At BDO 2013 I chose my dinner from Simon Bryant’s Dirty stall, Gado Gado, it was delicious and I have been keen to recreate it at home ever since. With a forecast maximum of 39C in Adelaide last Monday spending as little time as possible in the kitchen was high on my agenda, so this seemed pretty perfect.
Gado Gado is essentially an Indonesian salad with peanut sauce, feel free to mix and match your veggies or add some tofu if you wish. That would have required additional cooking so I didn’t bother, I just added an extra half egg per person to amp up the protein factor.
Gado Gado - Serves 6
Ingredients
4 Carrots, julienned
2 Red capsicums, julienned
Tin of baby corn, halved lengthways
Bag of bean sprouts, washed
250g Green beans, trimmed
Bunch coriander, leaves roughly chopped
1-2 eggs per person, soft boiled
Peanut Sauce
150g roasted, unsalted peanuts
2-3 dried red chillies, depending on how spicy you like it. Fresh will work fine too.
2 cloves garlic
25g palm sugar (or 2 tbsp brown sugar)
Juice of 1 lime
2 cm ginger
Salt to taste
Method
Blend the peanuts, chillies, garlic, sugar and ginger with a food processor or pound in a mortar and pestle.
Tip the mixture into a small saucepan and fry over medium heat until it starts to smell good.
Add 1 cup of water and mix well, scraping up any caramelisation from the saucepan, leave to bubble and reduce but check and stir often. Once it is getting really thick add a second cup of water and reduce some more.
It will thicken more as it cools so be careful not to reduce it too much. Add the juice of one lime and salt to taste.
Pile all your veggies onto a large serving plate together with the halved eggs and top with the still warm peanut sauce
Dig in
Tatum xx
