Palm sugar

Boiled-down palm sap, sold as a soft paste or as hard discs. It is not pure sucrose: it carries fructose, minerals and the Maillard products of the boil, which is why it tastes caramelised before it is cooked. Shave it rather than chop it. Dissolve it in a hot liquid before any acid is present. It resists dissolving once the pH drops. Raise the quantity when you replace tamarind with a plain vinegar. Tamarind concentrate is about one third sugar, so a straight vinegar swap leaves a dish short on the sweet side by roughly 10 g for every 40 g of tamarind removed. White sugar substitutes at the same weight but gives only sweetness. Restore the depth elsewhere.