100 - Ayam Masak Habang - Fried Chicken in Spicy Tomato Sauce

Fried Chicken in Spicy Tomato Sauce

(recipe below)

And today's chicken was especially hairy! Sounds funny until you gotta be the one to pluck those hairs...

Dinner tonight for two was Ayam Masak Habang also known as Ayam Masak Merah or Fried Chicken in Spicy Tomato Sauce. My fiance loves south east asian cuisine especially 'spicy' south east asian cuisine and I must say that I have come to love it as much as he does.

In Singapore, we were spoilt for choice. everywhere you turned, you find such a great variety of cuisine, from indonesian, to chinese, to thai, to eurasian, to japanese etc. That is the experience I hope to recreate in my blog. I love the food of Singapore and I hope to share with you what is Singaporean food the home-cooked way. This is for all singaporeans abroad and those of you that have yet to visit the beautiful garden city of Singapore.

I must admit that I have never appreciated the tremendous variety that came at such ease when I was living in Singapore. All this changed when I moved to the 'Sunny' city of Dubai. Do not get me wrong, Dubai is a great place with great food but just not true blue south east asian food. It is this author's dream to be able to bring great South East Asian food to this cosmopolitian city and I am working on realising the dream. That will be another adventure...

Now for the recipe:
*P.S.: We love our food really spicy so please feel free to reduce the amount of chillies used as per your preference.

Ingredients:
1 Chicken ( 800 gm - 1 kg), cut into serving pieces
Oil for Deep frying

1 Stalk of Lemongrass, bruised

2 Tomatoes, cut into quarters
Salt and sugar to taste

Spice Paste:

3-4 Medium sized shallots
10 Big red Chillies
3-4 Chilli Padis
4 Candlenuts, pan roasted
3-4cm Ginger

5-6cm Galangal (Blue Ginger)

11/2tsp Dried Shrimp Paste, pan roasted
1tbsp Fish Sauce
1tbsp Soy Sauce

How to do it:
First, prepare the chicken by rubbing with lemon juice and some salt. I use bottled lemon juice for convenience's sake but feel free to squeeze some fresh lemons! Let the chicken sit in its lemon/salt bath for about 15 minutes.
Next, blend the spice paste together. I always pan roast my spices ie candlenuts/cumins/aniseed etc before I blend them. This brings out the flavour of the spices. I prefer to blend my spice paste with oil instead of water as I find that there is less splatter when you fry the spice paste.
Deep fry the chicken until golden brown.
Heat up your wok with about 3 tbsp of oil. You gauge. Using medium to high heat, saute the spice paste till ready. Add the tomatoes and lemongrass. Add more oil if necessary. You can also add some water to dilute the spice paste but not too much so that it becomes watery. This takes about 30 - 45 mins.
Finally, add the fried chicken pieces and cook for about 10 - 15 mins more for the fried chicken to absorb the spice paste.

Cook's notes:

• you can substitute cashew nuts for candlenuts if not available. Thats what I use anyways.
• I have found that indonesian/peranakan/malay cooking is different from cooking chinese food. The trick to getting it right is the blend of the spice paste and the length of cooking the spice paste. No short cuts, unfortunately. If you cut short the length of time of cooking the spice paste, you will never be able to experience the true flavour of the dish. So to all those cook books that tells you it takes only 15 mins to cook the spice paste, I am afraid that they are lying to you! However, its all with good intentions as they probably do not want to turn you off cooking the dish as you think that it will take too long!
• Now, I find that most cook books never tell you when its ready. They always say, till ready or till fragrant. But I can assure you that the fragrance starts almost as soon as you start sauteing the spice paste. I always cook the spice paste until the chillies start to turn a deep red like my picture and oil starts seeping out from the spice paste. Now, if you notice that the spice paste is starting to look tacky or matte in colour, you have to add in more oil to fry in order for that lovely red colour to develop.
• For this recipe, you may substitute the lemon juice for tamarind juice if you prefer.
• I did not add any more tamarind juice to my spice paste as I found that my chicken had already absorbed the sourish tangy flavour of the lemon bath. But feel free to add more if you prefer a more tangy taste.
• You may also substitute 1 more tomato if you are using less chillies.
• On a last note, after numerous trials and errors of preparing spice paste, I have learnt to recognise the smell of the various spice pastes that I am preparing. For instance, a Laksa spice paste will be different from a Beef Rendang spice paste. This guides me as to whether I have blended the ingredients in the correct amounts.

What is it supposed to taste like?
This recipe if cooked right will taste slightly tangy, with a subtle sweetness and of course spicy. It is meant to have a thick paste. It is very delicious and believe me, not that difficult to prepare at all. I hope you will enjoy this dish as much as we did!