RECIPE: QUAIL EGGS AND PRAWN SAMBAL

Both Mr G and I love the Malaysian style sambal. We get the ‘jitters’ if we don’t have it at least a couple of times a month. To this day, after 17 years of marriage Mr G still intrigues me – his passion for hot spicy food, that even me, a true born Malaysian, still cannot take the ‘heat’ like he can. Sometimes he will make a curry that ‘hot’ that even I can’t eat it! I keep telling him that he must have been a ‘chilli farmer’ in his ‘past life’……

In the recipe below, I used prawns and quail eggs. You can use normal eggs , which I sometimes do. What I do with normal eggs is hard boil them, and then I drop them in sufficient hot oil to ‘blister’ the outsides of the eggs. When they turn golden brown, lift and drain on paper towels and use as per the recipe below.

This is one way I make Quail Eggs and Sambal Prawn

Ingredients – serves 4 to 6

30 large Green Prawns
2 large handfuls of long dried chillies* – de-seeded and soaked in hot water
8 large shallots*
Half a head of garlic*
½ thumb size galangal*
1 stalk lemon grass – white bit only and chopped*
Small piece of belacan*
1 tbsp tamarind pulp – mixed with ½ cup water and juice extracted
½ to 1 can of coconut milk – depends how hot you want your sambal to be
½ a lime juice
Salt
2 tbsp veg oil
1 onion – sliced thickly

Method

Grind together * ingredients, using the minimum of water. Heat oil in a wok and fry ingredients until oil seeps through and the water has evaporated. Next add in the tamarind juice. Cook for 2 to 3 mins. Season with salt.

Add in the coconut milk and stir well. Cook for a minute and then add in the prawns. Cook until the prawns are done (around 3 mins).

Add in the eggs and onions, stir for 30 secs. Turn off the heat and add in the lime juice. Lift and serve with dishes such as NASI LEMAK and KANG KONG BELACAN.