Armed with 2 kilos of peeled ripe tamarind, at just PHP30 per kilo, it was time for a few experiments. I had little or no access to the web while at the beach, and had no previous experience with cooking ripe tamarind, so I decided to wing it, and if all failed, I wouldn’t feel bad about the monetary expense. The crew helped me peel off the stems and large veins from the ripe sampalok, then I placed it in a pot and covered it with water.

Put the pot over medium high heat and bring the water to a boil and lower heat to a steady simmer. I mashed the sampalok a bit, but after a few minutes realized it was disintegrating on its own. Tasted the water and my eyes nearly popped out of their sockets from the intense sourness of the broth, so I added a cup or two of sugar and let it simmer for another few minutes. It was still incredibly sour, and I decided I was going to make my own sampalok puree for use in roasted chickens, and additions to other cooked dishes, so I figured it had to be redolent with flavor, but not overly tart that it would be an unwelcome addition to other experiments. So I added another cup or two of sugar. So perhaps 4 cups of sugar to 1 kilo of sampalok and several cups of water.

Without much of a wait, the sampalok, water and sugar turned into this beautiful mass, it smelled wonderful and tasted so intensely of tamarind, but sweetened. I knew instinctively at this point this was going to be a really good thing. I realize this may seem really common or mundane to some of you familiar with cooking ripe tamarinds, but to me, this was a whole new food experience, incredibly unique and exciting.

I strained the solids out (the seeds and the tough layer around the seeds) and ended up with this fabulous medium viscosity puree. Had I added a bit more sugar and kept stirring over a medium flame, I would have ended up with jam. But instead, I decided to work with the puree. I ended up with roughly 5-6 cups of puree and stuck 3 cups in the freezer, and noticed the next day that it didn’t freeze up… cool. Must have been the high acidity/high sugar content of the puree.

It seemed a waste to throw out the solids that still had lots of stuff attached to it, so I added some hot water, let it all swim together and strained out the solids again, ending up with a tart/sweet tamarind broth or liquid. That’s what’s in the pitcher on the left of the photo above. It would be turned into a FANTASTIC drink, up next. Meanwhile, I was wondering what to do with my newly created bounty of sampalok puree… Stay tuned for more on the sampalok adventures. :)

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It isn’t that often that I find ingredients at my regular market haunts that I haven’t seen before, or have written about, for that matter. You tend to fall into a comfortable routine, like hitting favorite seafood vendors, buying my sea salt from Manang X, and purchasing ripe saba bananas in the fruit section whenever I visit the Nasugbu town market. But last weekend, I spotted some brown stuff inside a plastic bag and realized it was a huge clump of ripe and peeled tamarind fruit. Sampalok candies were my all-time favorite childhood sweet, along with my favorite champoy or kiamoy as my savory snack. I LOVE SAMPALOK candies and still do to this day, though I have to admit I eat a lot less of them due to the apparent amounts of sugar they possess. I almost always take a little packet of sampalok and champoy with me on long plane trips, I find the sharp flavors and sugar/salt are good quick pick me ups. At any rate, I had NEVER really made or thought to make them from scratch. It just seemed so much easier to buy them for such reasonable sums of money.

Without a clue what to do with the sampalok, and perhaps invisibly guided by a reader comment requesting a recipe for tamarind jam a few days ago, and bizarrely, comments left by sister on the blog (about our grandmother making a mean sampalok jam) at the same time I was at the market shopping, I think the planets aligned to guide me to the pile of ripe tamarind. At PHP30 a kilo, I thought it was a supreme steal, and bought 2 kilos on the spot. The lady selling them said they were supplied by a lady up in “the bukid” or mountains nearby. She had picked them, peeled them and walked them several kilometers down to the main road and eventually to the market. Egads, had I met the supplier, I would have paid her double for all her trouble. I can’t imagine what kind of patience and lack of any other thing to do is required to sit down and peel hundreds of these tamarind pods.

Previous posts on sampaloc:

Bomba Sampalok
Sweet Thai Sampalok in its shell
Sampaloc/Sampalok
Sampalok candy from Thailand

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Select plump, firm and unblemished unripe sampaloc (tamarind) fruit. When unripe, the fruit is snug within its greenish brown pod. If peeled, the pulp should be a bright, light green. Over time you will become an expert as to how ripe or unripe a sampaloc you prefer to use. You must balance acidity with flavor and somewhere between the near inedible rawest states and the near ripe light brown state lies true sinigang nirvana. Store the fruit outside the refrigerator if you plan to use it within two days, otherwise refrigerate.

Making Sampaloc/Tamarind broth is incredibly simple. Take a heaping handful or two (say 200-300 grams) of whole unripe sampaloc, remove any stems or leaves and wash thoroughly. Place in a pot with about 6-8 cups water and boil this at medium heat for approximately 20-30 minutes or until all the pods are very soft. Mash the pods through a sieve using some of the liquid to help the pulp and juices through the sieve. Discard the solids (especially all the brown skin bits, fibers and seeds) and strain broth again. The broth should be cloudy, tart and intensely flavorful. This is now your base for the Sinigang soup of your choice.

To make a Sinigang, heat up this broth and add water to dilute if necessary; taste to ensure that you have achieved the desired level of tartness. Add prawns and or other seafood or pre-cooked and softened meats and any vegetables you desire. Season with salt and or patis (fish sauce) to taste. My favorite sinigang has prawns, sliced onions, tomatoes, radishes and kangkong (swamp cabbage). Throw in the leafy vegetables just minutes before serving so as not to overcook. Serve hot with a bowl of steamed rice. A classic done right, this is comfort food at its finest.

You may make double batches of Sampaloc broth and refrigerate or freeze for future use.

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