Talk:Malaysian cuisine/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Nasi Lemak

So is it a Nyonya food or a Malay food?--Malbear 10:31, 29 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Even the name is Malay, how can it be a Nyonya food! U sotong kaa?? Malay food is known as village food for the country was colonise by the Indons, Japanese, British and so on. Nobody knows what food may come out from there.

Disputed

Eat Out

"Traditionally, Malays do not "eat out", preferring home-cooked meals."

Removed this as there is no basis for this claim. No group of people eat out ALL the time. also doubt relevance. --Malbear 07:52, 23 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Actually, there is merit in that statement. You'll be surprised when you go to countries like Malaysia or Thailand, where food seems to be available all day, all night and everywhere. And it seems some people just can't stop eating in spite of their small frames! Some cultures simply have a more developed food culture, as well as an affinity and love affair for good food. With the Malays (and I noticed this with some Indonesians as well), they do like to snack a lot and would frequently go hunting for street food like everyone else, but they simply aren't as high on dining out at restaurants like the Chinese and even the Indians do. A large proportion of the full range of Malay culinary repertoire (as in, the full course meals, not snacks) is to be found in Malay homes, not prepared or available at restaurants or even kedai kopis. It's just the way it is. Haleth (talk) 17:27, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Tosai

or tosai, which are thin Indian crepes originating from South India.

Removed as this is an Indian food from Indian and not malaysia.--Malbear 07:52, 23 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Original names please

"Some other notable dishes include fried soybean curd in peanut sauce, fiery curry prawns and spiced curried meat in coconut marinade."

Removed. Please add original names. Preferably add a small blurb.--Malbear 07:52, 23 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Prawn noodles

  • prawn noodles, a meal of thin yellow noodles served in a soup made from boiled prawns, chilli and fried onions with slices of steamed pork and prawns, steam chicken served with broken rice balls

Removed, please check if prawn noodles has broken rice balls and then add it back

Nasi Dagang

Where is nasi dagang???

If you can write a description about it, then add it to the article. This is a wiki, after all!  :) Remember the Wikipedia slogan, Be bold! --Lance E Sloan (talk) 02:22, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Wantan Mee OR Wanton Mee OR Wonton Mee?

Wanton means Immoral. (see http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/wanton)

My wife, a Malaysian of Chinese descent, says that the correct spelling is "wonton". Not only is that the Malay spelling, it is also the spelling I see on products and in menus in the USA. As an informal survey, I did Google searches for each of the three spellings and I found that "wonton" appears over a hundred times more than each of the other spellings. Merriam-Webster dictionary says "wonton" is the correct spelling, too. (See http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/wonton .) I am tempted to just change the spelling right now. I wish there were a way to search the article history for a specific change. I don't want to change the spelling of that word if it's been changed before. --Lance E Sloan (talk) 02:15, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Tong Sui - Drink or Custard?

The description here indicates that Tong Sui is a drink, but the link from it indicates that it's a custard dessert. Please clarify? -- irrevenant [ talk ] 10:30, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

I did not write this one but I know Tong Sui is variety (15 types ++) and are serve in bowl. I can drink it directly from the bowl, I can use spoon, I can also bite the beans, it is ok to drink and eat. L joo 20:20, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Renaming this as "Malaysian cuisine"

Well MOST other cuisines are named that way (eg. French cuisine, European cuisine). Might as well rename this for a more uniform style? — Yurei-eggtart 12:26, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Should be merged with/redirected to Malay cuisine. Huw Powell (talk) 09:41, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
No.., I disagre to merge this page with Malay cuisine. Malay cuisine is defined as cuisine of Malay people which also encompass Malaysia, Indonesia (coastal Sumatra and Kalimantan), Singapore, and Brunei. However Malay cuisine is just a part of the whole Malaysian cuisine which also include Indian and Chinese (Peranakan/Nonya) cuisine (Gunkarta (talk) 11:44, 10 March 2011 (UTC)).

