Homemade vegetarian Penang Assam Laksa, is a tamarind based soup with rich spice base such as torch ginger, lemongrass, tumeric, galangal, chillies, onions, garlic and laksa leaves called Daun Kasum in Malay. It’s a Singapore-Malaysia dish with origins largely from Penang, Malaysian Peranakan Chinese. My maternal grandmother has Penang Nyonya roots and therefore I am able to produce this in the vegetarian version for the first time. Before I was vegetarian, it requires one to boil or steam makerel fish 🐟 Kambong fish (Malay) and the meat will be added into the spiced soup broth, shrimp paste (belachan) had to be used but I had replaced this with flavours of the sea with seaweed Nori and kombu. For the sweet shrimp paste that is used as a condiment, I had used a store bought Rojak Sauce that essentially is made of sweet bean paste. To give the soup a further umami flavour, I added mushroom seasoning, salted bean paste and sweet bean paste to balance the flavours up with tamarind, salt and sugar.
This dish is usually garnished with pineapples, onions slices, mint leaves, torched ginger flakes, chilli slices.
The recipe is a rough estimate of my cooking as I do not measure but rely largely on tastebuds.
(A) Blended spice paste（搅拌好的香料）
2 lemongrass sliced （2 个香茅）
2 big red onions 🧅 cut into pieces （2个大葱）
3 cloves of garlic 🧄 （3粒蒜头）
3 cm thick galangal skin removed （南疆3cm，皮要拿掉）
2 cm knob of tumeric （黄姜 2cm)
(Blend all into a paste)
（使用搅拌机把香料搅拌成香料膏）
Garnishings （伴料）
Some mint leaves for garnishing （薄荷叶）
Some pineapple cut into slices （旺梨切小片）
Onion sliced for garnishing （葱切薄片）
1 torch ginger sliced and chopped finely （1姜花切成末）
Vegetarian SOS rojak sauce( optional, used for garnishing only) 素的rojak sauce
Other Ingredients:
300g of thick rice noodles pre-blanched. (粗米粉300克）
5 stalks of laksa leaves （拉萨叶5把）
Sweet bean paste （甜豆浆）
Salted bean paste （咸豆浆）
1 torch ginger bruised (一根姜花，用崔子稍微打碎）
2 pieces of seaweed Nori (做寿司用的海带两片）
10g of kombu seaweed （日本Kombu海带10克）
1.) stir fry blended paste until aromatic and the rawness of paste dissipates.
油热后，把搅拌的香料炒了，炒到很香，炒到那个熟的味道渐渐的淡了。
2.) add jn 1 bruised torch ginger and laksa leaves and continue to stir fry for a few mins. 这时，把打碎的姜花和拉萨叶放进炒一下。
3.) add water to half a pot of a medium sized pot and bring to boil. 然后加水到一个锅里。我用的锅是中的。水我倒到一半而已，差不多6个人可以吃那样）
4.) add 2 sheets of pre cut nori and 10g of kombu and boil it for 20 mins under Low fire. 然后把海带加入，把水滚起来后，慢火煮20分钟。
5.）add in about 2-3 tablespoons of tamarind paste 再加2-3 汤匙的罗望子膏。有两种我是从印度摊位买的罗望子膏（assam paste).
6.）add sweet bean paste and salted bean paste(you can use miso）然后加上几个汤匙的甜豆浆，一个汤匙左右的咸豆浆。
7.）balance off seasoning with mushroom powder seasoning, sugar and salt. 自己最后调味用香菇粉，糖和盐巴。试一试口味来调味。适合了关掉火。
8.）prepare your blanched rice noodles and pour the soup over to serve, with the mint leaves, pineapples, onion slices, torch ginger flakes and drizzle the vegetarian rojak paste to serve. (把煮好的汤倒过出米粉，然后把伴料-薄荷叶等等放上去后，在和一小勺的素rojak膏食用便可。
Chinese Translation:
這道菜餚是馬來西亞檳城拉薩。它的湯底，使用羅望子(assam),姜花，香茅，黃姜，南疆，辣椒🌶️，蔥，蒜，拉薩葉( Duan Kasum). 他在新加坡-馬來西亞吃到的菜餚緣由馬來西亞檳城的娘惹，我的婆婆就是檳城娘惹，所以和媽媽學上的菜餚，可是當時都是用魚肉（kambong fish)。可是我现在第一次把它变成素食。这道菜也本来需要sambal belachan 是小🦐子，也要🦐头膏（shrimp paste, rojak paste)可是我用的是素食店卖的 sos rojak sauce. 我把全部的海味，依靠着海带 (seaweed nori and kombu)来代替海的味道。我也用了甜豆浆和咸豆浆调味烫头取代 sambal belachan (小虾🦐糕）。这个菜肴上面通常有很多香料在面条上面如：
薄荷（peppermint leaves), 鲜甜的黄梨（pineapple), 葱片，姜花末，还有上面淋着”虾头膏（shrimp paste/rojak paste)。
不吃大蒜葱的佛友，你家那个可以不放也行。可需要一点鼓励吃素的人，并可以慢慢从不吃肉，海产开始。
Western Paradise Vegetarian Delights(极乐菩提素) 