Dear Mbak Linette,

here’s a kid-friendly chilli sauce for your girls. Easy to make and versatile for many dishes. Hope they like it!

Sambal tomat along with sambal kacang, are probably the first “spicy” condiments that most Indonesian kids try out; unless you’re like Asti The Seven-Year-Old-Masochist and go straight for the hot stuff, crying all the while. I’ll write up the sambal kacang recipe soon, ya. I got my daughter Ata on this too, before gradually getting her on spicier dishes.

Love,

Sami.

What you need for 2 cups of sambal tomat

• 1 tablespoon coconut oil.
• 2 cloves garlic, minced.
• 1 small shallot, finely diced.
• 10 ripe cherry tomatoes, washed and halved length-wise.
• ½ teaspoon brown sugar.
• 2 red chillies, thinly sliced diagonally: de-seed if the kids have very low spicy-ness threshold.
• Salt and pepper to taste.

Instructions

In a frying pan over medium heat, sauté garlic and shallot in coconut, until fragrant and the garlic softens. Add the tomatoes. The tomatoes will start to sweat, and the sambal will be quite watery at first. Let some liquid reduce, about 5 minutes. Don’t let the liquid disappear, you need it to dissolve the sugar.

Add the sugar, and the 2 chillies. Stir well, to combine. Let further reduce, about 10 minutes. The final consistency should be similar to a tomato dip: no liquid running off when spooned over food.

Place into a clean jar, let cool before closing the lid. Should be good in the fridge for up to 7 days, but we usually eat it all in a couple of days.

Gradual spicing up

We put this sambal tomat over fried tofu or tempeh, hot steamed white rice, anything you fancy really! Another variation is a green version of this sambal tomat: green tomatoes, green chillies and a handful of parsley.

Eventually you can either add more chillies, or change the type of chilli. Just in case: rice, yoghurt and sour cream are really the best things to put out a disco in one’s mouth.

Enjoy!