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Mark
Langkawi Popular Food
When early Chinese settlers arrived in Malaysia some took on local Malay wives. As a result tastes and flavours merged and developed into a unique cuisine called Nyonya cuisine.
Indian Muslim cuisine evolved when Indian Muslim men from South India in the 17th century, took on Malay wives. Out of this fusion came another unique cuisine which described as robust, hearty and spicy.
But though each race has a different cuisine, all share a common feature at the table rice. Rice, cooked in a variety of ways, is the staple food of Malaysians and appears at almost every meal along with a number of accompanying dishes. A typical Malaysian meal would consist of rice, two or three vegetables and a meat or a fish dish.
MALAY CUISINE: see here
CHINESE CUISINE: see here
INDIAN CUISINE & INDIAN MUSLIM CUISINE: see here
NYONYA CUISINE
Nyonya cooking uses spices such as buah keras, buah keluak and herbal plants like lengkuas, serai and daun limau purut are used to give that characteristic sweet with sour, spicy and hot flavours. Popular nyonya dishe are:
OTAK-OTAK: fish meat, mashed, spiced, wrapped in banana leaves and grilled.
GRILLED ITEK TIM: duck with salted vegetables.
ASAM CURRY FISH: sourish curried fish.
INTERNATIONAL CUISINE
Restaurants serving international cuisine can be found in the cities. They include cuisines of South African, Korean, Mexican, Vietnamese, Spanish, French, Italian, Australian, Japanese, Thai, American, British, Lebanese, Greek and Turkish. All the ‘big boys’ of American fast food chains, too, are well represented in Malaysia.
WHERE TO EAT?
There are choices of posh hotel restaurants, swanky restaurants, chic street cafes and inexpensive food outlets. Shopping malls have often food courts or hawker stalls. They offer a variety of Chinese, Malay and Indian food in an air conditioned environment at (very) reasonable prices. Hawker stalls offer cheap, quick food. Some rules to observe: Avoid hawker stalls near busy traffic or unclean areas. Avoid precooked food. Go for food that you see being cooked. If the food operator and his premise look clean chances are your food would be handled in a hygienic manner. Avoid iced drinks. Stick to hot or bottled drinks.
See our RESTAURANT GUIDE here
FRUITS OF THE TROPICS: see here
DRINKS
All kinds of fresh fruit juices can be ordered at food outlets. The national brew is ‘teh tarik‘ sweet milky tea. Water from taps is said to be safe to drink, but stick to bottled water.
C-Right: Langkawi Gazette
