Sambal

Sambal is an Indonesian chili sauce or paste, typically made from a mixture of chillis with secondary ingredients such as shrimp paste, garlic, ginger, shallot, scallion, palm sugar, and lime juice. Sambal is an Indonesian loanword of Javanese origin (Javanese: ꦱꦩ꧀ꦧꦼꦭ꧀ sambel).
In addition to Indonesian cuisine, sambal is also an integral part of the cuisines of Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, and Sri Lanka. It has also spread through overseas Indonesian populations to the Netherlands and Suriname.
Different sambal recipes are served as hot and spicy condiments for dishes, such as lalab (raw vegetables), ikan bakar (grilled fish), ikan goreng (fried fish), ayam goreng (fried chicken), ayam penyet (smashed chicken), iga penyet (ribs), and various soto soups. There are at least 212 variants of sambal in Indonesia, most of which originate in Java.
Sambal is often described as a hot and spicy Indonesian relish. However, its main ingredient, chili pepper, is not native to Southeast Asia but originates in the Americas. Common variants used in sambal recipes include Cayenne pepper and bird's eye chili pepper (both varieties of Capsicum annuum). These variants are native to the Western Hemisphere and were introduced to the Indonesian archipelago in the 16th century by Portuguese and Spanish sailors during the Columbian exchange.
Researchers note that the people of the Maritime Southeast Asia were already familiar with a type of hot and spicy relish prior to the 16th century. A hot spice called cabya had become a valuable commodity in the Javanese market as early as the ancient Mataram Kingdom era, circa the 10th century. The 14th century Majapahit Javanese Nagarakretagama manuscript mentions lombok mirah island which is identified as Lombok island, which is also the area that produced a spice called red lombok. In today's modern Javanese, the term lombok refers to 'chilli pepper', yet the term probably originally referred to a native hot spice prior to the introduction of capsicum. The Indonesian languages' terms for 'chilli pepper' are cabai or cabe, yet the word cabya is mentioned in several ancient inscriptions and texts found in Java from the 10th century CE. Cabya is actually a reference to the Javanese long pepper or Balinese long pepper (Piper retrofractum). Historians suggest that prior to the introduction of Capsicum from the Americas in the 16th century, it was cabya that was widely used and cultivated as a hot spice in Java. Cabya is still used in Java, but the overwhelming popularity of the capsicum plants eventually pushed out cabya consumption until it was only used in traditional herbal medication and in making jamu (Javanese traditional herbal drink). Nowadays, the plant is considered rare. Another historian suggests that it was ginger that was used as a hot spice agent in the ancient form of sambal. Ginger, cabya, and andaliman are among the earliest hot spices used in early sambal-like hot relish, followed by the introduction of pepper circa 12th century from India, and finally the introduction of chili pepper from the Americas in the 16th century.
The Javanese manuscript Serat Centhini (1819–1912) records sixteen sambal variants in Java. The recipe book Mustika Rasa (1967), written and composed by Hartini Sukarno, presented 63 recipes of sambals. In 2017, Murdijati Gardjito, a food researcher from Gadjah Mada University, identified hundreds of variants of sambals in Indonesia; 212 of them have a clear origin, while 43 have an unclear origin. Java has the most of variants with 43 percent of sambal variants, Sumatra has 20 percent, Bali and West Nusa Tenggara has 8 percent, and the rest are distributed between Maluku, Kalimantan, and Sulawesi.
Like many culinary introductions and adaptations in the archipelago, over the years this hot and spicy relish branched off into an assorted array of sambal varieties, localised according to regional taste and the availability of the ingredients. Today sambal is a staple of Southeast Asian households, essential in cuisines of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Singapore.
Traditional sambals are freshly made using traditional tools, such as a stone pestle and mortar. Sambal can be served raw or cooked. There are two main categories of sambals in Indonesia, they are sambal masak (cooked) and sambal mentah (raw). Cooked sambal has undergone a cooking process that resulted in a distinct flavour and aroma, while raw sambal is mixed with additional ingredients and usually consumed immediately. Sambal masak or cooked sambals are more prevalent in western Indonesia, while sambal mentah or raw sambals are more common in eastern Indonesia.
The chilli pepper, garlic, shallot, and tomato are often freshly ground using a mortar, while the terasi or belacan (shrimp paste) is fried or burned first to kill its pungent smell as well as to release its aroma. Sambal might be prepared in bulk, as it can be easily stored in a well-sealed glass jar in the refrigerator for a week to be served with meals as a condiment. However, some households and restaurants insist on making freshly prepared sambal just a few moments prior to consuming to ensure its freshness and flavour; this is known as sambal dadak (lit. 'impromptu sambal' or 'freshly made sambal'). Nevertheless, in most warung and restaurants, most sambal is prepared daily in bulk and offered as a hot and spicy condiment.
Today some brands of prepared, pre-packed, instant or ready-to-use sambal are available in Indonesia in warung, traditional markets, supermarkets, and convenience stores. Most are bottled sambal, with a few brands available in plastic or aluminium sachet packaging. Compared to traditional sambals, bottled instant sambals often have a finer texture, more homogeneous content, and thicker consistency, like tomato ketchup, due to the machine-driven manufacturing process. Traditionally made sambals ground in a pestle and mortar usually have a coarse texture and consistency. Several brands produce bottled sambals such as Heinz ABC sambal terasi and several variants of sambal Indofood. In the Netherlands a range of pre-packed sambals in glass or plastic jar is readily available from several brands (national and store brands) from almost all supermarkets and tokos.
The most common kinds of peppers used in sambal are:
In the Indonesian archipelago, there are as many as 212 to 300 varieties of sambal. The intensity ranges from mild to very hot. Some varieties include:
Sambols in Sri Lanka differ from those originating in Malaysia and Indonesia, in that they are generally made from uncooked ingredients, such as fresh chillies, shallots, coconut, garlic, which are then ground with a mortar and pestle and mixed with a citric acid, such as lime or lemon juice. They resemble a Mexican salsa or Laotian jaew.
Jaffna Tamils make campal that is more close to a chutney.
Sambal can also be used as an ingredient to a dish, which uses a large amount of chili peppers. The dishes started with the term sambal goreng means "fried sambal" dishes. It refer to stir fried sambal mixed with certain ingredients such as sambal goreng kentang (potato), sambal goreng hati (liver), sambal goreng krechek (cow's skin), sambal goreng teri (anchovy), etc. In Padang cuisine, any dishes started with balado- (lit: with chili pepper) indicate the sambal-mixed dish. Dishes bearing the word sambal include: