Coconut rice with sambal and okra
Instructions:
- Breakfast is the one meal in the day when cultural boundaries aren’t easily crossed - even the most experimental and daring of eaters revert to what they know and like, which is their mom’s cooking. I dare you to serve it for breakfast! And be warned: it is very hot.
Crisp-fried shallots are available from Asian grocers. You can also make them yourself, or substitute dried onion flakes.
Sambal
- 5 fresh red chiles (1 oz in total), seeded
- 5 dried red chiles (1/8 oz in total), seeded
- 20 baby shallots (4 oz in total), peeled
- 1 garlic clove, peeled
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 tbsp water
- 1 tbsp thick tamarind water (seedless tamarind pulp whisked with a little water, then strained)
- 1 tbsp sugar
- Rice
- 1 2/3 cups basmati rice
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 3/4 cup coconut milk
- 1 1/2 cups water
- 6 kaffir lime leaves (optional)
- 6 thin slices of fresh ginger
- 1 1/4 lbs (6 cups) okra, trimmed
- 2 tbsp crisp-fried shallots
- large handful of roughly chopped cilantro
- 2 limes, halved
- To make the sambal.
- Place the fresh and dried chiles, shallots, garlic and salt in a food processor and add 2 tablespoons of the oil and the water. Blitz for about a minute, or until you get a fine paste (this can also be made using a mortar and pestle but without the liquids; add these once you have a paste).
- Set a wok or a large heavy frying pan on high heat. Once hot, add the remaining oil and heat up well. Now add the chile paste and stir. Reduce the heat at once to avoid burning and cook on a low simmer, stirring frequently, for 5 to 10 minutes, or until you get a beautiful dark-red oily paste. Off the heat, stir in the tamarind water and sugar. Set aside.
- To make the rice.
- Wash the rice well under plenty of cold running water. Drain well and put into a medium saucepan. Heat the rice up a little, then add the salt, coconut milk, water, lime leaves and ginger. Stir and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat to a minimum, cover and leave to simmer for 12 minutes. Remove from the heat and leave, covered, for 10 minutes. Before serving, fluff up the rice with a fork.
- While the rice is cooking bring a medium pan of water to the boil. Throw the okra into the boiling water and cook for 2 to 3 minutes only, so it remains firm. Drain, rinse under cold running water and leave to dry.
- When you are ready to serve, reheat the sambal in its pan. Add the okra and stir just to warm it up (don’t cook it any more). Spoon some rice into each serving bowl or plate. Top with okra and sambal, and sprinkle with fried shallots and chopped cilantro. Place a lime half on the side of each bowl and encourage everybody to squeeze its juice liberally on top.