Following the food trail

I like to cook and have always enjoyed the  Discovery Travel and Living Channel. My favourite hosts are Ian Wright, Samantha Brown, Anthony Bourdain and Bobby Chinn. These are the people who would show you the fun of travelling to exotic places and trying out new delectable morsels of food.

So imagine my surprise when I learnt that Peter Ward of Country Choice and American celebrity chef and World Café host Bobby Chinn were going to be at the North Tipperary Agricultural Show – a  place for cattle, poultry, horse and pony showing classes and show jumping as well as many other competitions including the best floral displays, photography, art, baking, cooking, needlework, fruit and vegetable produce.

Not one with great spatial intelligence, I surprised myself by getting to the destination without any hitches and I was early as well. Peter Ward, the friendly and charming man who together with his wife Mary, established Country Choice, an independent delicatessen, café and supply business,  told me that Bobby would only be on an hour later. So that gave me some time to walk around the fair, admiring prized four legged creatures: Hereford, Angus and Friesian amongst others. 

                                

What is it about food anyway?

I firmly believe that any true Malaysian is a great lover of food. Not any type of food, but a wide variety of food. The thing about us is that we are eager to try cooking and tasting new stuff. It is not uncommon for us to ask our hostess for the recipe of the most gorgeous lime pie. Most people will happily share the recipes but some will make us swear that we will only use the recipe for domestic purposes and not to start a business.

Then there are some who would just travel for miles to other towns just because the satay is superb in Kajang or the bean sprouts are crunchier in Ipoh. The travelling may be tedious but the food makes it all worthwhile.

So far, I have tried many recipes, some of which are successful and some not. But the greatest achievement for me is baking bread, something that I would have thought impossible. Nothing beats the warm loaf wrapped in a tea towel and sitting on the window sill. Somehow the smell of bread baking in a kitchen gives the home a totally different meaning altogether.

Most times I have also altered recipes to suit my guests’ taste buds.  Tofu and tamarind-based dishes can be as strange to my guests as cold tongue and kidney pie are to me. I find that the more well- travelled my guests are, the more ready they are to enjoy and taste a variety of food beyond the bangers and mash. I made some mango custard dessert for a pot-luck at a local gathering and no one touched it. Unfazed, I made the same dessert at an international gathering and it was zapped up immediately with compliments all round.

Initially I found the Chinese takeaway dishes very strange indeed, not at all like what I am used to. As they try to cater for their customers’ tastes, Chinese dishes have morphed into a blend of eastern spices and western portions, so I could never actually finish a meal all by myself at a Chinese restaurant.

Following the food trail like any endeavour is a journey and it all starts in someone’s kitchen, usually our mother’s. Although my mother used to chase me out of the kitchen because I was more of a pest than a help, I was determined to try out all sorts of recipes. Table manners are also very different where I come from. Those who are younger will make sure that the older ones are seated first out of respect. Then we will ‘invite’ our parents or elders to eat before we did.

At a Chinese restaurant in Dublin, my daughter ‘invited’ me to eat before she started tucking in. Then I heard a Chinese mother ‘chiding’ her own daughter (probably she was born and bred in Ireland), ‘See the girl is asking her mother to eat first, I never hear you saying that.’

Another wonderful custom that we have is we like to share our food. Whether we are at home, in school or in the office, we will readily share what we have with others so we could taste each other’s food, thus forging a kind of camaraderie.

So after an hour wandering around the fair and having scrutinised the cows and horses, I went back to the Country Choice stall and saw the back of a very familiar person sitting on a chair. Like an excited teenager, I went around the chair and asked,

‘Hi, Bobby could I take a photo of you?’

Bobby grinned and said ‘Now why don’t we get someone to take a photo of us.’

Source: http://www.nst.com.my/opinion/columnist/following-the-food-trail-1.360807?cache=golhyfvvipwqzn%2F7.14219%2F7.14219%2F7.245988%3Fkey%3DKuala+Lumpur%2F7.478218%2F7.478218%2F7.478218