Sambal Chicken

Sambal Chicken, its flavorful and yummy chicken dish. Sambal is a spicy, chilly based sauce or relish that is popular in many countries across South East Asia, especially Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. Once the sambal paste is ready then its an easy dish to prepare. The kitchen smelled wonderful while it was cooking. Its my husbands one of the favorite chicken dish 😊. 

The sauce consists of ground or pureed chillies and include small amount of other ingredients such as green chilli, shallots, ginger and garlic. Here is a sambal chicken recipe for you all to try. 

Ingredients

• Chicken 1 kg cut into medium pieces and marinate with lemon juice and salt.
• Sambal Paste
• Chopped fresh coriander leaves

For Sambal Paste

• Kashmiri Chilli 15-20
• Shallots 1/2 cup
• Green chilli 2 (for spiciness)
• Tomato 1 large diced (or 2 tbsp thick tomato paste)
• Garlic 6 to 7 cloves
• Ginger 2 inch slice
• Palm sugar / Jaggery 1 small piece
• Candle nut 3(it is added for texture but its optional)
• Salt to taste
• Oil 1/4 cup or more

Method

Sambal Paste 

Wash and soak the dry chilli in warm water and kep it aside for 15 minutes. 

Squeeze the chilli and add the other ingredients except salt and oil in a blender and blend to a paste.

Heat a large kadai and add oil and fry the sambal along with salt until the oil separates. Once it cool down dish it out and store in clean bottles and keep it in the fridge or use it immediately to make any dish.

Now take a big kadai or deep pan and oil, once the oil is heat enough add the prepared sambal paste in the oil and fry for 3 minutes, add in the chicken pieces and stir to combine. Saute for 2 minutes. Add 1/4 cup of water and combine well and cook the chicken.

Cover with a lid and let it simmer until the chicken is cooked through and the gravy is well coated over the chicken. Stir well in-between so that it won't stick on the bottom. Check salt , if need add accordingly. Once the water evaporated well stir fry the chicken for 2 minutes then put of flame. Sprinkle coriander leaves and serve hot. 

Enjoy with roti or as a side dish for biriyani. 

NB: Chili you can add according to your spice level. Candle nut is used in many Asian dishes, particularly curries, as a thickening agent so if you dont get those can substitute with almonds or cashew nuts. You can prepare the sambal paste in advance and keep it in the fridge then you can use one making the dish. with the same recipe you can try prawns or fish. Enjoy cooking..