Gado-Gado (Indonesian Vegetable Salad with Peanut Sauce)

  • Total Time - 45 minutes
  • Preparation - 20 minutes
  • Cooking/Blanching - 25 minutes
  • Servings: 4
  • Country: Indonesia
Indonesian salad Gado-Gado with boiled vegetables and rich peanut sauce.

While Gado-Gado might seem like a simple mix of ingredients, its magic lies in the quality of the peanut sauce, which should be thick and well-balanced. The use of fresh peanuts and palm sugar is important for authentic flavour.

Ingredients

For the Salad Base

  • 3 pcs Potatoes, boiled and sliced
  • 200 g Firm Tofu, diced (fried)
  • 200 g Tempeh, diced (fried)
  • 4 pcs Eggs, hard-boiled and halved
  • 100 g Green beans, blanched
  • 100 g Cabbage (e.g., Chinese/head cabbage), blanched
  • 50 g Bean sprouts, blanched or fresh
  • 1 pc Cucumber, fresh, sliced

For the Peanut Sauce (Bumbu Kacang)

  • 150 g Unsalted roasted peanuts (or quality unsweetened peanut butter)
  • 2 cloves Garlic
  • 1 pc Fresh Chili (or to taste)
  • 1 tbsp Palm Sugar (or brown sugar)
  • 1 tsp Tamarind Paste (or 1 tbsp lime juice)
  • 1 tsp Kecap Manis (sweet soy sauce)
  • 150 ml Coconut Milk or Water (warm)
  • to taste Salt

For Serving

  • to taste Krupuk (shrimp or vegetable crackers)
  • for topping Fried Shallots (Bawang Goreng)

Instructions

Step 1: Preparing Solid Ingredients

Boil the potatoes and eggs. Let them cool, peel, and slice them.

Blanch the green beans, cabbage, and sprouts in boiling water for 2 minutes. Immediately drain and rinse with cold water to retain colour.

Slice the tofu and tempeh, salt them, and pan-fry or deep-fry in oil until golden brown and crispy. Set aside.

Step 2: Preparing the Peanut Sauce

In a mortar or blender, blend the peanuts (if using whole), garlic, chili, palm sugar, tamarind paste, and Kecap Manis into a coarse paste.

Transfer the paste to a small pot. Gradually pour in the warm coconut milk/water while stirring continuously until the sauce reaches the desired consistency (it should be like thick, pourable cream).

Heat the sauce and season with salt and potentially more lime juice for sourness. The sauce is served warm or at room temperature.

Step 3: Serving

Arrange all the prepared vegetables, potato slices, tofu, tempeh, and halved eggs on a large plate or bowl.

Drizzle generously with the warm peanut sauce.

Garnish with a large amount of fried shallots (Bawang Goreng) and serve with crackers (krupuk).