Seybak is a traditional Eurasian Christmas salad recipe from the Kristang community in Singapore and Malaysia. These are Eurasians of Portuguese descent.
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
Traditional Seybak Recipe
The traditional seybak recipe enjoyed by most Kristang families in Singapore and Malaysia is made with pork belly and quite often, chewy pigs ears. If you go back far enough, this Portuguese Eurasian recipe started out life being made with offal. Much like the other Kristang Christmas recipe, Feng.
Now I don’t eat pork, and I remember many a Christmas meal looking longingly at the bowl of Seybak on the table and wishing I could have some. Because it sure looked good! But I had to satisfy myself with the ever present Curry Devil and mash potatoes, which, let’s face it, was more than enough.
LinsFood’s Duck Seybak
I make no apologies for my seybak recipe here, needs must and all that. I know many of you traditionalists are probably scrunching up your faces right about now. 😉 But hey, don’t knock it until you try it!
To me, given its darker meat, fat content and slightly gamey inclination, duck is the best substitute for pork belly, and it’s what I use for many recipes that I adapt, given my aversion to pork.
The rest of the seybak recipe here is pretty much the same in terms of ingredients: salad stuff, puffed tofu (taupok) and fresh homemade ginger-garlic chilli sauce.
What I also do, that’s a little different, is that after the duck legs are done cooking, I reduce the braising liquid until it’s thick, sticky and syrupy. I then take the fat off and drizzle this dark, insanely delicious sauce over the salad, along with the chilli sauce. This makes a world of difference to the final flavour of this Kristang recipe.
Seybak Recipe
I’m not going to lie, preparing seybak is a little bit more involved than your usual salad recipe. This is because we marinate, then cook the duck legs first; either, or both, can be done the day before. This is what we’ll be doing:
- marinate the duck legs for at least 1 hour, or overnight – to save time on Christmas day, this is best done the night before.
- cook the duck legs for 1½ hours, leave to cool.
- make the chilli sauce – takes no more than 10 minutes in all.
- reduce the braising liquid after taking the cooked duck legs out.
- chop up the salad ingredients.
- shred the cooled duck legs.
- toss everything together in a large salad bowl.
Take a look at the images and tell me this Christmas salad doesn’t look amazing! Totally worth the effort. It is for a special occasion, after all.
Ingredients
The ingredients in seybak are mostly regular stuff and should be pretty easy to come by.
I like to add some galangal (fresh or paste) as well as lemongrass, to the braising liquid. If you can’t get either or both, don’t fret, just leave them out. It’s not going to make much difference at all to the final flavour.
The only other thing that bears a mention is the puffed tofu, or taupok. This is tofu that has been drained of much of its liquid, then fried. You will find puffed tofu in the fridge or freezer of most East Asian grocers. I can get them in both my local Chinese and Korean.
Puffed tofu is a very common ingredient in many parts of East and South East Asia, whatever the cuisine, whether in Chinese, Malay or Kristang recipes (Portuguese Eurasian recipes). This is what it looks like, when halved.
Make Ahead Seybak
You can cook the duck, reduce the braising liquid and make the chilli sauce up to a day early. Cover and keep in the fridge. The next day, bring the chilli sauce to room temperature for at least an hour before serving.
Same goes with the duck. There is no need to heat anything up, it is a salad, after all, so you can leave everything freu (cold), nothing wants to be kalo (hot). There you go, you’ve learnt some Kristang today!
Allowing the duck to come to room temperature for an hour or so, will allow you to shred it easier. Or you could shred it, then place it in the fridge.
Chilli Sauce for Seybak
The chilli sauce that we use to flavour seybak is a tangy, sweet and spicy red chilli paste. It’s made in minutes and is very much like the chilli sauce served with Hainanese Chicken Rice, a recipe I owe so many people! Yes, I’m talking to you!
I add about 2 – 3 tablespoons of the chilli sauce to the seybak, and leave the rest on the side for the daredevils to spice up their salad with. If you have any leftover, keep it in the fridge and consume within 2 days. It goes well with rice, noodles and as a dip.
Ok then, I think we’ve covered everything. Shall we get cooking?
♥ If you like the recipe and article, don’t forget to leave me a comment and that all important, 5-star rating! Thank you! ♥
And if you make the recipe, share it on any platform and tag me @azlinbloor, and hashtag it #linsfood
Lin xx
More Kristang Recipes
Seybak with Duck (a Eurasian Christmas Salad)
Ingredients
Marinating the Duck Legs
- 2 duck legs about 400 – 500 g (roughly 1 lb)
- 1 Tbsp dark soy sauce
- 1 tsp light soy sauce
- 1 tsp honey
- 1 tsp French mustard it's tangy, unlike English mustard
- 2 dashes ground white pepper or black
Braising the Duck Legs
- 1 medium onion about 120 g/4 oz pre peeled weight
- 1 medium clove garlic
- 1 lemongrass
- 2.5 cm galangal omit, if unavailable
- 1 Tbsp vegetable or peanut oil
- 1 cinnamon stick about 7.5 cm/3 in long
- 1 whole star anise
- water as needed
Chilli Sauce
- 10 fresh red chillies
- 4 medium cloves garlic
- 2.5 cm ginger
- 3 Tbsp white wine or clear vinegar
- 2 Tbsp white sugar
- ¼ tsp salt
Salad Ingredients
- ¼ small head of lettuce or 2 large handfuls loose leaves any variety: iceberg, batavia, little gem, loose leaves
- ⅓ cucumber
- 2 medium tomatoes or 8 cherry tomatoes
- 8 pieces puffed tofu (tau pok) see explanation in post above
- 1 small red onion or 2 spring onions don't like raw onions in your salad? Leave it out.
