Graceful, Grateful Moments

On a cool winter's night, think of cream brulee. Soft melting insides hidden below a thin crispy crust that is neither overdone nor too flimsy, but just with the right texture when you bite into it, savouring the flavour of infused caramel. Combine it with the sour-sweet sensation of fresh dark red raspberries and the nippiness of the evening air seems a distant window away.

The dessert is what you have been saving yourself for, after a light mains of seared scallops, juicy and firm, graced by sweet green long beans and refreshingly slim baby carrots. You recall the savoury cuts of john dory blending into the fettucine on another occasion, with the pasta pesto highlighted by spiced prawns. Tonite, the fettucine would have been too heavy with the cream brulee.

A meal is accentuated with the right company. Individuals whom I feel comfortable with and can relate to without effort. People who make me want to be myself, when politeness is not imposed but spontaneously accompanies relaxation and openness. There is no exertion at making conversation, it just comes naturally and logically, and each one of us at the same table enjoys expresssing what is uppermost in our separate minds. We might not have known each other long, but well enough. The interchange blends in well, with no embarasssment, as effectively as the tasty food served. Such is rare company, such is rare food!

Recently Lingering Inner Soul Food From Outside The Home

1. The curry puffs that cousin Lai Han got from a stall in a coffee shop in SS2, Petaling Jaya, Klang Valley
2. Curry laksa ala Vietnam from Hurstville, Sydney
3. Nasi lemak combination with Chinese roast chicken cuts from the Killerney Road Cafe, Sunway Damansara, Klang Valley
4. Roast suckling pig from Restaurant Yat, Section 14, Petaling Jaya, Klang Valley
5. Straits Chinese choon pniah (deep fried spring rolls) from the Penang Swimming Club
6. Ampang Road yong tau foo (vegetable-stuffed bean curd concoctions) from Jalan Ipoh, Kuala Lumpur
7. Pumpkin seed and apricot flavoured bread from Shellharbour Stockland Shopping Centre
8. Warm broth of black glutinious rice with a touch of coconut milk, from Thornleigh, Sydney

Muddy Confluence

The rains still come down at twilight
With the ease I gathered back with my mates
No thoughts at all on what could have been my delight
Had I stayed on in this tropical valley bed

What is reality, what are impressions
As I lay awake, with rekindled memories
of fondness, food and friendship as utmost expressions
of the most important of life's desirabilities

Countless hours of routine and persistence
melt into precious moments of reunions
The ordinary becomes special and not existence
The circumstance of a unique communion

To savour forgotten experiences
To sit at the same table
To ride on the same journey of shared nuances
And to realise that it was not before possible and able

Kopi Tiam Kopi Tiam

The half-boiled eggs, still whole in their shell, come served with soy sauce, pepper and salt to choose as garnishings. Sitting beside them are squares of two-layered toast, sandwiching a rich and inviting layer of spread called the kaya, To complete the trifecta in a winner of a breakfast is a small cup of milked coffee, looking as brown as the sandwich spread.

To get to this set of food, there was a queue of around 20 persons, all willingly waiting for their dose of this traditional mix, based on British colonial, Straits Chinese and South Indian tastes. In the sixties and seventies, this was the ubiqutious expected fare in down-to-earth coffee shops (kopi tiam) along every respectable main street in countless towns and villages in Peninsular Malaysia and Singapore. Such coffee shops still exist, but here I was in an ultra modern shopping complex called The Curve in the Klang Valley of Malaysia, and the coffee shop I was in was a shop lot on an upper level of the building and not street side. In Singapore, such fare is also served as fast food from economical outlets in MRT commuter stations.

Familes, singles, couples and children all took in their food with a gusto. Some order more spicy and chillied food like curry laksa and nasi lemak, both South-east Asian in origin. The laksa dish is akin to having curry soup combined with your choice of noodles, meat pieces and green garnishings. The nasi lemak is served with bits of deep fried anchovies, fresh cucumber cuts, a dash of sambal paste, slices of hard boiled eggs and gutsy Indian curry chicken. Sambal is the granish that gives the kick and glues all the different sensations together - the fluffiness of rice cooked in coconut milk, cruchiness of fresh vegetables and the spiciness of meat.

Watch out Starbucks, a newly revived trend in public eating may have emerged, one that provides a return to local values and also suburban chic. The business formula may look familiar - provide a few signature items that customers will eat on a regular basis; provide a shop ambience that encourages homeliness; ensure fast service and fast turnaround; employ young people at low cost in the shop; and ensure that the food - and coffee or tea - is flowing throughout. Oh yes, the coffee or tea - it must have its stand-out taste, with its own peculiar brand as well.

Dining at Benji's

Banjo Patterson is an Australian icon. His childhome home by the banks of the Parramatta River in Gladesville still stands, its sandstone walls as solid and sturdy as his resonating poems of life in a century gone past. Patterson's grandmother, Emily Barton, was a literary genius in her own right, but the grandson remains more significant in heritage, for it was him who penned The Man From Snowy River.

On a nippy winter's night, I was privileged to dine in the warmth of the Banjo Patterson House and with my cousin Susan and her hubby Boo Ann's family right in front of a much appreciated working fireplace. The window sill beside me led to a view of shiny lights by the riverbank, marred only by swaying palm leaves on a windy Saturday evening. The menu has been tastefully littered with verses from Banjo's most famous poems and images of his youthful countenance from another era.

Would Banjo have recognised the menu served? Maybe not the main dish of baked duck breast or the fancy desserts that belong to a more fusion age. I fancied that he would have chosen the kangaroo sirloin, the liquor-laced coffees and the wholesome pumpkin and potato soup (which I had as an entree). The ambience was one of easy, relaxed and fine dining, cocooned against the outside world, without a care for the weariness of the past week. Every time I had the privilege to be dining here there would be a wedding party in another function room, but bar for the alcohol imbibers hanging around the entrance, one would not have been aware of such a party. Instead I could concentrate on the 30th wedding anniversary celebration for Susan and Boo Ann.