Place each of the ingredients in a separate shallow dish, put the dishes on the table, and provide diners with individual dipping sauce dishes. Then, tell them how to go about assembling the sauce: First, put some salt and white pepper into the dish (2 parts salt to 1 part pepper is a good balance). Next, add a squeeze of lime. Finally, if heat is desired, use chopsticks to muddle some chile slices in the mixture to release their oils. That’s it. Diners should dip each bite of food into the sauce right before eating. They can make flavor adjustments and extra sauce as the meal progresses.

For a more elegant — and perhaps easier — assembly, set up a dipping sauce dish with mounds of salt and white pepper for each diner, and then let them add their own lime juice and chile.