FTs cannot help themselves. They will always add "lah" to their writings to seek some kind of acceptance.
Oct 18, 2009
THE EX-PAT FILES
Hot cuisine's not for me
By Jervina Lao
When I first arrived in Singapore, a Singaporean friend invited me for dinner. It was at an eatery in the East Coast which served the popular chilli crab.
I remember taking a claw, cracking it and eating it with a liberal dollop of sauce. Soon after, I was gulping down enough water to irrigate a rice field.
'Fierce, huh,' said my host. 'Yeah, fierce,' I said, wiping tears off my face.
'Welcome to Singapore. If you are going to live here, you better learn to eat chilli,' he laughed.
I like to think that I can take some heat. But the truth is, I'm really a sissy when it comes to chilli.
I have to admit that my lack of tolerance for chilli does pose some limitations on my enjoyment of Singaporean cuisine.
Hot and spicy Peranakan food is out. I take mee siam without the sauce, laksa without the chilli, prata without the curry.
'Are you sure you're Asian?' asked one colleague, when I revealed my antipathy to hot and spicy food.
Even my Greek husband has a higher tolerance for heat than I do. He can chomp down a huge red chilli pepper without batting an eyelid. He attributes it to Alexander the Great having conquered parts of India.
History tells us, however, that chilli peppers originally came from South and Central America and were brought to Asia by Portuguese and Spanish explorers. While most of Asia embraced the spice, the Philippines, strangely enough, did not.
The Philippines is probably the only South-east Asian country where chilli is not often included as an ingredient in food.
I don't really know why this is so, but my best guess is that when the Spanish colonisers arrived in the Philippines in the 1500s, they thought they had found the Holy Grail of spice - the Moluccas or the Spice Islands.
Well, they were a few hundred kilometres short. There was no spice in the Philippines. So the Spaniards had to make do with the next best thing - gold. I guess they were so busy mining for gold in the Philippines and selling the chillies to the rest of Asia that they neglected to cultivate any of the pepper in the Philippines.
As a result, 450 years later, Filipinos have a cuisine that is mostly sweet, sour and salty but not hot and spicy. The very few spicy dishes that Filipinos have would not even warrant a one-chilli fire alarm note on any menu.
So it can be tough when we have guests from the Philippines. Where do we take them? The obvious choice would be some place where they can experience Singaporean food. Well, the last time I brought my Filipino guests to a Peranakan buffet, they all ordered ala carte - chicken rice without the chilli.
Once, I took my brother who was visiting us to a top Thai restaurant where he not only picked out all the chillis, but also ordered a pitcher of ice water to douse the remaining fire in his gullet.
Singapore has a lot of wonderful restaurants with fantastic regional food. Indian, Indonesian and Thai food here is top-notch, although I admit that I do tend to order the least spicy items in the menu. Can't go wrong with pad thai, satay and naan.
Of course, there is always the ever-reliable Chinese food. I for one can live on Hainanese chicken rice, duck rice or noodles and bak kut teh.
As a foodie, I do understand how chilli brightens a lot of dishes. A little kick is always welcome. But a wallop?
A friend tried to entice me into developing a taste for chillies by trying to convince me that those little red devils can help me lose weight.
'How do you think Singaporean women can keep their figure despite eating like horses? It's the chilli diet, lah!' she said.
There has got to be an easier way to burn my fat without incinerating my tongue, I told her.
Of course after living in Singapore for eight years I have developed some tolerance for chilli. A dollop of curry with my naan. Mee siam with a spoon of sauce. A teaspoon of chilli paste with my laksa or popiah. Chased down with a big gulp of ice cold water. Ahhh. Perfect. Now please, let me have the chicken rice.
The writer is a sub-editor at The Straits Times. She has lived in Singapore for eight years.
Oct 18, 2009
THE EX-PAT FILES
Hot cuisine's not for me
By Jervina Lao
When I first arrived in Singapore, a Singaporean friend invited me for dinner. It was at an eatery in the East Coast which served the popular chilli crab.
I remember taking a claw, cracking it and eating it with a liberal dollop of sauce. Soon after, I was gulping down enough water to irrigate a rice field.
'Fierce, huh,' said my host. 'Yeah, fierce,' I said, wiping tears off my face.
'Welcome to Singapore. If you are going to live here, you better learn to eat chilli,' he laughed.
I like to think that I can take some heat. But the truth is, I'm really a sissy when it comes to chilli.
I have to admit that my lack of tolerance for chilli does pose some limitations on my enjoyment of Singaporean cuisine.
Hot and spicy Peranakan food is out. I take mee siam without the sauce, laksa without the chilli, prata without the curry.
'Are you sure you're Asian?' asked one colleague, when I revealed my antipathy to hot and spicy food.
Even my Greek husband has a higher tolerance for heat than I do. He can chomp down a huge red chilli pepper without batting an eyelid. He attributes it to Alexander the Great having conquered parts of India.
History tells us, however, that chilli peppers originally came from South and Central America and were brought to Asia by Portuguese and Spanish explorers. While most of Asia embraced the spice, the Philippines, strangely enough, did not.
The Philippines is probably the only South-east Asian country where chilli is not often included as an ingredient in food.
I don't really know why this is so, but my best guess is that when the Spanish colonisers arrived in the Philippines in the 1500s, they thought they had found the Holy Grail of spice - the Moluccas or the Spice Islands.
Well, they were a few hundred kilometres short. There was no spice in the Philippines. So the Spaniards had to make do with the next best thing - gold. I guess they were so busy mining for gold in the Philippines and selling the chillies to the rest of Asia that they neglected to cultivate any of the pepper in the Philippines.
As a result, 450 years later, Filipinos have a cuisine that is mostly sweet, sour and salty but not hot and spicy. The very few spicy dishes that Filipinos have would not even warrant a one-chilli fire alarm note on any menu.
So it can be tough when we have guests from the Philippines. Where do we take them? The obvious choice would be some place where they can experience Singaporean food. Well, the last time I brought my Filipino guests to a Peranakan buffet, they all ordered ala carte - chicken rice without the chilli.
Once, I took my brother who was visiting us to a top Thai restaurant where he not only picked out all the chillis, but also ordered a pitcher of ice water to douse the remaining fire in his gullet.
Singapore has a lot of wonderful restaurants with fantastic regional food. Indian, Indonesian and Thai food here is top-notch, although I admit that I do tend to order the least spicy items in the menu. Can't go wrong with pad thai, satay and naan.
Of course, there is always the ever-reliable Chinese food. I for one can live on Hainanese chicken rice, duck rice or noodles and bak kut teh.
As a foodie, I do understand how chilli brightens a lot of dishes. A little kick is always welcome. But a wallop?
A friend tried to entice me into developing a taste for chillies by trying to convince me that those little red devils can help me lose weight.
'How do you think Singaporean women can keep their figure despite eating like horses? It's the chilli diet, lah!' she said.
There has got to be an easier way to burn my fat without incinerating my tongue, I told her.
Of course after living in Singapore for eight years I have developed some tolerance for chilli. A dollop of curry with my naan. Mee siam with a spoon of sauce. A teaspoon of chilli paste with my laksa or popiah. Chased down with a big gulp of ice cold water. Ahhh. Perfect. Now please, let me have the chicken rice.
The writer is a sub-editor at The Straits Times. She has lived in Singapore for eight years.