Need help with photo

Can editors skilled in Malaysian cuisine help with this? I want to determine if this photo is kompyang. Thank you, Badagnani 17:41, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't look like kompyang at all to me, more like someone's misguided attempt at making rosti with onions and flour dough instead of potatoes...Malaysian-style! :-p I could be wrong though, maybe someone from some little Fuzhou community (it's a Han Chinese Fuzhou subdialect group snack) in some obscure part of Malaysia has decided to put a dramatic spin on their kompyang. Haleth (talk) 17:28, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

katchang idju

I'm probably spelling it wrong, but what of these little green beans? The only net reference I can find is at www.fepow-community.org.uk/monthly_Revue/html/food.htm+katchang+idju . Chris 08:27, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

The link doesn't work. What is the species of the beans? Are they mung beans? Badagnani 08:31, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
See id:Kacang_hijau. Badagnani 08:32, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Article will grow unwieldly

This is just my opinion. The current form of the article tries to present a unified summary of Malaysian cuisine with long lists of culture-specific food for each major races. Unfortunately for this article (but fortunately for us Malaysians), these lists will eventually grow to be very long as more items are added. My suggestions are to include more information on the historical and cultural background of Malaysian cuisine such as the influence of Indian and Arab traders, Portugese (chilli, tomatoes) Dutch(?) and British colonials, Chinese (Peranakan and British-introduced) and South Indian (Tamil). What are the common spices used, cooking techniques, cultural significance etc.? The long lists should be culled and instead moved to new articles named "Malay Cuisine" or "Malaysian-Chinese Cuisine" etc. We cannot compare Malaysian Cuisine to French Cuisine as although there is a degree of intermixing between the cuisines of the various races, there are still distinct differences between them, in contrast to French cuisine that has a more unified style. Note that I am not trying to imply any racial ideologies or that Malaysian Chinese and Indians are not "Malaysian". This is just to streamline the article and provide a starting point for people interested in Malaysian cuisine. Just my two cents. I have not made any changes to the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.154.161.31 (talk) 10:45, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Copyright problem

‎ This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. --Mkativerata (talk) 23:59, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Article needs trimming

As has been pointed out, this article is getting too big and unwieldy. There are already specific articles for Malay cuisine, Malaysian Indian cuisine, and Peranakan cuisine, so a lot of content of the article does not need to be here. The only page missing is Malaysian Chinese cuisine (currently a redirect to this page), and I would copy the content in the section here to that page, and then consider how best to trim this article. If no one objects, I would start creating the content for Malaysian Chinese cuisine soon, then perhaps a discussion on how best to reorganize the content of this page can start. Hzh (talk) 10:45, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

I do agree, this article has become too big and too long, mostly contributed by the long "dish list". I suggest we move the detail of the dish list to List of Malaysian dishes and trimming the Malaysian cuisine. This has been done in Indonesian cuisine and List of Indonesian dishes. Plus I agree that the detail should be dedicated to the specific article, once again in Indonesian counterpart, this has been done in regional specific article such as Minangkabau cuisine, Sundanese cuisine, Javanese cuisine, Malay cuisine, and Manado cuisine. Gunkarta  talk  02:24, 22 November 2014 (UTC) 11:44, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
Agreed. 👍 Like — ᴀʟʀᴇᴀᴅʏ ʙᴏʀᴇᴅ ʜᴜʜ? 17:26, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

I will copy the content of the section on Malaysian Chinese cuisine into its own page later today. I probably won't do anything to this page for a while yet to give time for others to contribute to this discussion first. One question though, is Rojak supposed to be Chinese? I see it listed under Malaysian Chinese cuisine but not Malay cuisine which I find curious. Hzh (talk) 12:38, 3 May 2014 (UTC)

That's a good question. It's very complicated, but I'll try to summarize as well as I can. I'll start with this statement: Malaysia is an immigrant country, and its reflected in its food culture. Just as the all-American hamburger has its roots in German food, Malaysian rojak has its origins in Javanese rujak from Javanese cuisine, which is actually very different in taste profile and concept to Malay food. Also, at the most elemental level Javanese and Malay culture do not have much in common with each other, they don't even speak the same language. But due to the convoluted racial and communal-based socio-political situation as well as government policy in Malaysia (long story and I don't want to delve into it), Muslim immigrants from Indonesia, no matter which province they're from or their cultural roots, were and are encouraged to assimilate and identify themselves as Malays. So following that logic, while subsequent ethnic Sumatran arrivals might blend in better with the established Malay culture in Malaysia due to inherent similarities, the Bugis and Javanese communities tend to stick out more. Hence the concept of a single unified style of Malay cuisine is highly nebulous in itself.

Malay food in Peninsular Malaysia mostly has its roots on ethnic Malay, Acehnese and Minangkabau food from Indonesian Sumatera, and in the case of East Malaysia Malay it's Bruneian food which is again distinct from their Peninsular counterparts. Back in the days when borders were less porous between the greater Nusantara region, recipes were less well documented. Malaysian Peranakans in particularly exchange a lot of ideas with their Indonesian Chinese counterparts in the old days, especially with food, and while today they are mostly Chinese in DNA their cuisine is considered very peculiar and different by both mainstream Chinese and Malay communities. A similar analogy would be like comparing the cooking and culture of Louisiana Creole and Cajun peoples with that of Black Americans and French Canadians, respectively. Similar roots, but very different outcome.

