I bought a bag of red chillies at the markets to make sambal oelek. Meanwhile, my mum has requested a post on “something other than your bento”. So here we go.
The basic recipe is chillies, vinegar and a bit of salt. You’re supposed to grind it up with a mortar and pestle, but I’m far too lazy for that. It’s the blender all the way today.
I had this many chillies, which were washed in lukewarm water with a tiny squirt of detergent, rinsed well and spread out on a teatowel to dry. It’s not strictly necessary but these ones were pretty dusty.
I cut off the stalks, chopped them up roughly and put them in a blender. This is one time I take the warnings about wearing a pair of rubber gloves when chopping chillies seriously. By the end of the chopping, the tips of the gloves were stained red.
There’s also a sneaky teaspoon of tamarind paste in there. Strictly optional. I like tamarind.
I added a good splash of vinegar (I used rice wine vinegar, because that’s what I had in the cupboard. I think any vinegar would work). Add just enough to get the chillies moving around. I added a bit, blended a bit and added a bit more. I probably put in a bit over a 1/4 cup (60 ml) in all up. I also put in about 30ml water, because I’m impatient – it would’ve worked better with about 15ml more vinegar.
Once it was pretty well smooshed, I put in 4 tsp of salt – based on the ratio of 2 tsp for about 25 chillies (very exact, obviously) and did a final blast to mix the salt through. It looks quite smooth in the picture above, but it’s actually a fairly chunky paste.
The final product:
And into a sterilised jar and then to the fridge it goes. The little bit of foaminess at the top is just from the blending (and adding too much water). Should last a month or two. It’s fairly stupid mould that tries to grow on a jar of blended chilli, vinegar and salt.
The end. Hope that’s sufficient, Ma.
The final product – a little more watery than planned, but smelled very yummy.
