Description

Sambal is native to the cuisines of Indonesia and is popular throughout Malaysia, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Brunei. This Malaysian-style sambal belacan is made with shrimp paste and at its most simple contains just three ingredients – chillies, shrimp paste and lime juice. Other ingredients can then be added to personalise the mixture as I’ve done here.

The belacan (shrimp paste) has been produced by salting, drying and fermenting shrimp which makes for a very funky smelling brick of umami. Once toasted and mixed with other ingredients, however, it brings fantastic savoury depth to the sauce and plays well off the sourness and heat to balance everything. It’s an essential accompaniment to many Malaysian meals, especially the infamous nasi lemak dish.