Saturday, July 11, 2009

'Blue rice' for breakfast ...

Nasi Kerabu is an authentic rice dish from Kelantan. The rice is tinted blue after it is soaked and cooked with local flowers called bunga telang.

The blue rice is then served with a combination of fresh aromatic herbs, or known as ulam.
The “kerabu” (some foreigners it described as salad) could be any vegetables or edible leaves though the more or less standard version will have daun kesum, taugeh (bean sprout), thinly cut long green beans, bunga kantan, cucumber and daun kadok.
Apart from that it is also served with fried breaded fish, keropok keping, salted egg, solok lada (fish fillet and coconut-stuffed chillis), and pickled garlic (local gherkins).
You need not go to Kelantan though to get the popular breakfast dish as a number of places in Kuala Lumpur have them. A favourite place is at the Datuk Keramat market which also offers nasi dagang, nasi berlauk and laksam -- all popular Kelantan dish.
I was fortunate to meet an uncle -- Halim, an occasional patron of the place. He was just back from Kelantan where he stayed a for week to attend a relatives wedding.

"I was so happy to be there although not many of our relatives are there anymore," said Halim who has been living in Kuala Lumpur for more than 30 years.

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