I love my mum’s food. It’s really quite different from other people’s cooking. I have had a fair share of delicious and diverse food at various relatives and friends’ homes, and at restaurants to make a fairly objective comparison. What can I say? My mum’s cooking is the best. This is true. Naturally.

Some of my mum’s dishes are truly outstanding. Exceptional to warrant seconds, sometimes thirds.  Which is a real testament to her cooking because I am not one for savoury or main meals. She cooks chicken expertly despite not eating poultry for many years. I love her ‘kicap or soya sauce’ chicken. Her Indian desserts for Deepavali are an annual treat worth waiting for. The ‘nai urundai’ or ghee balls and ‘muruku’ or crunchy crackers have her trademark consistent flavours stamped on them. Never different. Never short on taste. And, when she was younger and stronger, my mum, baked local cakes like ‘kuih talam’ and ‘bingka ubi’ for tea. That was before Western desserts like cupcakes, donuts and macarons arrived on our shores.

Like women of her generation, my mum learnt to cook from her mum. She had no access to the internet, TV shows by celebrity chefs, cooking competitions and cook books. Her culinary knowledge and expertise was from one source, her mum. My grandma, Tulasi, must have been a fine cook. She was an early entrepreneur. In the 1940’s, she made and sold Indian breakfast food like ‘tosai’ and ‘idli’ to support her three daughters, after my grandfather died relatively young.  My mum was the oldest. Sadly, my grandma had chronic asthma and was ill a lot when I was growing up, and passed away (today marks the 44th year since she left us) when I was a young teen. Hence, I have no recollection of trying any of her cooking or baking.

My mum knows her mum’s hand-me-down recipes by heart and follows them to a T. No short cuts. No substitute ingredients. No fusion. No innovation. I am no expert. I am not overly keen on Indian food. But this much I know. Spices are the foundation of Indian cooking.

Back in the day, when my mum was the kitchen boss, she used to manually grind chilli, turmeric, garlic, cumin and other spices using an ‘amikale’ – a flat stone with a cylindrical grinding stone. The other spice grinder was a pestle and mortar. She also used an ‘atte kale’ to grind rice and ‘urad dhal’ to make ‘tosai,’ ‘idli’ and ‘vadha.’ An ‘atte kale’ is a squarish granite grinder stone with a dug out centre or cavity and an accompanying cylindrical stone of the same material. These Indian manual kitchen tools involved bicep building movements that were strenous and sweaty. My mum persevered because the right quantity and different combination of spices produced the correct balance and added flavour to her fish, chicken and lamb curries, and vegetable dishes.

Usually a two person job, the ‘atte kale’ required the flour mixture to be placed in the cavity. One rotated the cylindrical stone in the cavity to pulverise the mixture while the other pushed and steered any escaping mixture back into the cavity.  The actions were synchronised and quite artful to watch but not much fun to do. Thankfully, electric grinders now do the heavy lifting. And, there are many brands of spices and flour mixtures available in the market. Some spices pass muster. Most flour mixtures don’t. That is why every Deepavali my mum cleans, washes and dries green peas, the base ingredient, and has them ground at a flour mill. 

Before gas and electric stoves and microwave ovens, my mum cooked and baked on a charcoal stove. I remember her baking ‘bingka ubi’ or tapioca cake in a pot using charcoal two-ways. The charcoal stove cooked the inside and bottom while charcoal placed on the lid of the pot browned the top of the ‘bingka ubi.’ I recall ‘kuih talam,’ ‘kuih lapis,’ ‘pulut tai-tai,’ ‘ondeh-ondeh,’ ‘kuih keria,’ ‘cucuk badak’ and ‘pulut panggang’ for tea. My mum was baking them long before the presence of Nyonya and traditional local kuih manufacturers. For Hari Raya Aidilfitri, we had ‘ketupat pulut daun palas.’ As I was writing this post, I realised how fortunate I am to have had so many wonderful dishes and treats, thanks to my mum.

My mum doesn’t cook much anymore. She is a Type A personality and a stickler for cleanliness. She rewashes plates, pots and utensils already washed and stored in her kitchen cabinets. The washing and rewashing consumes a fair amount of time. It adds another layer to the preparation and cooking process. Infact, these days, the thought of cooking tires her out. I don’t cook or bake the buffet of food I grew up on. That said, I would like to document my mum’s recipes simply because I want to remember them.