In other words, my point is rojak is a recent import to Malaysia as opposed to an ancient heritage recipe of the Malay community like pekasam or tempoyak. It's never a home-cooked dish or served in traditional Malay-run eateries, and it usually makes an appearance as street food sold by either ethnic Chinese or ethnic Tamil Muslim (Mamak) cooks (who themselves produce a hybrid cuisine of Tamil and Malay characteristics), and I suspect either one of these two communities were ultimately responsible for adapting the Javanese original and heavily modifying it for the Malaysian dining public. The version of rojak which is the most commonly encountered version in Malaysia is the Chinese/Peranakan fruit rojak. Indian rojak usually has a "Mamak" label attached to it, sometimes sold under a different name called "pasembur", and is a completely different dish in taste and texture. To make matters more confusing, the original Javanese recipes which was once considered alien to Malaysians, is beginning to make more of an appearance as Malaysians of Javanese begin to commercialize their heritage dishes in restaurants and eateries.

The lists can be trimmed, if you all like, and thank you for undoing the redirect for Malaysian Chinese cuisine. But I object to notion idea of removing every single entry and keeping it all confined to a "list of Malaysian dishes" page where there is barely a description and which quite frankly, no one ever reads. If one were to list a dish from each sub-set cuisine, each list would have at least 100-200 distinct entries compared to the numbers on the article. There is no single unified culinary style with Malaysian cuisine, not even on the individual state level (Kelantan is a major exception to the rule in a country with 13 states, and I intend to start a wiki page on Kelantanese cuisine along with the food of Johor and Malacca in the future). An example would be the state of Perak. Compare the demographics of the state capital Ipoh (predominantly Chinese) and the royal capital Kuala Kangsar (predominantly Malay). Naturally, the food culture in either of these two cities is very, very different.

So I am rambling, but it needs to be said. Malaysian cuisine is in itself a paradox...it is a massive melting pot of disparate dishes and a mish mash of eclectic influences just like the rojak dish, yet at the same time each of the ethnic sub-cuisines are highly distinct and even segregated from each other, often within the same state or even city and town. Basically, the cuisines of the Malays, Chinese, Indians etc etc...they're all cuisines within a national cuisine. If you're intimately familiar with Malaysian culture, you will understand what I mean. We shouldn't approach the article by doing exactly what was done on the Indonesian cuisine page - aka grouping everything by province. Haleth (talk) 21:33, 4 May 2014 (UTC)

Thank you for your considered and informed reply. Personally I'm uncomfortable with placing Rojak under Malaysian Chinese category because the concept of the dish is alien to traditional Chinese cuisine, and while there may be local Chinese adaptation of the dish, it is still essentially non-Chinese. It may be placed under cross-cultural or fusion cuisine if that is what they are. I would just make a few other points for now:
  1. I am not averse to having list on the page, however the problem is at the moment it is too open-ended, and in theory an infinite number of dishes can be placed here. This article is already far larger than the equivalent for French, Chinese, Japanese, American and other major cuisines of the world (although it should be said that those articles could be expanded more), and without a clear idea of what should go in here the article can become enormous. I think any list here should be limited to a small number of important dishes (e.g. Nasi Lemak, Satay, Rendang, etc. in a list of Malay food), although of course which is important is arguable.
  2. I believe regional variations of any particular dish should not listed here but moved to the appropriate page. I have been to a number of cities and towns in Malaysia and have noticed various differences, and it would be impractical to list them all. If there is any place that is particularly noted for a specific dish, then I think a Regional Specialty section can be created for that purpose.
  3. There is probably not enough on food culture in Malaysia, some pieces of information are scattered throughout, but it could be useful to have them in one section, especially if we are to delete some of the entries. This would include food typically eaten for breakfast, dinner or late night meal, hawker center or pasar malam, restaurants, food for banquet and special occasion, street food vs restaurant food vs home cooking, etc.
  4. Some entries that don't belong here are the list of fruits because cuisine implies some degree of preparation and skill involved in the making of the dishes, so unless those are ingredient for a dish, e.g. banana fritters or fruit salad, they are not very relevant. Perhaps a separate page can be created for fruits in Malaysia, but I'm not sure if there is a precedent for that with other countries.
  5. Some entries can be moved around, for example I'm not sure why Nasi Lemak is a subsection of rice in the ingredient section.
  6. Perhaps a history or general information section would be useful. Some of what you wrote above is certainly informative. Hzh (talk) 11:14, 5 May 2014 (UTC)
Again I do agree to most of Hzh suggestions, yet I do have somekind of aversion to the lists, it tends to grow uncontrolably. We should not turn an umbrella article like Malaysian cuisine into a long menu, we already have a separate List of Malaysian dishes. Some specific articles such as Malaysian Indian cuisine or Malay cuisine might employ the list (since it is not too long I guess). Not all dishes need to be mentioned and elaborated in detail here, they might have specific article already. One more thing, I suggests this article to be rewritten in nicely flowing prose, instead of collections of bullets or power point-like presentation. Oh yeah about rojak/rujak, in Indonesian perspective the oldest tradition that incorporate rujak are Javanese Naloni Mitoni (nujuh bulanan), and the original rujak was slices of tropical fruits (esp. young mango) in spicy coconut sugar sauce. Yet because rujak is well-distributed over Indonesian archipelago, it has been categorized as common Indonesian dishes, just like soto and sate. And it certainly not Chinese or Indian origin, although Chinese Indonesian do have their rujak juhi and rujak shanghai. Gunkarta  talk  02:24, 22 November 2014 (UTC) 12:16, 5 May 2014 (UTC)
I understand that some people prefer prose, it is after all the recommended style for wikipedia, I also understand some like a bulleted list because it is easier to read (which is why it is often used in powerpoint presentation). In this case it doesn't bother me either way except that the lists are too long. For ease of readability, I also think that a long section of prose needs to be broken up in some way. For example, the "Pantry Essential" section would read better if it is split up into Sauce and Condiments, Herbs and Spices, etc. I should add that some of the foodstuff in the section, such as Tofu, should not be considered essential. It could do with better organization. Hzh (talk) 14:43, 5 May 2014 (UTC)

