All That Glorious Food

Peranakan achar. Homemade.
There's sambal belachan too. Totally hoarding the precious bottles of gifts.

The lunar festive season also means a truckload of homemade meals firmly fixed into the schedule for the month. YAY! Tasted a plethora of fantastic signature dishes from each Chinese dialect group, and also Vietnamese. Totally blessed. Although I'm feeling a little overwhelmed. Not by the amount of food, but by the sheer effort expended in putting these dishes on the table. The love, has been incredible.

I love buah keluak. And also nasi rawon. But not with ayam or babi. Needless to say, this season, I get to eat a ton of the bitter-black insides of the cooked fruit/nut of the keluak (or kepayang) tree. The effort and difficulty in producing any dish involving buah keluak means it can't be a dish produced weekly at home. Quarterly is a realistic expectation. And unfortunately, the best Peranakan dishes aren't found in restaurants. They're found in the kitchens of my aunts, the MIL and her extended family.

Grew up with damn good sambal belachan and sambal belado made almost on a daily basis, alongside chagayu, fresh fish, as well as the entire spectrum of Peranakan food with sauces and stock made from ground up. I was a kid. So while I was safe from the knives and chopping, I had to fan charcoal stoves, and the batu lesung was my daily buddy for every friggin seed, nut, green, pepper and whatever-chilli. So I know truly, what goes on behind the beautiful plates of glorious food on the dining table. When I learnt that the man's mom is Peranakan, I almost died. If she expects me to cook, she's going to hate me. I can only pound out good sambal belachan and dips. Thank goodness it didn't turn that way. *giant grin* Well, I don't like cooking and I can't identify vegetables, plants and flowers for shits. But it doesn't mean I'm a total idiot in the kitchen. The man has been insidiously making me cook.

Okay. It's time.

It's time I learn how to make two dishes (one vegetarian and the other with seafood) with buah keluak. Learn how to make a damn good rempah.

Yes, you heard that right.

THIS. Black gold.