Food is an instant memory prompter, a single bite or whiff is enough to carry you to happy times. Food is the most accessible medium to explore the traditions and cultures of countries we travel to.
Most often it is the stories and memories attached to the food I cook and eat that make me passionate about it. But it is not just the eating that I relish, I love the entire process of cooking something associated with an exotic locale or a great dining experience. Assembling the ingredients, prepping them, losing myself in the smells and textures as I cook and reliving the experience of discovering the dish itself, preserves memories as no photograph could.
One of my favourite food cities is Singapore. I first travelled to Singapore in my teens, a long time before I embarked on a career in food writing. But even my untrained palate of that time registered the many flavours I was exposed to; that first meal on arrival of flat noodles and slivers of meat redolent of wok hay — the breath of a wok, curry puffs aromatic with spicy curry flavoured potatoes my cousin brought home from the corner store, the savoury rice porridge that we had for lunch one day, a peppery crab at a dinner out one day. Over the years I have gotten to know the food of Singapore intimately. Singapore cuisine is a prime example of the ethnic diversity of the culture, flavoured by the diverse cuisines of nearby Penang and Malaysia, liberally spiced with Chinese, Indonesian and Indian influences and seasoned with a little twist of the West.
Here are two recipes that are regulars in my home now.
Hainanese Chicken Rice
One of my favourite places to have Chicken rice is Tian Tiam Hainanese chicken rice stall at the Maxwell Road Hawker Centre. Serves 4-6; prep time: 1 hour
Ingredients
For the chicken:
- 1 (about 1-1/4 kg) chicken, cut
- 300 gm pak choi/spinach, washed
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 large onion, sliced
- 4 slices fresh ginger
- 1-2 green chillies, pounded
- For the rice:
- 2 tbsp vegetable oil
- 8 garlic cloves, minced
- 4 cups long-grained rice, washed
- 1 tsp salt
- For the chilli sauce:
- 2-3 tbsp lime juice, freshly squeezed
- 5 tbsp fresh red chillies, finely chopped
- 5 garlic cloves, minced
- 3 tbsp grated fresh ginger
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ cup boiling hot chicken broth
Method
For the chicken:
Wash the chicken thoroughly and drain. Wash the pak choi or spinach thoroughly and drain. Bring water to boil in a large pan with the salt. Add the chicken, onion, ginger and green chillies to the water. Bring the water to a boil again, reduce the heat, cover and simmer, till the chicken is cooked. Put the pak choi or spinach leaves in a strainer and lower it into the boiling soup for a few minutes, till bright green and tender. Remove the strainer from the broth and set aside. Remove the chicken from the broth, drain and rinse in ice-cold water. Drain and slice the chicken flesh. Strain the broth. Reserve the chicken and the broth.
For the rice:
Put the oil for the rice in a large pan on medium heat. When hot, add the garlic and stir-fry, till fragrant. Add the rice and stir-fry for 2 minutes. Mix in the salt.
Ladle in enough chicken broth to come 1/2” above the rice and boil on high heat. Once the water has dried out, cover the pan and steam on low heat for about 30 minutes, till the rice is cooked.
For the chilli sauce:
Combine all ingredients, mix. Serve the rice with the sliced chicken, pak choy/spinach, chilli sauce and hot chicken broth to wash it down.
CINDY’S PORRIDGE OR CONGEE
Whether it is plain rice porridge with fried dough (you tiao) or a huge bowl of Cantonese jook with fresh seafood, it doesn’t matter. Singaporeans love to start their day with a steaming hot bowl of congee! My friend Cindy makes it the best. Called porridge, congee, chook or jook, in Singapore (and Asia), the dish consists of rice cooked in many times its volume of water or stock. Eaten as is or tweaked to taste with accompanying condiments such as salty preserved eggs or soya sauce, spicy chillies, fresh spring onions and You Tiao, a local fried dough. I just could not get enough of the last, crispy and chewy, with just the right amount of sinful deep-fried flavour, and lots of nooks and crannies that sopped up the porridge! This is my personal instant version of Chinese congee that I invented using beaten rice and a flavourful home-made stock. Redolent of ginger, spicy with chillies and topped with a selection of relishes (chopped spring onions, fried garlic, pickled green peppercorns, sliced sausage), to add accents of delicious flavour to each bite.
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp oil
- 1 cup diced chicken or vegetables (celery, carrot, beans and mushrooms), finely chopped, or a combination
- 9 cups chicken or vegetable stock
- Salt to taste
- 2 cups white or unpolished thick beaten rice (jada poha)
- A few generous twists of freshly ground black pepper
- Accompaniments:
- 1/3 cup chilli oil
- 1/3 cup finely sliced fresh red or green chillies
- 1/3 cup finely sliced spring onion greens
- A handful (30 gms) of fresh Thai basil leaves
Method
- Put the oil in a large pan on medium heat. When hot, add the chicken or vegetables and sauté lightly, till well coated in oil and almost cooked.
- Pour in the stock and add salt to taste. Bring to a boil on high heat.
- Add the rice and cook, till the porridge has achieved the desired thickness.
- Mix in the pepper, taste and adjust salt. Put the accompaniments in individual bowls and serve them on the side with the congee.
Time: 20 minutes; Serves 2
Rushina heads the APB Cook Studio in Mumbai and has authored A Pinch of This, A Handful of That
