I received a lot of those Khadijah’s Kitchen instant pastes from my cousins in Kuching and I have tried most, if not all of them. I remember we enjoyed the chicken kapitan and the rendang tok was nice too though it was more like curry and nothing like rendang as I know it. We did not think the pajeri nenas was good though and there was a box of satay peanut paste but I can’t remember who I gave it to…and I do not seem to remember if/when I cooked another one of the lot, the asam pedas. There was just this one…
…left in the pantry – the sambal tumis.
I do recall that there was this one time when I was torn between using this one or one of another brand that we had, a product of Malaysia made for sale in Singapore, and I chose the latter only to regret it as it was not nice at all and the other morning, finally, I decided to give it a try.
It said on the box that I should add one big onion – that would be a Bombay onion, I guess so I took one, peeled it and sliced it very thinly…
…and I decided to go a step further and added a few stalks of my skinny serai (lemon grass) and a sprig of curry leaves from my garden and I just could not resist throwing in two cili padi for that extra kick!
Hmmm…it certainly looks like Ms Khadijah needs a good editor to check the language use in what she has on the boxes…
…of her products. I am sure they mean sliced onion, not slices onion…and bawang hiris, not hilis…and mix should go with with and not to…and other than those slips, I do think it should be mixture and not mixtures and KITHCEN is kitchen wrongly spelt, obviously. Oh dear! Forgive me, for I digressed a bit there but I guess that is an occupational hazard and as they say, old habits die hard. LOL!!!
I did not measure the water but I just poured a bit into the wok and added the paste in a sachet inside the box after pouring away the oil. Gee!!! Some of these things can be really oily. Then I threw in the other extra ingredients and the prawns and boiled the lot till the prawns were cooked. After letting it simmer for a while, I dished everything out…
Oh dear! That sure looked watery! Perhaps I should let it simmer longer to let the sauce thicken a little bit but I did not want to do so as I was sure the sauce would go absolutely well with rice…and I was right!
Yes, it was very nice…
…but no, it wasn’t anything like the sambal that we would get with our nasi lemak. That one would be on the sweet side but this was slightly sourish, like asam prawns or fish and it was extra spicy, so very very hot – the cili padi must be behind that as on the box, the level of spiciness was indicated as medium only.
I would say we enjoyed it very much, the last of the lot that I had at hand – they’re all gone now and please, if anyone is thinking of getting me some more, no, thank you very much. For one thing, I do know that they are not all that cheap and for another, I still have a lot of other stuff at hand that I have yet to try.
...STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! 
This would be too hot and spicy for me, but it looks very nice.
Some like it hot!
Never mind. I would add the sauce onto my rice and eat with the prawns. Yum yum.
Lol on your old habit that never die. Haha. English teacher!!!
Terrible hor! Once a teacher, always a teacher! Pandai pandai go and correct everybody! π
I heated up the leftover prawns this morning and let it simmer till it has dried up. VERY VERY nice! See my photo on Facebook. I wouldn’t mind buying this one from Khadijah’s Kitchen again if I see it in the shops.
I tried to bring back some pastes from Malaysia to my brother-in-law in Australia who loves cooking spicy food. They got confiscated at Australian customs however π¦
Oh? You’re unlucky! Have to declare…and if it is factory-produced and packed like this, they will let you through. My family and friends have got away with murder – going back via Singapore, the customs people asked, “Bee Cheng Hiang?” (barbecued pork) “Bengawan Solo?” (popular nyonya kuehs at Changi Airport) and they carted back all sorts of instant pastes and stuff, no problem at all.
Since it is slightly sourish in taste, I can assure it is an appetizing dish. Not too spicy for me too. Gravy looks great to go with a bowl of hot piping plain rice. Yummm!!!
Just don’t add the cili padi, should be fine. My missus ate…and she said, “Not spicy leh?” π¦
Oh yes, when I see Khadijah, I think of your kapitan curry already.. I thought your prawn dish looks like asam prawns instead of sambal tumis prawns, haha, but it’s still tasty, I’m not complaining..
