Rojak

Rojak is usually referred to the mixed fruit salad dish and the taste is just amazing.Imagine eating the mixed fruit salad with the fruit dressing. Rojak has upped the ante and made a boring dish into something worth tasting with its delightful shrimp paste concoction known as petis.

The fruits used are basically young papaya, guava, wax apple, pineapple. The shredded cucumber and sweet turnip are also added to give extra freshness to the dish.

What makes the rojak delicious is the thick, dark and flavorful shrimp paste that is used as the dressing. The combination of the fruits, the salad and the petis mixed together, sprinkled with crushed peanuts and the crouton is enough to make you salivate.

Some prefer to add dried octopus and boiled eggs to the dish. Once you’ve tasted rojak, you would never go back to the normal boring mixed fruit salad.

Image by: Falchion

Hear From Others

Anyone who knows me well knows that I have a deep love affair with this unique Malaysian fruit salad. I knew all the best rojak sellers in my neighborhood and ate it at least once a week. It is the food I am most homesick for.

Christine
VermilionRoots

A little bit stinky, sweet, salty, sour and spicy, rojak is said to be an acquired taste – like durian. The pungency and black, sticky character of the sauce comes from prawn paste, a condiment fermented from the heads and shells of shrimps as a by-product of the making of dried prawns.

Julie Wong
TheStar

It was an odd mixture of the salty and sweet dressing, layered on top of the fresh tastes of fruit and cucumber. While it was interesting to try, it’s not something that I would go out of my way to look for.

Anonymoose
TheBrûléeBlog