Gado Gado,Vegetable Salad With Peanut Sauce

This Malaysian salad is one of my most favorite salads. You may serve it as an arranged salad, or tossed in a glass bowl as it is very colorful and attractive. There are two simple components to this dish , the peanut sauce ,which acts as the dressing  and the vegetables. I use the recipe by Vatch but feel that the vegetables should be blanched first and not left completely raw as he suggests.

Photograph by Rahul Mahtani

Ingredients

Oil for Deep -frying

2 blocks of beancurd, about 2 inch square

4 oz beansprouts

4 oz longbeans, chopped into 1 inch lengths and blanched (optional)

4 oz cucumber , thinly sliced

4 oz white cabbage , blanched and thinly sliced then broken up into strands

 2 hard boiled eggs ( omit if vegan)

PEANUT SAUCE

2 large dried red chillies, finely chopped

2 garlic cloves , finely chopped

5 small red shallots, finely chopped

1/2 tsp shrimp paste (omit if vegan) or 1 tsp soy sauce

2 tbs oil

3/4 pint coconut milk

1/2 tsp salt

1 tbs sugar

1 tsp tamarind water

4 tbs crushed peanuts

SAUCE

In a mortar pound together chillies , garlic and shallots to form a paste. Add shrimp paste or soy sauce and mix well.

Heat the oil in a wok or deep frying pan and stir in the paste. Add coconut milk and stir well. Add all the remaining ingredients together, stirring well. Cook briefly until the coconut milk comes to the boil. Remove at once from heat.

SALAD

Heat the oil and deep fry Bean curd until golden. Remove , drain and set aside.

Arrange all vegetables in a salad bowl. Shell the eggs and quarter them (if using), then place them in the salad bowl . Thinly slice the beancurd and place the slices in the bowl.

Serve with the sauce , either seperately or poured over the salad.