Can’t get those here. π¦ This morning, I simmered the leftover till the sauce has dried up – very very nice, just like the sambal udang at the nasi lemak stalls, but not sweet like some of theirs. I like!!! Sure would buy the paste again if i happen to see it. Hint! Hint! Dijamin sampai hari esok. π π π
Love the fact that you have deveined the shrimps, such great details can only be found in home-cooked dishes
They do not do it outside. Eyewwwwww!!!! They do it here – in the restaurants, at least…dunno the chap fan and nasi campur places. Don’t think they ever have prawns, so expensive. RM19 a kilo for these small ones – used to be less than RM15. π¦
IDK anything about this food or the way it tastes, but i’d say from the looks of it (and you mentioned about spicy), i think that i’d love this one. π
I bet you would. Malaysian cuisine, simply the best!
Loves this dish, cannot resist, hehe…
Bet you would. Can get at the nyonya restaurants there, very nice. Add petai! Yum yummmm!!!!
Talking about poor grammar. The vocabulary workbook that my department printed has 55 grammatical errors, but nobody seems to care.
The West Malaysian publishers pay peanuts, so they get all the monkeys!
I used to write for one – fabricated all kinds of lies, said the books did not sell well when the sales people told me they had to keep requesting for reprints…and in the end, they only wanted to pay me very little plus on top of that, they said they had to deduct the copies unsold…and they never paid me for the answer guides. I hear they just ask their own employees to come out with the answers so they would not have to pay the writers – of course, they came out with all the wrong answers. Bet you would have spotted those as well. Once, never again!!!
I used to write for a Sibu publisher before that, it was so good and I made quite a bundle.
I love sambal udang. ha, with stink beans even better.
I would have added those too but there weren’t any in the fridge, would be very nice.
No offense, but the packaging doesn’t look like for food one, seldom see blue color packaging for sambal, usually is red and orange.
She has different colours for different things – red, yellow, green, purple – all the colours she has. No foodstuff in blue packaging? I know a lot of chocolates and cookies are in blue wrappers and some canned stuff as well, what is wrong with that, why blue cannot be used for food?
maybe too much water. Eat with white rice will be just nice. Not with nasi lemak
I heated the leftover this morning, simmered till dry and it was VERY nice, nicer than many that I had before at the Malay stalls or nasi lemak places. I would not mind buying this particular one again. Dijamin sampai hari esok? Wink! Wink! π π π
Old habits die hard. I tend to be like you – always picking out errors. Over here, nobody seems to know how to use apostrophes, and often use “there” when they mean “their”. Can you believe it?
There too? Yes, I did see one that day, either Australian or British news report…where it’s was used instead of its. Needless to say, it is much worse here – the sign of the times. π¦
hah..hah..the spelling and grammar is all kelam-kabut π I notice these things too, some in those dual language cookbooks.
They should engage good editors…ESPECIALLY publishers coming out with books, so disgraceful…only want to make money. See my reply to Charles above.
Yummm!
Yum yummmm indeed!!!
the looks of it… is spicy enough for me to get started with. lol. but definitely mouth watering!
You like it hot? With the cili padi added, it sure was…very hot!
For the upcoming post, please do something on pizzas…I mean Pizza hut’s pizza and Pezzo’s Pizza…which do you prefer? as a reader of yours, I would like to know…
I do not go for Pizza Hut’s pizzas as I am not crazy about their bread crust – I prefer thin…plus they had the 6% tax and 10% service charge before and that would total up to quite a lot. I hear that they’ve done away with the 10% so it is relatively cheaper now. Used to go once in a long while when there were no Italian restaurants in town.
I think Pezzo’s also bread crust, dunno…but what I do know is it’s expensive – RM8 a slice and RM40 for one pizza, so much cheaper at my favourite Italian place in town…and very much nicer too, I’m sure. I’ve heard mixed reviews – some like, some don’t…not enough cheese and what not. Like I always say, to each his own.
Are you the owner of one of the outlets here, by any chance? If you are, you can always invite me to go and sample. I have to pay for everything I feature in my blog, you know, poor ol’ pensioner…and mine is not a money-spinning blog, I do not get paid a sen for anything though I do not mind doing my bit to support our own Sarawak franchises. Or even if you’re not, you can always invite me – we’ll go and try together. Wink! Wink!
Add in petai…wahhhh…best in the whole world… Now im drooling over here…
Aiyor!!! Grab to chance to enjoy all the best they have to offer over there – sure not the same here, our half-baked wannabe chefs, surely not as nice, not so authentic. Come home, can eat all the Asian stuff that you want.