time to prepare and enjoy breakfast. In oppose, I either sleep late on weekends or eat out. On weekdays though, I prefer to enjoy some healthy homemade breakfast before going to work. Knowing that I have a lovely breakfast waiting for me seems to be a pretty good motivation to get out of bed. Now that is the best alarm clock in the world, don’t you agree? So I had this really good, healthy and substantial muffin recipe from 101 cookbooks really long time ago in my to-do list, which I cannot resist sharing it here. I can’t seem to find this post anymore in that blog, so I could not link it, but I will share my adapted version here though.

This muffin turns out great the way I imagine it would be, slightly chocolatey, with good thick texture, occasional encounter on soft raisins and crunch on the nuts. To top it off, it uses all the readily available ingredients in your pantry and is really versatile for substitutions accordingly. These huge muffins can only keep for bout 3 days in room temperature but fret not, it freezes really well, so far I still have 2 left in my freezer and it is still keeping well. Whenever I wanted to have it the next day for breakfast before work, I would take one out the night before, put it in a tall container and leave it in room temperature, and by the time I wake up in the morning, it is ready to eat. No better reason to wake up than breakfast; pour a cold glass of milk and enjoy with this yummy muffin. Eating one is enough to fill you up for the whole morning, without feeling as if you ate too much. It’s really good and healthy too! Give it a try.

Whole Wheat Banana Chocolate Muffins

I had, as usual, adapted the recipe to suit whatever I have or can get my hands on. Anyhow, feel free to experiment. Besides, I had halved the recipe to make do with my mini oven, thus there are cases like half a ¼ cup, which I hope you would understand, I advise to double the recipe since it freeze so well, for rainy days. The oat and bran cereal topping is optional, but it does give the muffin a novelty look besides adding more crunch and flavour to it. You can use whatever oat bran cereal you have, or even granolas. Remember to push it down slightly though when you sprinkle on before baking, as quite an amount of mine fell off during removal.

1 cup whole wheat flour
1.5/4 tbsp brown sugar
¼ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 ½ overly ripe bananas, mashed
¼ cup low-fat yoghurt
1 egg white
1 tsp vanilla extract

¼ cup of nuts (walnuts, almond, pecan)
¼ cup of raisins (original calls for currants)
1.5/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

Oil for preparing the pan
Oat and bran cereal for topping

Method:
Preheat oven to 180C/350F
Lightly oil a 6 hole muffin pan (I used an oiled tissue to wipe it)
Combine flour, brown sugar, cocoa and baking soda together.
Add in mashed bananas, yoghurt, egg white, vanilla, nuts, raisins and coconut.
Stir until combined.
Pour batter into the muffin pan and top with the oat bran cereal.
Bake about 25-35 minutes, or tooth pick is clean when inserted.

Makes 6 large breakfast muffins

P/S: I just bought a new camera, Canon Ixus 60! I am so ready to take lovely food pictures now. Do you notice the clearer and better muffin pictures? I must admit I need more practice though, as I am still testing out my camera’s various functions and getting use to its ability. So look out for more pictures for you to drool on, I hope ;)

Friday, August 04, 2006

Happy Birthday to Me!

A weekend of indulgence had past, with a meaty BBQ party on Friday ending with walnut birthday cake, then a full feast of Chinese course dinner on Saturday and a decadent cheesecake that I would be confessing about, a chow-down on durians, all the way from Taiping, along with a whole day of shopping on Saturday followed by another feast of course and then some more of the leftovers durian, cold from the refrigerator. Now try beating this wonderful tummy-filled birthday weekend. In sum, I had a blast.

The BBQ pictures will be up soon once I get the pictures from M, my
1984-recentlly-turned-housemate friend. As for the cheesecake that I mentioned about a confession, oh yes, I made a cake for my own birthday. That night it was a trio of celebration, where my sis, cousin and I celebrated, as we have our birthdays close together, spanning out in 10 days. I decided to go full force indulgence for this once-a-year event, and decided to make Oreo Cheesecake. I got this recipe from Kraft’s website, which I had faith would turn out well.



