What is Peranakan Food?

Food from the Straits of Singapore is influenced by Chinese and Malay.  Like the Thai or Indian curries, the Peranakan Curry is not sweet, nor too heavy on the spices. The curry leans more towards the Malay or Indonesian style. I know what I like and my favourites are rendang, chicken curry, buah keluak, kua pi tee, and the deserts are to die for. There are so much more I could get into but here is a taste of the little array just to wet your appetite.

Buah Keluak Seeds

Onde Onde

Kueh Pi Tee

Peranakan food takes a lot of preparation and you got to grow up with these food to know what is quality and how it should taste. In Italian food you talk about the Mirepoix which consist of carrots, celery and onions. In the Peranakan cooking, the rempa (Sauce) varies in each dishes. Coconut, ginger, asam, tumeric, anis seed, cardamons, garlic, cloves, lemon, candlenut, onions are mostly present in some of these savoury dishes and these little spices all adds up in the makings of the extra zang of taste.
Other dishes include:

Asam Pedas Fish 

Buah Keluak

Fried Pork and Shrimp rolloed in Beancurd in Sheets 

Popia: Vegetable Spring Rolls

Braised Pork with Black Soy Sauce

Chicken Curry

Are you hungry yet? America is not yet exposed to these dishes in full diversity but I hope that through this blog they will learn to appreciate it for they do not know how much they are missing out. mummm....