Acar Rampai ~ Vegetables Acar

Having acar with rice is one of my favourite. My mom would always make acar whenever she cook flavoured rice like ghee rice and tomato rice or even fish biryani. .. I remembered - my mom would cook vegetable acar in a small pot and i'll be the one who keeps on going in and out from the kitchen eating it on its own like it is some kind of snack.. ;)
For those who love vegetables.. this is one of the dish that i would highly recommend it.

The ingredients:

A. The Vegetables
1 medium carrot (cut into the length of 1" thick strips)
1 medium cucumber (de-seeded and cut into the length 1" thick strips- skin in tact)
a few strands of young long beans (cut into 1" length )
3 plump green chillies (de-seeded and cut into 1" length strips)
2 red chillies (de-seeded and cut into 1" length strips)
8 - 10 shallots (cut into quarters depends on its size)
6 garlic ( julienne)
1" ginger (julienne)
1 1/2 big red onion (sliced)

B. Ingredients for stir-frying/ gravy

2 tbsp dried shrimp (fried till fragrant)
5 - 8 dried chillies (blended into a paste)
2 garlic
1 cm ginger
5 candle nuts
3 shallots
1/4 big red onion (optional)

(all the stated ingredient above is blended into fine paste)









C.
2 tbsp sesame seed (fry in oil for a few seconds and put aside)
1/2 cup of vinegar
1 1/2 tbsp brown sugar
salt

Let's get started!
1. Heat the oil in the wok and pour in the B ( the blended ingredients/gravy). Cook till the oil rises or what we refer to as 'pecah minyak'

2. Once the oil rises on the top, put in vinegar, sugar and salt to taste. Stir for a minute or two - then put in all the vegetables in. Make sure that the fire is in low heat.

3. Stir the vegetables for about 3 minutes and pour in the sesame seed.

The acar should be scoop out from the pot immediately to avoid overcooking the vegetables.

4. In a bowl mix well the sesame with the rest of the vegetables and the acar is ready to be served with rice. :)

Note: The vegetables should be cruncy - not cooked.

~ bon apetito ~