Instructions
Marinate the Duck Legs (for at least 1 hour)
- Place the duck legs in a bowl and add all the ingredients.
- Mix thoroughly, getting under the skin.
- Cover with clingfilm and leave to marinate for at least 1 hour. Overnight, in the fridge, if you have time, is good.
Prep Work for Braising
- Bring the legs out of the fridge if they were marinating overnight, while you get all the other ingredients together.
- Peel and quarter the onions.Smash the garlic with the back of your knife, peel and set aside.Bruise the lemongrass. Click here on how to do this.Scrub the galangal and slice it in 2-3 pieces. No need to peel. (I'm using homemade galangal paste).
Let's Braise the Duck Legs
- Heat the oil on medium heat and fry the star anise and cinnamon stick for 30 seconds.
- Add the onion, garlic, lemongrass and galangal and fry for 1 minute.
- Add the duck legs and all the marinade and stir the legs around for 1 minute to absorb some flavours.
- Next pour in as much water as needed to completely submerge the duck legs. Increase the heat and bring to a boil.Reduce the heat to medium-low or low, and simmer, uncovered, for 1½ hours. Turn the duck legs over 2-3 times during this time.While the duck legs are braising, let's get the chilli sauce done.
Seybak Chilli Sauce
- Slice the red chillies and drop them into a food chopper.Peel the garlic and add to the chopper.Slice the ginger and add to chopper.
- Add 2 Tablespoons of the vinegar and chop everything to a fine paste, pushing down the sides of the chopper to get everything.
- Pour this chilli mix into a small saucepan and place over a medium heat. Add the sugar and salt and bring to a simmer. Reduce the heat and cook for 3 minutes.Taste the chilli sauce. If you'd like it tangier, add the last Tbsp of vinegar. Likewise, add a little more sugar if you want it sweeter, and more salt if you need it.When done, take it off the heat, and leave aside until needed.
When the Duck Legs are Done
- Take the duck legs out onto a large plate and leave to cool down for 30 minutes.While waiting, cook down the braising liquid and prepare the salad vegetables.
- In the meantime, increase the heat to medium and cook off the braising liquid until you have a dark, syrupy sauce. Take if off the heat and pour this liquid into a shallow bowl to cool down. You don't want it hot as you'll be adding it to the salad vegetables.Scoop out as much of the fat that's floating above as you can. (Store that fat in the fridge for up to 2 days – it's great in stir fries).Pick out the star anise and cinnamon stick and discard.
- When the duck legs have cooled down, shred the meat with 2 forks and discard the bones. Tip the shredded meat into a large salad bowl.
Salad Vegetables
- Cut the lettuce into long slices and drop into the salad bowl over the shredded duck. I forgot an image for this stage, but you can see the lettuce below the tomatoes in the next picture.
- Cut the tomatoes up into quarters. If using cherry tomatoes, halve them. Add to the salad bowl.
- Quarter the cucumber lengthwise and cut into little quarters. Place in the salad bowl.
- Peel, halve, then thinly slice the red onion and add to the bowl.
- Quarter the puffed tofu and add to the salad bowl. I like to use a pair of scissors for this.
Assembling the Seybak
- Drizzle 2 Tbsp of the chilli sauce all over the salad.
- Follow this with the reduced braising liquid. You shouldn't really have more than 4 Tbsp of the braising liquid. You can add half or all of it. I use it all up for maximum flavour.
- Toss the seybak ingredients, mixing everything thoroughly, ensuring that the duck, tofu and vegetables are all covered in the sauces. Add more chilli sauce if you like.I sometimes finish if off with a light squeeze of lime juice. I'll leave this up to you, as it doesn't actually need it. This is why it's not in the list of ingredients above.Serve immediately, but will keep, covered, for 2 hours at room temperature.
Are duck legs the only part to use??
Hi Faith, the darker meat of duck legs are my favourite for this, but you can use whatever you prefer. Duck breasts will be perfectly delicious too.
Tried this yesterday with your curry devil. I had tears in my eye as I was having dinner. Both dishes brought back so many memories of Christmas dinner with my late parents. Thank you!
It’s my pleasure, Nicola. I’m so pleased that you enjoyed both recipes and that they reminded you of you parents.
Oh my goodness, you have no idea how thankful I am for this recipe, Lin! I converted to get married and no longer eat pork. But I miss all the Serani dishes at Christmas and never even thought I could make my gran’s seybak with duck! You’re a lifesaver! I’m going to try it this weekend, will let you know!
Don’t want to be greedy or anything, but any chance you can do feng too?
And that’s exactly why I posted this recipe. I know so many seranis who have converted and dying for some Christmas food. I’m looking forward to hear what you think.
I’m actually working on the recipe for Feng, but will probably not quite make it for this Christmas. Look out for it sometime in Jan. I’ll send you an email when it’s published.