Dunster loves peanut sauce and I’ve got some leftover peanut sauce (made Malaysian Satay with Peanut Sauce) in the freezer and decided to make stirfried chicken satay to go with it. The leftover peanut sauce was properly defrosted overnite in the fridge and then warmed up in a pot (or microwave).

Serves 4; Preparation Time: 30 mins+Overnight Marinate Time; Cooking time: ±60 mins

Ingredients:

  • 1kg chicken thigh fillets or beef tenderloin, cut into 1x2x3cm pieces
  • 2 red onions, peeled, halved, cut each half into 4 wedges

Marinade Ingredients: to be blended into paste

  • 2 tbsp coriander seeds
  • 1 tbsp ground cumin seeds
  • 5 shallots or 1 medium red onion, peeled & chopped
  • 2 clove garlic sliced
  • 1 tsp ground or 2cm fresh turmeric, peeled & chopped
  • 4 stalks lemongrass, pale part only and remove any dry outer layers, sliced finely
  • 1cm galangal peeled & chopped
  • 4 tbsp brown sugar
  • 1½ tsp salt
  • ¼ tsp dark soy sauce
  • 4 tbs sunflower oil

Homemade Satay Sauce Ingredients: (in case there isnt any in the freezer)

  • 15 shallots or 2 medium red onions, peeled & chopped
  • 20 dried red chillies, stalks discarded, deseeded, soaked in boiling water till soft & drained
  • 8 cloves garlic, peeled & chopped
  • 2cm galangal, chopped
  • 2 stalks lemongrass, pale part only and remove any dry outer layers, sliced finely
  • 1 – 2 tbs tamarind paste (also can be extracted from pulp)
  • 2/3 cup brown sugar
  • 2 tsp salt
  • 200ml vegetable oil
  • 1 cup water
  • 2 tbsp lime juice
  • 500g salted, roasted, crushed peanuts

Fruit/Vegetable to serve:

  • half a pineapple cut into bite sized pieces – optional
  • red onion, cut into 3 cm pieces & layers separated
  • cucumber, cut into 3 cm pieces or into angled chunks

Preparation – Marinade:

  1. Pound lemongrass, shallots, galangal and garlic in a mortar (with pestle) to a fine paste. (or use a blender.)
  2. Toast cumin and coriander in a fry pan till fragrant, mortar and pestle it, then place in a bowl.
  3. Add lemongrass mixture to toasted spices.
  4. Then add brown sugar, salt, dark soy and oil.
  5. Marinate meat overnight in a snaplock bag (or container with lid) making sure all the air is pushed out first and meat is totally covered in marinade.
  6. Preheat 2 tbsp sunflower oil a flat pan on medium heat.
  7. Add in marinated pcs of meat and leave them to cook and caramelise on 1 side before turning over to cook and caramelise on other side, abt 5 mins. Cook in batches till all meat is done. Set aside.
  8. At the same time, also fry red onions till soft and slightly caramerlised.
  9. When all meat’s nicely brown and cooked, add in cooked onions and mix evenly.
  10. Serve stirfried satay meat with homemade peanut sauce, cucumber and red onion.

Preparation – Homemade Satay Sauce:
(This sauce makes twice the amount you will need but it doesn’t really work to make less. It is however, freezer friendly)

  1. Using a mini food processor, blitz shallots, garlic, galangal, rehydrated chillies and lemongrass in small batches to achieve a fine paste. (Be patient and don’t be tempted to add water as this will make the paste difficult to caramelise. You can instead use a mortar and pestle but you must add only small amounts of the ingredients at a time, ensuring you have a fine paste before you add more ingredients.) Set aside.
  2. Heat oil in a heavy based saucepan or wok till medium heat and pour paste in.
    Stir fry, continuing to make sure bottom isn’t catching till there is very little steam rising from sauce and can definitely see it caramelising and smell it getting fragrant.
  3. Add water and bring to boil.
  4. Add tamarind, lime, sugar, only tsp salt.
  5. Add half the amount of peanuts after adding water to sauce. The other half added just before serving, for crunch.
  6. Bring to boil again, remove from heat and set aside till required. This can be made a couple days ahead of time and keep in a glass jar in the fridge and then re-heat to serve.
  7. Serve with ketupat (compressed rice) and vegetable (skewers) on the side.

** To extract tamarind paste from the pulp, dissolve about ¼ cup pulp with ½ cup hot water. Mash and stir mixture with a fork so water and pulp become homogenized, then push mixture through a strainer and into a small bowl. This will catch all the pulp and seeds. Make sure bottom of sieve is scraped as paste is a little sticky and most of it won’t fall into bowl underneath without help. Discard pulp and seeds and reserve paste till required.

Well worth all preparation which in actual fact didn’t really take all that long or is much work if the satay and peanut sauce are made a day or 2 earlier. Or if it’s like me, there’s always some leftover peanut sauce in the freezer. 🙂



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