Egg sambal ‘shakshuka’ | Ottolenghi COMFORT

I think if there was a dish that encapsulated our friendship, I think this would be it. That's very intimate, yes it is. Okay, well don't have that, you can edit that. No, no, I love that. So Helen, today we're cooking shakshuka. Yes. But we are shaking it up a bit, right? Yeah, it comes from our new book. Comfort, traditional shakshuka, but we're adding curry powder, curry leaves, sambal oelek. Sambal oelek, which is a Malaysian chilli. Tamarind. And then we're serving it with controversial rice. Rice for me. Or flatbread for me. You know, calling it shakshuka because it's got all these flavours that normally don't go into shakshuka. I know, but isn't that great? It is great. So shall I toast some spices? Yeah, so the spice for the, it's your shakshuka, right? Yeah, it is. So it means that it's got a few unusual ingredients there. It has. So I've got fennel seeds here. Yeah. And two cloves with the seeds from two cardamom pods. Yeah. So I'm just going to bring out that flavour just by giving it a little toast. And I'm going to start the other bit, which is in this larger pan. I think now it's not too hot. I'm just going to start by cooking some curry leaves, about 10 curry leaves straight in there. And some mustard seeds. I love how they do that, the sizzle. I know, it's just that popping sound. And just that, it tells you when it's ready, that popping with that. Totally, I love that. So I'm just going to give it a little shake. So on medium heat. And the thing with both curry leaves and with mustard seeds, you don't want to cook them too long. No, they get a bit bitter, don't they? So as soon as they start to pop, which is like 30 seconds, I'm going to add my onion and that will cool down the oil. So some sliced red onion. I'm going to crush these seeds. We're kind of infusing the shakshuka sauce from the base. Yeah. Right. And it's funny how we call everything shakshuka. It's like everything is pizza. Everything that's got a base and a topping is a pizza. There's so many dishes around the world for braised eggs. But shakshuka kind of became the buzzword for braised eggs. Yeah. This could be anything really. And that's the beauty of it, is that when you cook an egg and it's in the sauce, it just kind of stays nice and soft and gets the flavors, but also keeps its own identity. Yes. But I think people also have this idea now that they know as soon as you say shakshuka, they know it's going to be eggs poached in tomato of some kind, right? Totally. So I'm just slow cooking the onions here. It should take about, you know, under 10 minutes just to caramelize and give them a bit of sweetness. Yeah. At the same time, they're absorbing all these wonderful flavors from the curry leaves. Yeah, it smells so good already. So my spices are pretty good. So that's what we toasted before, which is the fennel and the cloves and the cardamom pods. And then I'm going to put it together with the other spices, which is curry powder. Quite a mild one, right? Yeah. Can I? Do you think it's going to fit? Yeah. Curry powder. We're going to have a little bit of cinnamon for sweetness. So we've got sweetness, those kind of curry flavors with the cumin and turmeric and that. They're both quite, oh, very warming, right? All very warming. And then you've got that sort of sharpness of the acidity from the tomatoes. Yeah. So it's quite complex and lovely. I'll add some more flavor by adding ginger and garlic. Shall I chop up this for you? So the garlic can be also ground or chopped. It's really cool, isn't it? It doesn't matter. Yeah. Once the onion starts getting color and kind of losing volume. Yeah. You want to make sure that it doesn't start burning. Yeah. So I normally take the heat down at this point. I think people have to adjust because I find that with gas, it probably cooks a lot faster. I know at my home that it comes together a lot faster. Yeah. So I've got ginger here. When you've got the garlic, you can give me that. At the same time, I'm also adding these fresh tomatoes. You don't even need to chop them. They'll kind of break down with the heat. Yeah. But I like it that they kind of stay present there as well. So we're going to add a tin tomatoes as well. But there's nothing like a fresh tomato in this context to kind of as pops of freshness. Yeah, I agree. I agree. I think it's really nice contrast to the tin tomatoes that you have. I mean, my garlic's a little bit rough, but it's okay. Give me a rough garlic. Yeah. Rough garlic over to you. So that's this. So we're starting to build up the flavors in the sauce for the Shakshuka. And just to add to that, I'm going to chop in some coriander stalks. Oh, yeah. So that really will give a deep coriander flavor, right? I love it. Yeah. And it's so nice that the whole bunch is used because we're going to use the leaves for the garnish. Yeah, you can garnish with the leaves or you can use only coriander. It's got so many endless uses. But in this case, we're going to use them as well. So I'm going to give this like five minutes just for the tomatoes to break down a bit and then for the ginger garlic to cook down. So it's not harsh, obviously. Yeah. Some of the tomatoes are already breaking. It shouldn't take more than like five minutes before we turn it into a sauce. Add the spices and the tomatoes and let it cook down. Yeah. So, Helen, your spices are here, the toasted spices. I'm going to add those in. So we're going to give that about two minutes. You just want to toast it to really bring out those flavors, those oils. Kind of the cinnamon and the curry has not been cooked down yet. So you just with the oil and the heat, you're going to kind of tease out the flavor a little bit. It's a good word, teasing