Trimming and reorganizing

I would be starting to trim the article starting some time next week. It's mostly the list of food that'll be trimmed, I do think they can and should be moved their own articles. It is however not intended to upset anyone here who contributes to the article, so if you think if the trimming is too severe, or if you don't want something removed, then by all means restore them. The sections on East Malaysia (Sabah and Sarawak) may also need to be trimmed but perhaps it can have its own page. I will also do a bit of re-organizing and add a few sections. There might perhaps be a history or background section, but I don't have much knowledge on that front, so if you can do it, do contribute. Suggestions on what to add or remove and how to re-organize the article would also be appreciated. Hzh (talk) 15:21, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

I'm considering creating a page for East Malaysian cuisine and move the content from this page there. At the moment the content in this section is too detailed and many of the dishes are too minor in significance to be in a general page on Malaysian cuisine. If anyone has any opinion, e.g. if there should be separate pages for the cuisine of Sabah and Sarawak, I'd be interested to know. Hzh (talk) 12:40, 9 July 2014 (UTC)

Overhaul of page of content

I will be starting a major overhaul soon. A lot of the things I had intended to do last time will be implemented, for example trimming of dishes, especially the East Malaysian ones (and the creation of a page for East Malaysian cuisine), etc. I will create a history section, how much I can put in I'm not too sure, but if you can contribute, please do. But do let me know if you think I have gone too far. You are also welcome to suggest anything you think that are missing in the page but should be in there. Hzh (talk) 12:04, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

Nice Hzh, but can you help to rewrite the Nasi lemak article before you start your main work here. I see there is some irresponsible people trying to merge the main Malaysian national dish article into the Indonesian cuisine articles. Thanks! ~ Muffin Wizard ;) 05:37, 1 April 2015 (UTC)
I'll see what I can do with the Nasi Lemak page, but I will be travelling, so may not be able to do much (depends on what wifi is like where I am going). Here, I should warn that I might do quite severe trimming of content here given that a lot of the dishes are duplicated on pages dedicated to Malay cuisine, Malaysian Chinese cuisine, Malaysian Indian cuisine, and a lot of the content will be moved to the East Malaysian cuisine page to be created. But do stop me if anyone thinks I have gone too far. Hzh (talk) 07:03, 1 April 2015 (UTC)
Thanks! You can use all the source links I found in Google there in the Nasi lemak talkpage. Don't worry about that, I will always keep this on my watchlist. Everyone also need some rest! Hope you safe in your journey. ;) ~ Muffin Wizard ;) 07:08, 1 April 2015 (UTC)
Hzh Before you go ahead with the overhaul you are proposing...I just want to know, how knowledgeable about Malaysian cuisine do you reckon you are? Haleth (talk) 23:09, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

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