The long Eid Al Adha holiday is almost over. Soon I will go back to office again, Thank God. Long holiday coupled with nothing to do and the result is an unbelievable state of boredom. I spent my days sleeping (hey! by Malaysian standard it IS quite cold out there!) and when things got really ugly, dull and dry, I would gloriously jump to the kitchen and start cooking...naked!

Strange thing happens when you are alone in a strange land and struggling to cook a perfect Malaysian meal. Ingredients for All-Malaysian-Food are not always available, so you have to settle for substitutes. Therefore, creative cooking plays a vital role in getting your stomach filled during long holidays. A trip to a restaurant will do the trick, but after sometime, it become just as tasty as dipping a stale bread in a glass of tap water. I always surprise myself every time I finish cooking my dinner. I can cook a same dish with exactly the same ingredients and come up with a surprisingly differently taste! Now you can eat my "Chicken Masala ala Malaysia" everyday and never get bored with it.

As there are so many people from the Indian Continent here, naturally, their foods are abundant. They event have grocery stores selling solely Indian foodstuffs. I was surprised to find that curry has so many faces and names. It almost like every town in India has come up with their own spice mix. If you think you can just hop into a grocery store and come out with curry mix in your hand, then you are dead wrong. It is NOT just a trip to a grocery store, IT IS AN ADVENTURE! First you’ll be surrounded by all kinds of spices mix then you will be overwhelmed by their aroma. Your mind frantically tries to comprehend the unfathomable relationship between spices names, aromas, tastes and the incredible pleasure of a satisfying meal. By the time you relatively confident that you’ve made the right choice, it is already too late. You realized that you’ve been wandering aimlessly at that spice section for over five hours! Forget about cooking, let’s go to McDonald...

Adnan Md Shariff

***END!***

p/s – I do admit that Chicken Biryani here is excellent. Trust me, I’m a Johorean, I know what I’m talking about when it comes to Biryani.

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