Description
A popular dish from Manado, North Sulawesi, ayam woku is a dish of chicken cooked with herbs, spices, and a ton of chillies. In Manado, it is often wrapped in a woka leaf and grilled just before eating.
Ingredients
Scale
- 1 medium chicken, cut to pieces
- 1 small lime
- 4 big red chillies, chopped
- 5 bird’s eye chillies
- 8 small shallots, peeled, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, peeled, chopped
- 3 cm ginger, peeled, chopped
- 2 cm turmeric, peeled, chopped
- 4 candlenuts, chopped
- 1 red tomato, chopped
- 1 lemongrass, bruised, cut to 4 cm pieces
- 4 kaffir lime leaves
- 1 pandanus leaf, cut into 3 cm pieces
- 1 turmeric leaf (optional), cut to small pieces
- 3 stalks spring onions, chopped
- A handful of kemangi leaves (Indonesian basil), use only the leaves.
- Salt to taste
- 200 ml water
- 3 tbsp cooking oil
Instructions
- Wash the chicken thoroughly, and then squeeze the lime and rub the juice all over the chicken. Set aside.
- Blend into a fine paste: big red chillies, bird’s eye chillies, shallots, garlic, turmeric, ginger, candlenuts and tomato.
- In a wok, heat the oil in a medium heat, and then sauté the chilli paste.
- Add the lemongrass, pandan leaves, kaffir lime leaves and turmeric leaves. Fry for another 4 minutes until fragrant.
- Add the chicken pieces, fry for about 2 minutes, then add water.
- Add the salt.
- Cook the chicken in the chili paste over medium heat for about 30 minutes or until the chicken is done and the sauce thickens.
- Add the spring onion and basil leaves, cook for around 1 minute and then turn off the heat.
- Transfer the dish to a serving plate.
Notes
- Sometimes the chicken is fried prior to cooking, but I omitted the step for a healthier version.
- Adjust the amount of the chilli, especially the bird’s eye chilli, according to your tolerance level.
- I added a few drops of lime juice for extra freshness after the cooking was done and it tasted great!
Keywords: Spicy, candlenuts, lime leaves, woka leaves