One bite into it, everybody says “Mmm, it’s good!’ My dad, who was always honest, he even commented on my not-risen-enough cake for my Grandma the last time, said I can give Secret Recipe a run of their money with this one. But half way through the cake, I started to get more comments. My sister’s boyfriend asked did I use blue cheese, and I was startled. I take a bite of the cake and oh no, I realized that something was wrong with my cream cheese. I confess, I used a block of cream cheese that had been, let’s say pretty long, maybe too long in my refrigerator. My mum and aunt decided the cheese was too heavy and did not finish their cake while my cousin though enjoyed it, wasn’t able to finish it either due to the ‘weird’ taste which became obvious after more than few bites. J can taste it right away, since he had so many of my cheesecakes before, and being a cheese lover himself. Only my dear Pho Pho, enjoyed her cake, this proving she’s a strong-cheese lover. As for me, let’s just say, the cake could have been good, the texture was great, the Oreos was yummy but the cream cheese was just, a little too cheesy, more for the savoury kind I might say. Anyhow, I would certainly try it again; I still think it is a good recipe. Ha-ha. So, let’s just call this my Blue Cheese Birthday Cake. How’s that. Anyway, the rest was finished later by J’s family and her sister even said it was not bad.



After the eventful weekend, I was suddenly swept back to reality with training and all, so was too busy to really post up anything. But in case you haven’t notice, I had just properly shifted all my recipes and posts’ links to a new index page, as my recipes grew too long for the sidebar and the categories I had was not enough to properly catalog them. In addition, I had finally made an about page of myself, do have a read about this tham jiak little girl behind this blog! ;)

Saturday, July 29, 2006

With Love, L

I seldom post without picture if you had notice, just because I like to spice up my posts, but this testimonial had been long overdue in my laptop and I have yet the chance to post it. You see, I do not have internet connection at home and I usually online at J’s with this laptop. Most of my precious pictures are, unfortunately, in my house personal computer. So sometimes due to my usual forgetfulness, I forgot to copy the picture over to this laptop while I have the notes here at this laptop. Now I am posting from office, oh yes, this is how naughty I am and they banned my picture site, stating ‘Banned Phrase Found’. Now would I have anything naughty in there? Did I accidentally name my food that can offend or provoke people? Anyway, back to the topic, this testimonial is by none other than my favourite guest blogger, yes you guessed it, L. I mentioned that she will be leaving a testimonial here as she leaves to go back to Penang. How I missed her! Now on to her lovely and thoughtful note:

My mother is an excellent cook. She works her magic in the kitchen effortlessly and I watched her cooked, baked, skewed, sliced and chopped since I was a little girl. But at 22 today, one would normally assume that the daughter would have learnt a whole lot from the maestro herself. But assumptions do go wrong at times because she just can’t cook.

But one thing for sure, I enjoy eating and am always open for new eats. It is no surprise for someone who had always been accustomed to good food to be critical of others than her moms’. Thus, with this passion of mine and Rokh’s passion for cooking and eating out as well, we set out always in search of good eats, always talking about food and writing about them.

This testimonial is one which came way too late. I apologized for the delay as I was busy settling down up north again after my rather short 2 month stint in KL. I was there for my compulsory Industrial Training which every 2nd year university student needed to complete. And the word ‘wonderful’ is underrated to sum up my experience.

Of course, the highlight of my entire stay was staying with my good friends (all 3 including Rokh with additional good friends coming over every once in awhile)and our gastronomic adventures around the Klang Valley. A drain on our pockets for sure as we never resist to splurge on good food and then, expanding our waistlines. But it is always worthy; as I believe the connection made at a table of people eating is wonderful. You not only dine together but you connect. This is where friendships are forged and kept in checked.

Rokh is truly a wonderful and close friend of mine. Our friendship is further strengthen through this blog where we would discuss about food and new findings. She surprises me a couple of years back when she donned on an apron and whipped out utensils to cook. Shame on me to think it would be a passing fad but boy am I wrong, for she sure is an excellent cook today. I’m sure her future daughter would feel the same way as I do now. Grateful and ecstatic to always have good food waiting for her.

So this is my short say and do watch out for my detailed food ventures here with my good friends around town. There is nothing irreplaceable than hanging out with your friends, cracking up jokes,endless drinks and filling in stomachs together. That is what I would certify as life’s greatest pleasure.

P/S: Yes, I cannot resist putting a picture, this one from a cute site, and I also would like to leave that message to L, :). Oh, since I am already so thick, I might as well announce that tomorrow is my birthday! Look out for party food!

