FIRE IN MY BLOOD (Addicted to Sambal)

You know you’re truly hooked on something when you begin to miss it even before being deprived of it. Here I am, heading into my last few weeks in Indonesia, and already I’m jonesing for sambal, and using more of it than any sane westerner should.

Sambal is the condiment of choice in Indonesia. It is fiery hot and a tad piquant, and its main ingredients are ground up red chilis, shallots, a bit of shrimp paste and garlic. That’s the basic idea, but there are 300 varieties of sambal across the Indonesian archipelago, some of which use local fruits, spices, palm sugar and other ingredients to create variations on a theme. There is a version called  tempoyak that is made from fermented durian, but I have not encountered it yet. Traditionally, sambal is made with a stone mortar, and restaurants (even warungs) have their own jealously guarded recipes and devotees.

Preparing Sambal (from Wikipedia)

I have always been a hot sauce guy. At home we bring out two or three different commercial hot sauces at lunch and dinner. If we’re not eating cereal or frozen yogurt, it probably has hot sauce on it. When I got to Indonesia, one of my guide books counseled the use of just a little bit of the sambal usually found in a small crock pot or very small round side dish at almost every restaurant, “just to brighten things up a bit.” But Lord help me, it’s a slippery slope. The stuff is addictive, and you find that you need more and more to get that spicy, fiery high. Then you begin to notice that you’re planning meals and choosing restaurants based on the sambal offerings. You will even forgive less-than-excellent food if the sambal compensates. During meals you see friends dipping into their sambal, getting completely red in the face and breaking into a sweat while their eyes are closed in rapture, and you wonder “Did Rowan take it too far this time…” One of my room mates gets take out from a certain place because they have her sambal of choice. It was an ugly scene at the house last week when the restaurant sent her order over without the red stuff. She was an unhappy camper, for days.

So now I’m a bit worried. How will I get along without it? Is there an Asian specialty foods store in Boston that can hook a brother up? And will Tabasco cut it now that the fire is in my blood? Stay tuned.