Rujak

Ingredients

Fruit

• 1green mango
• half a pineapple, firm
• 1green apple or kedondong
• 1cucumber
• half a jicama, bengkuang
• 1star fruit
• a few unripe guava

Dressing

• 150 gpalm sugar, gula jawa
• 1 tspterasi, toasted shrimp paste
• 3to 6 bird’s eye chillies
• 2 tbsptamarind paste
• 1 tspsalt
• 3 tbspwater

To serve

• immediately, on a plate, with the dressing spooned over

Equipment

• a stone mortar, cobek, and pestle

Directions

1. Wrap the terasi in foil and toast it in a dry pan for a minute or two on each side, or hold it over a flame on a fork. Pound the chillies and salt first in a stone mortar until broken down.
2. Add the toasted terasi and pound it in, then the palm sugar. The palm sugar should break down into the mixture rather than staying in lumps.
3. Add water sparingly, since a thin dressing runs straight off. Chop or grate it before pounding, since a solid disc is hard work in a mortar. Taste the dressing on its own: it should be aggressively sweet, salty, sour and hot all at once.
4. Make it stronger than seems reasonable, since the bland hard fruit dilutes it considerably. Adjust the chilli to taste, and Indonesian rujak is usually made genuinely fiery.
5. Peel everything and cut it into bite-sized pieces or thick slices. Cut them fairly thick, since thin slices go limp under the dressing.
6. Keep the pieces separate and dry, and pat them with a cloth if they are wet. Some cooks soak the green mango briefly in salted water, which takes off the harshest edge.
7. Toss the fruit with the dressing just before serving, or arrange the fruit and spoon the dressing over. Dress it at the last moment, since the salt and sugar draw water out of the fruit within minutes. Serve it immediately, with the remaining dressing on the side for dipping.

Technique

• The fruit is deliberately unripe, hard and sour.
• Terasi must be toasted before it goes into the dressing.
• Singaporean rojak is a related but genuinely different dish.

Substitutions

• Any hard sour fruit, including green apple and unripe pear.
• Dark palm sugar in place of gula jawa.

Variations

• Rujak cingur, from Surabaya, with boiled cow’s snout.
• Rujak es krim, served with ice cream over it.
• Rujak serut, with the fruit grated rather than cut.

Frequently asked questions

What is Rujak?

Rujak is a salad & side from Indonesia: unripe fruit tossed in a dressing of palm sugar, tamarind, chilli and shrimp paste.

How long does Rujak take to make?

Rujak takes 25 min of preparation and none of cooking. The recipe makes 4 servings. It is rated easy to make.

What can I substitute in Rujak?

Yes, within limits. Any hard sour fruit, including green apple and unripe pear. Dark palm sugar in place of gula jawa.

What is the most important thing to get right in Rujak?

Add the toasted terasi and pound it in, then the palm sugar. The palm sugar should break down into the mixture rather than staying in lumps.