Dissecting the Sambal: An Indonesian dish with a foreign kick
Sambal is a staple in Indonesian cuisine. Every single restaurant that sells savory dishes will have some sort of sambal, whether it be the sauce kind in a sachet or the freshly ground one made with a mortar and pestle. So imagine my surprise when I just learned somewhat recently that chili, the main ingredient of sambal, is not native to Southeast Asia. In fact, unlike most of our “foreign” cuisine and ingredients, chili did not come from India or China, but all the way from the Americas. That’s a whole ocean away.
Let’s tale a closer look at sambal. If you ask any Indonesian what is in a sambal they will say chili, always. Then maybe they’d say other ingredients like terasi, tomatoes, garlic, onion, salt, sugar, different types of fruit, and so on, but I assure you that the first thing they will say is that chili must be present for it to be sambal.
But what my quick research had to say about both sambal and chili had me intrigued.
Sambal is a loan word from the Javanese language. Archeologists have been able to trace the use of the word ‘sambal’ or similar up to 10th century Mataram. It truly is one of the oldest cuisines we have in the archipelago. Though the word itself is from the Javanese language, each tribe and culture have their own version of sambal. It truly is a versatile dish that can be adapted to the ingredients available in the region.
To explain just how varied and popular sambal is, there are several popular restaurants that uses this variety as the hook to their menu. For example, there’s a restaurant in Jakarta called Bu Eva Spesial Sambal that serves 30 types of sambal from different parts of Indonesia.
So, we can trace the use of sambal and similar type dishes in Indonesia to the 10th century, but here’s the kicker. The chili, which we’ve established is a must in any sambal, did not enter Indonesia until the 16th century when Portuguese and Spanish traders brought them from the Americas. Or at least, the chili that we know today, of the Capsicum variety. So what was the main ingredient of sambal for those 4 or so centuries before the Capsicum chilies were brought here?
There are many theories, but the leading one is the use of this little fella called cabya. (Others say that ginger or perhaps even a now-extinct spicy plant was used.)
Now, if you know Indonesian, you’ll notice that cabya is very similar to a word that very much has to do with sambal, and that’s cabai or cabe. This is the word for chili in Indonesia.
Let’s do a little etymology detour, shall we? When it comes to fruits and vegetables, Bahasa Indonesia tends to follow this rule. If we have our own variety of the plant that’s local to the area, we’ll have a different name compared to the one used in English/Europe. For example, water spinach is called kangkung and orange is jeruk. (These plants were more slowly introduced to the region via land migration or were originally from the region.) But if the plant is introduced by the Dutch or other similar sea traders, then we will use a variation of what they call it. For example, dragonfruit is buah naga (literally dragonfruit translated to Indonesian) which is originally from the Americas. Same with apple (apel) and tomatoes (tomat), which are also from the Americas. These plants are almost impossible to be introduced slowly to our part of the world and thus we never developed our own word for it.
But the chili is different. Even though it was brought over by the European traders, we still ended up using a different word (cabai/cabe) than what the Portuguese and Spanish called it (pimenta and chile respectively.) This is because this Capsicum variety replaced what was then supposedly the popular spicy ingredient in sambal, cabya. The locals started calling this new “spicy fruit” cabya, which later evolved into cabai and cabe, while the original cabya is now known as a varietyt of cabai, cabai jawa. This OG Indonesian spicy fruit is very rare and even I have only heard about it when I began doing the research on this.
To highlight just how important and ubiquitous the chili is to Indonesian cuisine and culture, there’s always a panic when the price of chilies go up. Earlier this month, the price had gone up to around Rp.70.000 per kg (roughly US$4.50), with some vendors even selling them for Rp.100.000 per kg, from its previous price of around Rp.50.000 per kg (roughly US$3). Buying chilies is like buying salt and pepper in this part of the world. It’s considered a staple crop to the point that the government will sometimes step down and dictate the price if it gets too expensive.
I love finding out little things like this in my own culture. It goes to show that nothing grows in a vacuum. There are so many times when I’ve been pleasantly surprised that something we consider intrinsically Indonesian has its roots in other cultures/geographical areas. Indonesia is this beautiful melting pot of so many cultures thanks to its geographical position as harbors and ports for many trade routes. I’m curious what else has contributed to our culture that I never thought of.
Thanks for reading!
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