Friday, October 22, 2010

Mee Goreng Basah

It might never occur to us that food in Malaya with the same name as that in Sabah could be very different. However what is interesting is that though some of the food in Malaya and Sabah might share the same name, they may actually be different.

For example, a reader told the North Borneo Herald that he had visited Lahad Datu a few years ago and ordered his favourite Mee Goreng Basah. Now, in Malaya Mee Goreng Basah means stir-fried noodles with extra soy sauce, giving the noodles a wet look. However when this reader had the Mee Goreng Basah sent to his table, he was surprised to see pale looking noodles soaked in thick gravy.

This serves as a lesson to us all, that the next time we are in Malaya, Sarawak or anywhere else and order our favourite food, make sure we ask what it is. Anyway the North Borneo Herald believes such diversity adds more colour to the already colourful cuisine of Malaysia.

As for the reader who sent his story to the North Borneo Herald, he said that the Sabah version of Mee Goreng basah was very tasty indeed.

Send your stories to: northborneoherald@gmail.com

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

There are many more:
(1) Laksa - Laksa in Likas is called Mee Rebus in Johor. Sarawak Laksa, Penang Laksa, KL curry Laksa.. they all claimming their own version as genuine authentic recipes and others are merely modified coprying variation.
(2) Chicken rice - too many variation and conflict to write down.

The worst thing is the Sabah handcraft such as Sompoton selling in many Penisular Malaya tourist shops were all being modified by erased off the name "Sabah" and replaced by "Malaysia" or "1Malaysia"... this is the work of Tanah Malaya Colonisation.