it out. Tease out the flavor. Some words are only used in the cookery books. Yeah, exactly. So I'm just going to cook the spices for about two minutes now and give it a little stir, which is really nice. So anyone that likes shakshuka, you would love that because that's exactly like the shakshuka, but with a little bit of an extra. And I would eat it with rice, but you'll probably have flatbread. I know, I'd be happy with both. So we've got some flatbread here that we can toast in a minute and that would be very nice. But I think some jasmine rice or basmati rice, fluffy, will take it really nicely. That with some cucumber on the side and I'm halfway to nasi lemak, right? Yeah. Or, you know, all these nice rice dishes that you have in Malaysia that you eat with egg. It's such a wonderful thing to do. Nasi lemak is one of them and nasi goreng. So I think the spices are cooked. So I'm just going to slightly start adding the other elements that go in because we want to cook them down. So it's a tin of tomatoes. So tamarind, really important. Yes. So what does the tamarind do here? It just gives it that added acidity. I mean, the tomatoes have that and the sweetness, but the tamarind really kind of just brightens the whole thing, much as you would lemon juice, I guess. Yeah, it's the equivalent of lemon juice, a bit of vinegar. So there's palm sugar here, which will dissolve. Yeah, and the combination of tamarind and palm sugar, it's just for me, just that sweetness and that sharpness just really brings things together. If you can't get palm sugar, then you can easily get light brown sugar. Yeah, I think that's fine. Or any sugar, really. Any sugar, yeah. And I'm adding a little bit of salt here, some sambal oelek, which will give it the kick that we want. So that's a Malaysian chilli sauce, right? Yes, it's slightly fermented. So you could use, you know, shata. Yeah. If you have an otolengi, you know, chilli, jarred chilli, that would be absolutely fine here. Yeah, because we want to cook it down. So we want to give it the time for all the flavours to come together and during that reduction, concentrate. I reckon it's getting there. You know why? Because I'm starting to cough. Oh, really? The texture to be much thicker than that. Yes, you want it to be moppable, you know, whether with rice or bread. Exactly. So the key to every shakshuka is to have the right texture or the right viscosity for the sauce. So the eggs just nestle there, but they're not like cramped in something too thick, but something a bit runny, but not too runny. Yeah. So I'll just bring it to the boil or to a simmer and we'll give it about 20 minutes roughly to just kind of reduce and become all luscious and thick and beautiful. And then we'll break the eggs in. Sounds great. So this is nice and thick, right? It looks good. It's ready to receive the eggs? It is. So you make a little, I'll just crack an egg. Divot here. Nice. So let's do another one there. I mean, you don't really need two people to do it, but it's quite fun. You definitely don't need two people. Yeah. That looks really nice. So I love that bit. Once you've added the egg and the whites, the egg whites just start turning white. So I'll just get a little bit of salt and kind of slightly season every egg. We'll just put a lid on. So they steam a bit as well. Yeah, the eggs kind of steam. They kind of puff up a bit more when you do that. And then we'll give it five minutes, six minutes. While the eggs are cooked, right? Perfect. It's nice. They're steamed, but when you shake the pan, you can see that they're still a bit wobbly. I'm going to cook the curry leaves just for the final flourish. Nice. And we're going to use the leaves, but also that oil is so aromatic and beautiful. The oil just sucks in the flavour from the leaves. It does. And then when you drizzle it over the shakshuka, you get that extra curry leaf flavour. Yeah. Oil and leaves. Oh, that is just the sizzle of joy. Nice. That is so easy and so delicious. I'm going to throw all these coriander leaves on top. And that's... Look how beautiful that looks. I love it. Very happy with that. I'm ready to eat. So, Helen, you're getting rice. Yes, please. And you're getting your beautiful shakshuka. An egg. Goes without saying. Yes. Superb. Oh my God, that looks so good. Thank you so much. Yum. Can I start? You can start. I think... I was going to say I'm going to have flatbread, but I think I'm also going to have some with rice. You can't resist the rice. No. Especially if you've got all those Asian flavours. I mean, tamarind and sambal without rice. Come on. Oh my God. It's good? It's so delicious. It hits the spot. It hits the comfort spot. Totally. And the rest. Oh my God, it's so good. He's laughing. Which other spot were you thinking me? Chuckle. I know. It hits all the spots for me. Every spot. It's so yummy. It's so good. So this is a wonderful supper, right? Like at the end of the day, you put it all together and it's like end of the day. I thought you were going to say breakfast because shakshuka is kind of brunchy breakfast, isn't it? I think it could go breakfast as well. I think it could go breakfast, lunch or dinner. Yeah. Some people would say, oh, I don't have spicy food for breakfast. And this has a nice kick to it. But if you are the kind of person that likes spicy food for breakfast, this is like the ultimate breakfast or brunch. But I can have it anytime of the day. And if you're Malaysian and you normally have nasi lemak, well, I reckon you can have shakshuka. Sambal shakshuka. Yes, because it's nasi lemak, but then it's shakshuka. It's otelengki, but then there's something that I've brought to the table with it. It's amazing. It's so good. You should all make it. Definitely.