FEBRUARY 27 — I spent my birthday lounging in a hotel bed, watching silly TV. A show came on that was talking about Singapore’s “dying” heritage cuisine.
Mr so-called defender of Singapore cuisine was going on and on about how char kuey teow would soon be extinct, and that wok hei was “not something you can simply teach!”
Tell that to the foreign helpers at Malaysian food stalls who can char the char kuey teow just fine, thank you.
I watched something slightly less annoying on TV as well, an anime anthology of shorts, entitled Flavours of Youth.
While the show itself was a little bland, one quote from it stood out: “if you find joy in eating, you would always be blessed by delicious food.”
It’s true that as the times have progressed, our food has evolved as well.
I see friends bemoan on social media how hard it is to find good, cheap packets of nasi lemak and how expensive iced Milo is now.
We do take for granted the rich variety of our cuisine, and its availability at all hours.
If I wanted nasi kerabu at 3am, I could head down to Damansara Uptown to Hayaki. If I wanted better nasi kerabu, Kesom is just five minutes away and open for lunch and dinner most days.
In Munich if I had the munchies after midnight, I would have to settle for a streetside kebab.
I do think we do take for granted how cheap and accessible our food is. For too many of us, it takes being away from our food for a long time to appreciate Malaysian food.
Yet TV shows that blame young people and busy workdays for the disappearance of traditional cuisine aren’t really helpful.
“Young people don’t want to learn how to make our food! Rendang takes seven hours, no one has time to make it, soon no one will make it anymore!”
This histrionic approach to the preservation of cuisine is something I hope doesn’t catch on here.
I think, as simplistic as it is, a food will last so long as it is loved. Malaysians love money; they also love food. Combine those things together and maybe we can get somewhere.
Of course there will be people who think they can palm off mediocre food for a quick buck, but these people will always learn the hard way they were wrong.
So long as Malaysians love rendang, char kuey teow, laksa and the likes, they will survive somehow.
Sure, anyone can learn to cook. But not everyone can cook well.
Our food will last so long as there are people who long for it. Who seek it out. Who drive to Ipoh for the coffee and toast, to Melaka for nyonya food, to stalls where they have had the best version of a dish they’ve ever tasted.
Our food isn’t in danger of disappearing, but maybe we could do better at marketing and appreciating it. So maybe we won’t have Malaysian entrepreneurs lie to the New York Times that our white coffee beans are roasted in olive oil and that we grew up with orangutans.
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
