Sambal Trassi

It’s this simple. You make a sambal trassi or terasi with a generous amount of chilies (20), half a teaspoon of salt and trassi. That is concentrated shrimp pasta you can buy at Asian shops (used a lot in Thai cuisine too).

Trassi has a very strong fishy scent and flavor. It is used a lot in Indonesian vegetable and noodle dishes. It turns every stir-fry dish into Asian food. ;-).

This amount is enough for 10 people and is made in 10 or 30 minutes (by hand in mortar).

Sambal terasi #16 translated from Beb Vuyk Groot Indonesisch Kookboek, page 57.

Ingredients

20 lomboks
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of terasi

Preparation like sambal oelek and rub the terasi through.

You can use any chili pepper for a sambal; make is at hot as you like. You can use small green or red peppers (more spicy that regular ones) or Madame Jeanette which is crazy spicy.

I love simple red peppers. They are not too hot so I can control the spicyness better. Sometimes I deseed half of the amount of peppers so make it less spicy.

I can get trassi in dry or wet (paste-like) form. Both work well, although I often think dry trassi has a stronger flavor.

I used my cobek (mortar) this time to rub the chilies by hand. That takes some time and the sambal has a rougher texture. I like it this way to serve with soup for example. But if I need a smoother chili salsa sambal, I use my emersion blender to do the job.

But if I need a smoother chili salsa sambal, I use my emersion blender to do the job. I like smooth sambal with babi kecap or rendang.