There are many parts of the country that I have not been to, some parts of Sarawak even, so what more to say those in Sabah and beyond the sea in the peninsula. For instance, on the east coast of West Malaysia, I have only been to Kuantan sometime in the mid-80’s. Thus, I have not had the chance to taste some of the delicacies from the states there like Kelantan and Trengganu, except perhaps keropok lekor which is easily available here.
But the other morning, my regular kuih-muih stall at Bandong here resumed business after an extended Hari Raya break and they were selling nasi kerabu which, according to them, was made by a Kelantanese living in Sibu. I decided to give it a try and bought a packet. When I reached home, I opened it up and by George, the rice was blue…
…and as you can see, there were a lot of raw vegetables on top. I do recall eating kerabu before at the buffets in some KL hotels e.g. kerabu pucuk paku but they tossed it in vinegar and stuff, so it was something like a Thai salad and quite different from these.
There was also a fish in the packet…
…and a green chilli stuffed with something – I think it was fish mixed with grated coconut and dunno-what-else…
…and there was some grated coconut as well, though I could not tell in what manner it had been cooked…
…and TWO types of sambal…
I was told that I would have to mix everything together to eat and I did just that. The first one or two mouthfuls felt a bit peculiar as it was not a taste I was accustomed to but as I went on eating, I began to like it more and more.
By the time I finished, I felt that it was really nice, except that I was sweating and vigorously blowing hot air as a result of the green cili padi in it. But all in all, I really enjoyed it and would not mind buying it, should I happen to stumble upon it again…
...STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! 