Sunday, July 23, 2006

What Breakfast Means

Since young, my mum had always enforced the importance of breakfast to us, my sister and me. Once someone told her that an egg a day would make your children grow up big and smart!(I can testify that the former is wrong, judging from my height, but I hope the latter is right ;) So, every morning for most of my pre-school, she would make half boil egg for us and a glass of Milo (a popular Malaysian chocolate malt drink). We practically eat the same breakfast everyday for school days until one point I am revolted with the smell of half boiled egg (which suddenly smell really raw) and my mum would insist I finish them. So every morning I would pinch my nose (I learnt from somewhere that we taste through our nose, ha-ha, cheeky me) and down the egg and then quickly wash down with milk or Milo. At one point my sister and I take up a banner and make a riot to sanction a ban on it. Ok, maybe a bit exaggerating but you get the idea. Finally we got our ban and moved on to other breakfasts. But knowing my mum, she would go the fast and easy way, and most of our breakfasts are then bread with jam, or peanut butter and so forth. Soon it got even lazier where my mum would just get chocolate milk drink in cartons.

That was a long time ago, and later I came to stay by myself in KL and soon found out how is it to live on my own. Many of my mornings went without breakfast, maybe an occasional cereal and fresh milk, but that’s about it. Most of my university days have me waking up when the sun is already halfway across the sky. Thus breakfast took a back seat in my life.

Now, as I grew up more and got into culinary adventures and food craze, I learnt that how important breakfast is (yes mum, I finally understand), and always look forward to have a good breakfast to
kick start my day. I even got the penchant back for half boiled egg, especially with toast and a good cup of coffee, kopitiam style. Nowadays, getting into the life of working, I need a good coffee to boost my day. I am now always in search for good and healthy breakfast recipes as I want to go home made style. of course I take into account on time and also ease of eating, as I would sometimes need to have my breakfast in the car. Life is all about rushing isn’t it?

Anyway, nowadays I seem to surf a lot on breakfast recipes and was mostly interested in the healthier options such as lower fat, higher nutrients and so forth. I had made quite a number for my everyday breakfasts before I got to work, and so you can be sure of more breakfast recipes to come. To me breakfast is something of a ritual, something exciting to look forward to the night before and the reason for you to get your bum off the bed in the morning. I wouldn’t call it a day without breakfast, won’t you too?

Ginger Molasses Cake
(adapted from Williams Sonoma)

I love ginger. It is one of the most useful spice that I ever came about. In Asian cuisines, it mostly used in savouries, especially with meats and in some sweet soups. Since our ancestral times, we know the goodness of ginger, of its medicinal properties, such as aiding in digestion after a heavy meal and also others such as aiding in nausea and other illness. This ginger cake that has crystallized ginger in it is something foreign to us Asians, Malaysians that is, but somehow I am attracted to it, imagining the flavours in my mind. This cake is really light and soft, despite the low fat content and the ginger flavours is just amazing. Sadly though, J did not enjoy it as he felt that it is weird and my housemate Y thought it was chocolate cake at first and got a surprise once she bit into it. She could not exactly guess the taste but once enlighten, she left the cake alone too. Well, I guess I am the only one having ‘foreign’ taste here. Don’t be put off though, if you’re a ginger lover and you love the thick heavy taste of molasses, this cake is definitely good eats, as it is really tender, moist, gingery and full of flavour from the spices.

3-4 Tbs. unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup molasses
1/2 cup minced crystallized ginger
2 eggs, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups cake/superfine flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground allspice
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/2 cup low-fat yoghurt

Preheat oven to 180C. line a 9 by 4 inch loaf pan with baking/parchment paper.
Beat the butter and sugar till creamy and fluffy.
Stir in molasses and crystallized ginger.
Beat in the eggs, one at a time.
In another bowl, sift together flour, baking soda and the spices.
Stir the flour mixture into the butter mixture in 3 additions, alternating with yoghurt, starting and ending with flour.
Mix until smooth.
Pour into prepared pan and bake in oven for 45-50 minutes.
Transfer to wire rack and let it cool for 10 minutes or so.
Then turn the loaf out onto the rack.
Cool completely before storing.
It tastes divine warm out of the oven, still good in room temperature but it would turn hard once refrigerated. It keeps well for about 5 days in air-tight container and room temperature; if it is still around.
Now have a few slices and call it a day!

Serves 10-12.

P/S: This post is added into Nandita's Weekend Breakfast Blogging over at Saffron Trail. Do look out for the forthnightly roundup!

Update: The roundup is here, Part 1 and Part 2. More food to wake up to!

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Tastes of Yesterlife

If one's life can be determine by food preferences, I believe that I might be an Indian in my past life. As much as I love Chinese cuisines, I am strangely drawn towards Indian food, my five senses transfix on the myriad of spices, smells, tastes and textures. Indian cuisines are complex. Even the simplest cooking involves clever blends of various spices. But of course, there are some simplicities, such as its roti (bread), which ranges from easy to long preparation and the choice itself is numerous! Every roti is different from one another; some made with rice flour, some gram flour and many more that I have yet to learn and discover.

