BUMBU CHILI PASTE

So I was watching an episode of Rick Stein’s Far Eastern Odyssey and he was in Bali having a seafood dish prepared by a Swedish chef. And the dish looked amazing! After a bit of digging and mistyping words I finally found out that the seasoning for the dish is called bumbu. I did find a recipe but it was all in grams and weight vs. the metric cups. So a bit more googling and translating and realized that I could cut the recipe I found in half.

Its a great chili paste, except I think I need to use different chili’s. The ones mentioned (in the original recipe) are large red chilies and I could only find the small red Thai variety. Until I can find a better chili, I’ll keep them in my recipe. If I can find a mild chili I think I’ll use about 20 of them, for the super hot Thai chilies, I’ll stick to 5-10 depending on how hot I want it. I used 5 for the first time around and both the Hubby and I found it a tad mild.

I’ll be attempting the actual dish later this evening and if it turns out will make another post.

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Bumbu Chili Paste (Seafood)

Ingredients

Place in a food processor

• 5-10 Thai red chilies
• 1/8 cup 5-6 cloves fresh garlic, peeled and sliced
• 1 cup 1 medium onion, rough chopped
• 1/3 cup fresh Turmeric peeled and grated (1)
• 1/4 cup 3-4" piece Ginger, peeled and sliced
• 1/2 cup peanuts
• 1 cup medium tomato, rough chopped
• 1 tbsp Coriander seeds crushed
• 1 tbsp Dried shrimp paste terasi, roasted
• 75 ml Coconut oil measured into a glass measuring cup and nuked for 20 seconds

For the frying pan

• 1 tablespoon Tamarind paste
• 125 ml Water
• 1 teaspoon Salt or salt to taste
• 3 kafir lime leaves
• 1 stalk Lemongrass cut in half then in half again (diagonal along the vertical)

Instructions

• Pulse the food processor ingredients until they form a pulp.
• Place the mix in a large frying pan and add the rest of the ingredients and simmer over low-medium heat for approximately an hour (or until water is evaporated and the marinade changes to deep golden color).
• Place in a non-metal container and use when cooled. (2)

Notes

1. Peel the tumeric like you would ginger - use the edge of a spoon to gently scrape off the skin. DO IT IN THE SINK! Under running water is even better. Then grate over a piece of wax paper. This stuff will stain anything and everything. Wear gloves or you'll be dyed a nice yellow color too.
2. Don't store in a metal container. Preferably glass as tuperware will be stained for life.

Adapted from Bali Foods