Thai hot dipping sauce is used to accompany grilled or deep-fried fish, pieces of omelette, and fresh vegetables and fruit such as eggplant, cucumber, wing beans and snake beans. You can vary the number of chillies, depending on how hot you like it.
Ingredients
- 4 garlic cloves
- 2 teaspoons shrimp paste
- 3 small red and green chillies
- 4 Thai eggplants (aubergines) (optional)
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 tablespoon fish sauce
- 2 tablespoons lime juice
- mixed raw vegetables and fruit such as pieces of Thai eggplant (aubergine), cucumber batons, wing beans, pieces of snake (yard-long) bean, spring onions (scallions), pomelo segments, pieces of rose apple, to serve
How to Make It
- Using a pestle and mortar, pound the garlic into a rough paste. Add the shrimp paste and grind together. Add the chillies and lightly bruise to release the hot taste. (Do this gently so the liquid won’t splash.) Add the Thai eggplants and lightly pound. Add the sugar, fish sauce and lime juice and lightly mix in. Taste the sauce, then adjust the seasoning if necessary.
- To make without a pestle and mortar, put the finely chopped garlic in a bowl and, using the back of a spoon, scrape the garlic into a paste. Add the shrimp paste and mix well. Add the chillies and break them up with a fork. Add the Thai eggplants and squash them gently against the side of the bowl. Add the sugar, fish sauce and lime juice and lightly mix.
- Spoon into a small serving bowl and serve with the mixed vegetables.
