Ayam Taliwang

F's coming home today after 2 days serving the nation. Decided to cook our favourite dish. Ayam Taliwang. We chanced upon this dish on our trip to Batam once. I just ended my job at the bank and started on a new job at the assistance company. We decided that we need a trip and tramped down to Batam for a few days. On our way in and out of town, we saw many many stalls by the roadside selling Ayam Taliwang. We didn't dare ask the cab driver to stop so that we can try. The cab fare costs us SGD 22, we do not want to imagine what it'll cost us for him to stop and wait while we savour the unknown dish.

We then noticed the dish on the menu at the Hotel's restaurant and decided to try. It was amazing!! Back home, a quick search on the net and I tried to reminiscence our Batam trip. The dish just got stuck to our palate. Even mum loves it.

Ayam Taliwang

1 mid-size chicken
100 ml cooking oil
Juice from a lemon

To grind:
14 bird eye chilli
2 onions
a clove of garlic
An inch of belacan*
A handful of cekor/ kencur**
2 candlenut
Salt and sugar to taste

Veggies:
Any sort that you like
I use Onions, carrots, potatoes and sweet potatoes
Today I am trying to use brinjals.

You'll need an ovenproof dish and an oven

1. Heat the oil in a wok and pour in the grinded ingredients
2. Fry until the smells makes you drool (fragrant) .... or until you see the ingredients combine and looks kinda springy
3. Put in your chicken pieces or the whole chicken
4. Let it simmer for about 10 - 15 mins
5. Meanwhile, cut your veggies into big chunks and arranged it at the bottom of your ovenproof dish
6. Stir your chicken and ensure that chicken absorbed all the goodness of the grinded ingredients. Chicken will turn to a pale brown colour. This is gooooodddd....
7. Arranged the chicken on top of the veggies in the dish. Scoop the remaining gravy left in the wok and pour it on top of chicken. Leave some gravy for basting.
8. Pop it into the oven at say 130 degrees celcius for about 40 - 60mins
9. Remember to baste the chicken once in a while
10. The chicken will cook and all the flavours will be captured by the veggies. You might see some liquid at the bottom of the dish. Pour it out and use to baste the chicken too.
11. Serve with hot white rice.

* See my very first blog entry.
** Cekor in Malay or Kencur in Bahasa is in the same family as Galangal, which all hails from the Ginger family. The very first picture at the top there is Cekor. Wikipedia said that it is aka Kaempferia galanga. It smells like Galangal but sweeter and I felt nuttier.

You can either cut the chicken into 12 pieces or smaller. Sometimes I like to use whole chicken. If you decided to use whole chicken, then just double the amount of grinded ingredients.