Sambal Udang Kering

 
Ingredients:

1. dry shrimp - 1 cup cleaned and head removed
2. Shallots - 10
3. Dry red chillies - 10 deseeded and soaked in water
4. Garlic - 5 cloves
5. Oil - 1/2 cup
6. sugar - to taste
7. Salt - to taste
8. tamarin paste - 1/2 tsp
9. Shrimp paste (belachan) - 1 cm piece

 Method:
Soak de-seeded red chillies in water for 30 minutes.
clean , wash and drain shrimp and keep aside.
Add the shallots,chillies, garlic into small jar of blender and pulse to a coarse mixture.
remove this and keep aside.
In the same blender jar pulse the shrimp to a coarse paste.
Heat oil in a nonstick frying pan .
Add the crushed chilly/shallot mixture and stirfry for 5 minutes.
Add the crushed prawns and mix well.
Add salt to taste.
stirfry this mix until it is dry and turns crispy. It will take 30 -45 minutes on a low flame.
Once the mix is starting to turn dry add the tamarind and sugar and adjust flavors.
Add more oil if required - the more oil you add the easier it is to get the mix fried.
This can be stored in a clean dry jar for few weeks at room temperature.

Chicken Satay With Peanut dipping sauce

Ingredients:

1. Chicken - Breast of 1 whole chicken sliced into long thin strips. Slice it at a diagonal after freezing the chicken breast.
2. Soy sauce - 1.5 tbsp
3. Honey - 1/2 tsp
4. Garlic - 6 cloves crushed and chopped very fine
5. Chillies - 5 chopped very fine
6. Ginger - 1/2 tsp chopped very fine
7. Spring onion - 1 tbsp chopped fine
8. vinegar - 1 tsp
9. Vegetable oil - 1 tbsp + 2 tbsp for grilling /sauteing

For the peanut sauce :

1. Peanut butter - 2 tbsp
2. Coconut milk - 4 tbsp
3. Chilly garlic sauce - 1 tbsp (or you can use 1 finely chopped ripe red chilly and 2 cloves of garlic)

Method:

Marinate the chicken strips in all of the ingredients mentioned in the chicken section except for the 2 tbsp of oil.(Keep that oil aside for sauteing/grilling)
Refrigerate and leave for an hour .
Meanwhile soak the bamboo skewers in water and keep ready.
Thread the chicken strips onto the skewers ,just like how you would stitch with a needle, brush the marinade on it and prepare a grill or saute pan.
I sauteed it on my chappathi tawa.
Heat the pan on high and add 1 tbsp oil and spread the oil around.(you might have to cook it in 2 batches)
Place the chicken skewers on the pan

Grill until cooked - The chicken pieces are sliced very thin so it only takes 2-3 minutes to get cooked.
Overcooking it makes the satay dry .Depending on the thickness of your satay cook the chicken until done.
serve hot with peanut dipping sauce and salad .


To make the peanut sauce - combine the peanut butter, coconut milk and chilly garlic sauce in a microwave safe dish or sauce pan and stir well.
Once the ingredients are well combined , cook or microwave until it has thickened . (About 2 minutes in microwave stirring in between).

Tamarind shrimp

Ingredients:

1. Shrimp - 25 (medium large size cleaned and deveined leave the tail on)
2. Tamarind pulp - 1 tbsp (not the concentrate , if using concentrate use 1/4'th of a tsp)
3. Sugar - 1/4 tsp
4. Soy sauce - 1 tbsp
5. crushed red pepper flakes - 1 tsp
6. Garlic - 2 cloves crushed fine
7. Oil - 2 tbsp

Method:
Add the tamarind pulp, soy sauce,crushed pepper, garlic and sugar into the prawns and mix well .Let it Marinate for 15 minutes.

Heat up a non stick frying pan and add the oil.
When the oil is hot add the shrimp into the pan fry until cooked and slightly burnt.

Nasi Lemek

Nasi lemak is the national dish of Malaysia.In Malay Nasi Lemek means 'rice in cream'.Traditionally, this comes as a platter of food wrapped in banana leaf, with cucumber slices, salted dried anchovies, roasted peanuts, hard boiled egg, and hot spicy sauce at its core.

Reminds me of our Pothi choru .Here is my version with ingredients that I had on hand.

Ingredients for rice:

1. Basmati rice - 1 cup washed and drained.
2. Coconut Milk - 2 cups.
3. 1 piece of ginger and a bay leaf.
4. salt to taste

Cook the rice in coconut milk adding the ginger piece and bay leaf and salt.

For the Prawn sambal:

1. cleaned prawns - 2 cups.
2. Onion - 1 big.
3. Tomatoes - 2 medium.
4. ginger and garlic chopped - 1tsp.
5. Powdered dry shrimp - 1 tsp(optional).
6. soy sauce - 4 tsp.
7. Chilly sauce - depending on how spicy you want the dish to be(you could use chilly powder instead).

Saute the chopped onion,ginger/garlic,tomatoes in oil.
add in the powdered dry shrimp and the soy sauce and chilly sauce and the shrimp and cook until done.It should be on the drier side with not a lot of gravy.