After bouts of exercise early one morning, the first thing that hit my mind for breakfast is some Indian fare. So I walk all the way through The Curve (shopping mall in Malaysia) to Restaurant Penang Nasi Kandar, right outside Tesco, for my Indian breakfast fix. On the way there I had already picture tosai in my mind. Why, I love the taste of tosai, slightly tangy and its texture soft to bite, crunchy on the outer layer certainly plays one palate

I like my tosai with the coconut chutney (on the left) and the middle chutney, I can't make out what it is but it is tangy, from tamarind I believe, and some spices, hope someone can enlighten me here. It pairs real well with the tosai, adding more to the tanginess and sourness. Of course I would also eat it with dhal (on the right); then again, I eat my dhal with every other roti.

Then its time for lunch, my hunger pang starts playing with my head again. I crave for more Indian fare. Then I thought of banana leave, from a shop I once was recommended to by a friend, which I found the branch right here in my neighbourhood. Banana leave is actually a kind of meal where your food is serve on a clean banana leave, and the perks are, you can ask to refill as many times as you want with no extra charges. It consists of only vegetarians fares but you can separately order other meats. When one eats banana leave, one tends to indulge a little bit, as it is addictive and the thought of able to fill to one's content is extremely inviting. Therefore, as I am set on getting fit before work, I think twice bout this choice of lunch.

I drove aimlessly there, park the car, still deciding on whether to enter a Chinese hawker restaurant, but somehow my feet got me over to Sri Paandi, a restaurant serving Andhra cuisine. I sat down, I asked for banana leave, I take a quick snap of picture, devour, ask for refill, and then proceed to clean it off. Then I was really full, but just enough place left in my tummy to clean my palate with the really tangy fresh yoghurt. The thought of fitness somehow just got suck into the black hole in my mind, he-he. Then the pictures did not turn out well, due to my gluttony thus the impatient take of picture. So on another day, this time, I drag both my good friends there again (vowing not to refill), in aim to once again answer my cravings and of course to take more pictures! Ah, all in the name of this blog, and my tham jiak-ness.

Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

The meal was great. I absolutely love the vegetable curries. The usual fare are the lightly spicy long beans, tangy and superbly spicy brinjal with black-eyed peas, one mild veggie (on the right, which I'm not sure what it is) and the light yoghurt cucumber (I forgot the proper name for this) which is really refreshing. Then there comes the condiments, coconut chutney (again), and one really salty and sour chutney where I accidentally bite into the sour fruit (not sure what fruit, now I sound like an Indian food enthusiast who knows nuts). Then there are the keropok (chips), where there is the ever famous papadum (though I have tasted better ones out there) and also the potato chips, which tasted like heaven, sliced thinly, heavily spiced and deep-fried. Ah, such indulgence. Then you can opt to drown your rice in dhal or chicken/fish curry. Lastly, there is rasam and one light tangy milk (in the picture, which I don't know what it is, if someone can tell me I'll be so grateful, never mind if its just a guess) and also yoghurt to soothe off all the spice, which are now madly meld on your tongue and in your tummy. Take note that, they will charge an extra dollar for the yoghurt as we had asked to clarify when we saw it on our bill. In addition, my friend ordered a mutton curry, which is reasonably priced with good portion and which of course, tasted good.

Maybe I was an Indian in my past life, but indeed much of my knowledge on the food must have been loss during my transition to this new life. I cannot really name most of the food yet or even to cook them, but one thing for sure, I absolutely love to eat them. One day I might just be able to learn the secrets of Indian cooking, but of course not to forget my own origins. I always think the spices and condiments have some kind of drug in them that makes one keep going back for more, but to me, that's a good thing. Oh no, I am addicted.

Restaurant Nasi Kandar Penang
Tesco
Damansara

Restaurant Sri Paandi (TTDI)
36, Jalan Tun Mohd Faud 1,
Taman Tun Dr Ismail,
60000 Kuala Lumpur
03-7726 8581

P/S: I went to Sri Paandi again last two night, and found the selection less than lunch time, condiments must be requested, no yoghurt or rasam, and the chips were already ‘lau fong’ (soft). So go only during busy lunch time where the service would be even faster and better!

