darkholme

Nasi Lemak

Today I went with my mum to Serangoon Gardens in the late morning to run some errands. I woke up at 10am so didn't have time to grab breakfast before leaving, so when we get there, I decide to hunt down some breakfast at the Serangoon Gardens Market(1).

After walking one big round, I curse at myself for not paying more attention to those "food hunter" tv shows on Mediacorp. If I had actually watched them, I would've known what was good to eat. In any case, two things I remember when walking around the market.

a. There was a pretty dark stall that looked like it was selling economical rice (2)

b. There was a very brightly lit stall with nice big pictures of the nasi lemak combos that you could buy.

If you ask Daphne, she would confirm that I'm very easily influenced by what I see when it comes to food. If we pass by a steakhouse, I immediately feel like eating steak.

So it is no surprise then that I choose to eat nasi lemak from the stall mentioned in pt. b.

I buy the rice and it contains the following:
- coconut rice
- small fried egg
- fried chicken wing
- fried peanuts and ikan billis
- 3 pieces of cucumber
- huge dollop of sambal

Overall not bad, so I sit down and tuck in. As I begin eating, I finally notice that stall mentioned in pt. a. is also selling nasi lemak. And what's worse, it's Chong Pang Nasi Lemak (Serangoon Gardens Branch).

For the uninitiated, Chong Pang Nasi Lemak is famous. Quite famous. But I won't blame you for not knowing it as I myself didn't know it until I was sent to Mandai for my last 6+2 months of NS.

Not only is it Chong Pang Nasi Lemak, but it's also endorsed by some Channel U food programme. I look back at the brightly lit stall and notice that there's no recommendation, only a newspaper article on its kueh kueh. Argh.

The nasi lemak I bought was "bo-miah" (no name; not branded). Damn! And it really didn't taste that good.

So moral of the story: Bright signs and nice photography does sell; Don't judge a nasi lemak stall by its signage.

Hmmm.... remember what I said about being easily influenced when it comes to food? I'm hungry now. Grrrr.




(1) Note: This is not the famous Chomp Chomp but rather the Serangoon Gardens Market and Food Centre. See Wikipedia entry

(2) For the uninitiated: Economical Rice, or Curry Rice as it is sometimes called, means you get a plate of white steamed rice and you choose servings of food to go along with it, e.g. meat, veggies, eggs, etc. I reckon that it's called Economical Rice because it's quite cheap and "economical". I could be wrong. I think that it might also be the literal translation from Mandarin - someone with good Chinese language skills please tell me. Curry Rice is because most of the time, you can have curry or gravy poured on the rice if necessary.

posted by kelvin @ 10:21 pm