Indonesian foods are indeed the best ones. In all the countries in South East Asia, Indonesia has the most kinds of food in numbers and varieties. Like the foods you already seen in previous articles like the traditional dishes or maybe the traditional snacks. They came in many different forms and many different flavor. But of course, the people’s favorite dish is the one that came with sambal. So what is this Sambal about?
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- Traditional Cakes in Indonesia
- Traditional Food of Java
- Famous Food of Indonesia
- Indonesian Street Food List
Those Indonesian foods are not fa from the traditinal Indonesian hot sauce called Sambal. Talking about sambal, it’s one of our habits that we must have a sambal during our eating time. Indonesian people can’t be divided with it. To make it less boring, we combined so many things with it. Thus the combinations of sambal created. There are so many of them to be honest, here are few of them that included in 20 types of Indonesian sambal:
1. The Green Chili Sambal
The first one is the Green Sambal or the sambal that people call as Sambal Ijo. Ijo means green, for your information. This little devil can be found in almost all the Nasi Padang, you can even order it alone, with some little price of course. The sambal is also good to eat during the meal time everyday, but it’s recommended to eat during lunch, to open your eyes. But, consuming during breakfastd during the breakfast is not recommended.
If you can make it your own, just prepare the ingredients like green chilli, green tomato, onions, some sugar n saltm and also cooked with frying oil. Just stumble them all together into a bowl, don’t use blender because it can break the sambal texture. Add some sugar and salt, suit them to your level. And finally cook them altogether with frying oil.
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2. Sambal Kecap (Chili with Sweet Soya Sauce)
The next one is another unique combination between the sweet soya sauce with the sambal. This sambal kecap creates the sweet and spicy taste in one sip. So many people really love it, and use this sambal as the additional topping for their chicken, or fish. This sambal kecap alsoc an be found on several foods like tempe penyet.
The way to make it is pretty simple. All you need is preparing some stuff like the chillis, sweet soya sauce, tomato, and red onion. Combine all the ingredients except the sweet soya sauce, because we will add this when the combination is done. Then you can have youe own, home made Sambal Kecap.
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3. Sambal Bawang (Onion)
Next, is the Onion Sambal. This sambal is actually became trend not long ago, and mainly introduced in many stalls, like in the sellers out there, and the ones that located in a campus. Some people also packed this into an interesting package that usually sold also in university. The sambal has the unique smell of onion, and also great taste that came from the combination of both.
If you don’t want to bother goingout there to get one, you can make it yourself at your own comfy home. Prepare some things like red chilli, garlic, red onion, and frying oil to cook it. It;s pretty simple to make, all you have to do is combine them all into one bowl.
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4. Sambal Tomat (Tomato)
Even though there’s the saos sambal or you can call as ketchup, but the Sambal Tomat is way better than those packaged ketchup. It’s more refreshing and also a little bit salty, but very tasteful, The addition of onions is always a good one.
The main ingredient in here is of course tomato, which you can find so easily in the grocery store, and the have some onions to make it way better. Crush them and then add some sugar and salt to make it more tasteful. Then it’s done.
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5. Sambal Terasi
For you who don’t know what Terasi is, Terasi is the local shrimp paste, that looks really different from the other shrimp paste put there. You can find the same taste and the same form of shrimp taste called Terasi, only in Indonesia.
When combined with the Tomato Sambal, the Sambal Terasi created. The taste of course is really good especially when combined with foods that have basic ingredient of chicken, beef, or other meat.
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6. Sambal Bajak
For you who want to try the mid level of a sambal, a sambal that has not too hot spicyness, then you should try this sambal called Sambal Bajak. There’s this sweet taste that came from another ingredient, and also an ingredient that make it more fresh.
The ingredients are the tamarind and palm sugar. You maybe need some salt to make it more balance. Or maybe you can add some terasi, make it better than ever. And then, you can create your own Sambal Bajak with ease.
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7. Sambal Dabu-dabu
This sambal doesn’t require a cooking tool with the name of pestle, so you don’t have to worry because of not having it around. In fact, there are two sambals that don’t need a pestle to process it, this one and the other sambal below, Sambal Matah.
Just like the basic ingredients of the sambals above, the main stuff is of course almost the same, like tomatoes, cayennes, red chillis, shallots, some lime water, and of course cooking oil. You just need to cut them and then put them in a bowl after being cooked by frying oil.
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8. Sambal Matah
Sambal Matah, the other sambal that doesn’t need a pestle. The colour of this sambla is not the same as the other sambals out there, because this sambal mainly uses shallots. This sambal only added with small portion of cayennes.
The Sambal Matah also doesn’t need to be cooked, so you can eat it immediately after several minutes making it. Eve though the onions can give you bad breath, but it doesn’t matter as long your Sambal Matah tasted good.
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9. Sambal Mangga (Mango)
Even though the name of this Sambal is the Mango Sambal, that doesn’t mean this sambalhas the sweet taste of mango. The mango used in this sambal is the young one, that has pretty sour taste. Yep, you can eat it as the addition for rice or other meals.
This can also be named as simple rujak. Mango with sweet tasteful sauce made from palm sugar, and completed woth some salt. This sambal has two uses, as the additional sauce and can becoming a snack.
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10. Sambal Belut (Eel)
This sambal can be the best stomach filling out there. You can imagine, eating a sauce that has side dish in it. The taste of it is pretty good though, especially if you used the pretty cooked eel to it. Thus can create the combination between savory and hot altogether.
This sambal can be a great option if you eating sea foods, or just having rice with you. With this sambal, you don’t actually need the other side dish. Just this sambal and a plate of rice can be a great meal to fill your stomach pretty quick.
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Those are ten types of sambal, there are ten more sambal await you. So here’s the small list of the other ten types of sambal that you should try:
- Sambal Petai
- Sambal Tempoyak
- The Fried Fish Sambal
- Fish Satay Sambal
- Fried Potato Sambal
- Sambal Cibiuk
- Sambal Peda
- Sambal Tempeh and Beans
- Sambal Teri
- Sambal Tumpang
So those are the twenty types of Indonesian sambal, sambals that have so many different flavor. Because of rich in flavor, you can choose your own favorite sambal that you like. If you come by some restaurants or stalls, surely that will be at least five types of sambal served in there. If you want to create it, feel free to do it, and try your best combination of sambal. Maybe your creation can be the best sambal variation. Just measure the balance of it, the sweet level, the savory and the hot level must be balanced. Sambal can’t be too sweet, nor too hot.
Too much sweet can destroy the essence of sambal, and if too hot, the sambal can’t even be consumed. Just do your own measure about the sambal, be sure that the sambal can be consumed by you, make sure that it’s not too hot for yourself.