Saturday, July 15, 2006

It's Getting Hot in Here

If you guys have noticed, I had slowed down a lot on blogging into only bout once a week. I had just started my new job, and still in process of getting the hang of things and in the midst of training. So do bear with me as I have a lot of wonderful good eats waiting to share here.

Anyway, this time I am here to post for Barbara’s The Spice is Right Event, this time with the theme ‘It’s too darn hot!’ Barbara is so right about the case that we Asian love to eat hot and spicy food even though it is darn hot out there. Why? We are mad people who like to sweat their shirt out in some road-side stall with the heat up to 38 degrees. We also like to burn our tongues when we eat and end up with red puffy lips all day. We also happens to enjoy end up with a burning sensation in our stomach all day long and maybe a big business trip to the toilet. Well, there are many reasons we Asian eats darn hot chillies in the heat, but one holds true for everyone is that it is just plain good eats.

The chili condiment that I am going to feature today is called the Sambal Chilli. It is usually served alongside the famous local dish called nasi lemak, which is the unofficial Malaysia national dish, competing with char kuey teow. Nasi lemak holds much stronger position to me as it is enjoyed by all races, young or old. Somehow I believe that it evolves from a simple Malay dish to various types of serving, somehow adapted by other cultures. There are Indian and Chinese serving nasi lemak here in Malaysia, both with their own distinctiveness, or maybe not, what is real nasi lemak anymore anyway? The basic is the rice that is cooked in coconut milk and pandan leaves for fragrance. For now there are two popular types, one which is in small servings wrapped in banana leaves, the usual breakfast fare for our locals here. As for the bigger serving style, of huge amount of lemak (fatty) rice, and lots of sambal to go with it along with some fried ikan bilis (anchovies), groundnuts and cucumbers, sometimes with egg, hardboiled or sunny-side-up and fried chicken. This is the usual mamak style fare that we eat it anytime of the day, which I called it fast food the Malaysian style.

For me, as I grew up in Taiping, with not much of wondering around and not much of mamak stalls available, I have not been really expose to the wonders of nasi lemak. When I then came to KL I started to try it out both the breakfast and the mamak style. To me, the best of the nasi lemak comes not only from the coconut milk rice, but the sambal that goes with it. It must be hot with enough kick, while slightly sweet and tangy. Now I would share with you one fool-proof and darn hot

Sambal Chilli

I got this recipe from KC, and it yields quite a large portion of sambal, thus I had scaled it down by half when I did it. But if you have a large family to feed, I would definitely recommend you to make the whole batch since you are doing the same amount of job and it keeps really well too. According to Gina (founder of KC and the one who shared this recipe) it can last for 1 month in room temperature (away from sunlight), 2 months in the fridge and 6 months or longer in the freezer! How cool is that? As for me, after eating bout half the batch, I took the liberty by adding fried ikan bilis (anchovies) to it for the nasi-lemak-style sambal which I’m not sure would the shelf life be shorten, but I remembered keeping it for quite sometime in the fridge. As the recipe that follows, most of the ingredients are just for guidelines, you can add more or less of whichever fancy you most. I had also reduced the sugar amount as I like my sambal more hot than sweet. Amount of oil is also adjustable, some like their sambal drowning in it, but as for me, I am a little health (or weight ha-ha) conscious, thus I reduced the oil amount quite a bit and it still turn out great.

100g red chilli
2 pcs of assam keluk/gelugor (tamarind slice)
100g sugar
10 shallots
6 cloves of garlic
250ml tamarind pulp juice (or dilute tamarind paste in hot water)
80ml oil
2 lime, juiced

Grind together the chillies, onions and garlic into a smooth paste
Add in sugar, tamarind juice and assam keluk to mix
Heat up the oil in the wok
Add in the chilli paste to cook, turning down to low heat and continue to stir fry the paste
Cook until the paste turns dark and starting to dry out
Turn off the heat and let it cool completely
Stir in the lime juice
Store in tight jars

For sambal ikan bilis:
2-3 handfuls of ikan bilis (anchovies)
Oil for frying

Heat enough oil for frying in the wok
When smoking hot, throw in the ikan bilis and fry until crispy
Take care not to burn it as it can turn from crispy to burn pretty fast
Dish out and let drain
Then stir it into the sambal, mix well
Store in tight jars again

Yields 300g of darn hot sambal

Suggestions:
Serve with nasi lemak
Goes along really well with stir-fry noodles too like my pad thai
Kicks up a notch on any regular or chinese fried rice
Leave out the ikan bilis to go with char kuey teow

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