SAMBAL DABU-DABU | MANADONESE SPICY SALSA

This is how I learnt how to eat spicy food! Sambal Dabu - dabu is a staple condiment in Manadonese household. In the next few posts I'll be posting recipes for food that you eat with dabu - dabu.   

If you can handle the heat, you'd love this sambal. It is super fresh, you'll get an explosion of heat biting into the chili, the tomatoes sooth the burn in your tongue and the shallot add a mild spicy taste and a crisp texture. 

In the photos I'm showing you how my Pap makes Dabu - dabu. He uses ulekan (= flat mortar and pestle) to grind all the ingredients together. I personally like the chopped version because you're keeping the texture of the tomatoes and shallot and you can still have something to bite. If Pap is in the kitchen, he'd make the ulek version and I would protest :P 

Ingredients 

• 1 large tomato, diced
• 1 medium shallot, thinly sliced 
• 4 bird's eye chilli (red or green), sliced to 5 mm pieces
• juice of 1 lime
• 1 teaspoon of salt

Method

• Add all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Done! 

Notes

• If you can't handle the heat, you can substitute the chilis with red paprikas. I do this all the time for my Dutch family. 
• If you still want to use the bird's eye chilli and want to lessen the heat, remove the pits and finely chop the chilis.