source: easyuni.com
Being Malaysian, I underestimated the uniqueness of this country in terms of it's food culture. Racial acceptability? That's been over and done with -despite multiple cases of racism surfacing the news, the effort to reunite as one has always been publicly raised everywhere including social media. As part of the Malaysian youth, there's no doubt to admit our younger generations are displaying more bravery and disciplinary strength to make our tanah air the best again. We've grown into verbal millennials speaking up to what we consider makes the country continue developing and successful, shown effortless hard work to make up a living in this economical crisis and have without fail, assist each other to survive.
However, when it comes to food, I noticed a few things we should keep in mind of preserving. Yes, we still eat nasi lemak on a daily basis to even have McDonalds merge a burger into one concept to gain popularity of market sales. No one ever skips going to the mamak for some good roti canai or chicken tandoori and spend the whole night watching football. Ikan bakar, dosai, otak-otak, satay. rojak buah, kue teow, pan mee, hokkien mee, hainanese chicken rice, nasi kerabu, cendol, nasi kandar, rendang *crispy*, and boy haven't I started on the Arabic, Japanese and Pakistani food which are all easily accessible to get in Malaysia.
Yet, with all these foods girls still don't know what to choose. Aha.
The point is, I've noticed we've diverged ourselves into how westerns promote their food globally on the internet. There is nothing wrong with western cuisine, I love it and it's such an inspiration to make simple but really delicious foods -unlike ours, we need lots of base ingredients before starting to even fry something on the pan. But to exaggerate is sometimes a bliss. A good example of today's trend is the glorifying of hipster cafes. There's been too much of promoting volcanic cheese bursts, excessive gravy on burger patties, additional amount of food preservatives and to my concern, majorly I see is promoted in Malay culture. Younger kids prefer chicken chop over curry chicken, nuggets and fries over nasi lemak for breakfast etc. Too many local cafes especially built by young entrepreneurs tend to promote these -hundreds of fb pages and reviews cater for this category alone.
I don't think of this as a problem, as western foods are acceptable here in Malaysia just as any other cuisines from respective countries. But this has brought to mind when I changed my perspective as a non-Malaysian. My international friends insisted me of bringing them around and try local cuisines, I felt a bit stuck. My Romanian friend, Maria asked me where I'd like to eat, I told her we can go Benz, where they offer the best pastas. Then I realised it was the last thing she wants to try here. I thought of the high demanding places youngsters prefer -Jibby, Nandos, McDonalds, Dominos, Kilang Bateri, BurgerLab, 4fingers, KyoChon, Mr. Dakgalbi, Seoul Garden, the Steakhouse etc. None of them promoted Malaysian cuisine as the highlight of their menu. Yes, all of us eat local foods on a daily basis and eat at these places as a 'treat'. However, with the modernity and likelihood of insta-potential snaps of scrumptious food, we serve the platter to make it better than our local choices.
Who doesn't love western foods? I do love them. Just that sometimes we're too blinded with the things we don't have -and we don't embrace the main speciality we obtain effortlessly. Twenty-one years of my life I didn't bother to notice, until my U.K lecturer and friends emphasised how bland their foods were as compared to Malaysian cuisine. I appreciated their interest of taking such generosity to try our foods, post on social media elaborating how different and unique our food is and taking time to promote other people what they liked and did not -durians are still the top rank of disliked feedback as expected. Their interests made me realise our country isn't so bad after all, especially when it comes to food.
Enjoy the diversity of food we've been blessed both asian and western -yet, never forget internally of our roots and how we should preserve Malaysia's heritage.
Malaysia's the best on trending just about anything.
Everything shared, told, commented is worth an impact in our country.
All foods are worth cherished and appreciated, so include a good indulge of our Asian dishes on the list!
