Food
I think about food. A lot.
Not just because I love to eat: I also think that food is politics, history, culture, and the best lens through which I can learn about the world.
I've been lucky to have eaten extensively across the world. I've also worked on several cookbooks. Now, I write an occasional food newsletter, obsessively review tacos, and develop recipes that are at once traditional and outright absurd.
-
I Hate Cabbage Soup
White cabbage is death. If there is a Creator, it is one of his less glorious moments. The only thing worse than white cabbage is white cabbage soup. I am a soup maniac, but white cabbage soup I do not touch with a ten foot pole. I cannot even sit at the same table when it is being drunk. The sight and smell of it…
-
A Drinkable History of My Family
The following piece is an original piece written specially for Ceriph #3, published by Math Paper Press. It's on sale at my favourite bookstore, BooksActually, and also at Kinokuniya.. Fish Sauce We are Teochew, people of the coast. Fish sauce, more than hot food, opera, more than even yam paste desserts - is what…
-
Crazy, Delicious Love
One of the projects that's been super fun to work on has been the birth of the Klang Valley's first homemade ice cream outfit, The Last Polka. M and E run the ice cream empire, I help out with the other bits, like the… tasting of the ice cream. And the copywriting. What started as a crazy idea — bringing ice cream to…
-
You Asians Have Two Stomachs
Some friends from Turkey came to visit this past weekend. I had a great time hanging out with Melissa and Emirhan in Antalya when I stopped by en route to Istanbul (from Damascus), so I naturally returned the favour and put them up at my place. After three dinners (not at the same time, albeit the same night), Emirhan…
-
There Is Always Chicken Curry at Funerals
Last Rites Living in Singapore is not easy, one can quickly see. Could it be that we tire quickly from our programming — the PSLE, the Os, the As, the university, the serving the nation, the feeding your family and all these things? Or is it that we pack the rush hour morning and evening trains daily, increasingly…