Gado-Gado Peanut Sauce

If using whole roasted peanuts, pulse in a food processor or blender until you reach a coarse, chunky paste — not smooth peanut butter, but not whole peanuts either. You want irregular pieces from coarse sand to small pebble size. This textured paste will give the finished sauce its characteristic rustic body. If using natural peanut butter, skip this step.

Combine chilies, garlic, shallots, and galangal in a mortar or small blender. Pound or blend to a coarse paste. A mortar is traditional and gives a more fibrous, aromatic paste with better depth; a blender works fine if you are short on time. The paste should be uniformly pulped — no large chunks of garlic or shallot remaining.

Heat 2 tablespoons of neutral oil in a wok or saucepan over medium heat. Add the spice paste and stir-fry for 3–4 minutes until it darkens from pale pink-orange to a deeper rust-red and smells cooked and sweet rather than raw and sharp. Add the palm sugar and stir until melted and incorporated. The paste will begin to caramelise around the edges — this is correct. A properly fried spice base smells fragrant, slightly nutty, and deeply savoury.

Add the peanut paste to the fried spice base and stir to combine — the mixture will be very thick and dry at this point. Pour in coconut milk gradually, stirring constantly to incorporate the peanut and spice paste. Add tamarind paste, kecap manis, and salt. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium-low heat, stirring frequently to prevent the thick sauce from catching on the bottom. Simmer for 5–8 minutes until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon heavily and the oil from the peanuts rises to the surface in golden droplets. Taste and adjust: more palm sugar if too sharp, more tamarind if too sweet, salt to lift the whole.