Tomato Sambal Recipe

Online shopping is a boon to most of us. We don't have to step out of the house, drag the kids, or even our own feet, and make our way to the store, to purchase those sweet things we want to buy. And now, with Tesco online grocery shopping, things have just gone sweeter!

Living in a condo now, it is rather a chore to do grocery shopping buying all those bulky items, and gather the whole family to transport things upstairs. In this case, online shopping is really useful that you can plan, pick and add your items to your cart. 

However as with anything online, it has several disadvantages. One being you can get carried away, over-buy, and in my case, accidentally buy things in larger amounts or sizes. A month ago I ordered RM1.80 worth of fresh turmeric, and I received turmeric so much that I am still using it up slowly. One of the things I made was this tropical juice. Ever since, I have also added fresh turmeric in most of my cooking.

Two weeks ago, I had another Tesco delivery fiasco, when I received 2.5kg of tomatoes, and some obscene amount of calamansi limes (I had ordered RM3 worth). I put my thinking cap on and got planning!

I took the big amount of tomatoes to my stride (and into the fridge). I decided to make some tomato sambal that would go with rice, and even for our idli weekends (oh yes, there is such a thing in our household).

To my embarrassment, I realise that I did not snap a pic of the tomato sambal. However, I can still share the recipe of my sambal here.

For the sambal, I take about 3 onions, 5-6 cloves of garlic, about 3-4 inches of ginger, 7-9 dried chilli (soaked in hot water), 2cm of raw turmeric. Give it a nice blend with some water. Set aside.

Heat the pan with some oil, add 2 chopped onion and lemongrass (chopped too), sautee till fragrant. Then you can add the blended mixture, and let it simmer for 20-30 minutes or longer if you need to. Halfway here you can add 5-6 chopped tomatoes. If you feel the sambal is drying up very fast, you can keep adding water to your desired consistency. Season with salt and brown sugar to your liking. In my case, I keep trying till I get it right. The level of heat of the dried chilli really differs every time.

Tomato sambal goes well with plain rice, nasi lemak (especially if you are going vegetarian) and even with mee hoon! 

Everything has a silver lining. I started using turmeric into my sambal paste since the over-buy of turmeric and I have discovered turmeric really enhances the taste and gives the sambal a vibrant red hue. After the tomato sambal I used the calamansi to make some refreshing juice which I will share soon. Happy trying!