If you’re lucky in the morning, you may be able to catch them selling midin (wild jungle fern) at the Bandung kuih stall that I frequent. For RM4.00, you get one plastic bag full.
I had picked out the unopened….or not fully-opened “curls” and fried those to take over to my parents’ place for their lunch. That would be the best part – very sweet and crunchy. My father, who would never eat midin at the restaurants, was full of praises…and complained about how hard those at the shops were and how he was not able to eat them.
Well, the fact is…the midin that they sell here is very young and freshly-plucked that very morning. After cooking half of it, I still had this much left…
…My missus did not cook it that evening and no prize for guessing who had to do it in the end – the next day! Tsk! Tsk! Normally, it is fried with sambal hay bee (dried prawns) and belacan but you will need to pound that with all the other ingredients, like what I did here. My mother used to blanch them in hot water and toss with lard and Foochow red wine. That was nice too but I was never really crazy about it – like the Thai-style way they prepare midin at the Ruby Restaurant here.
But being really fresh and young, the midin tasted good even when you just fry it with garlic and add salt and msg according to taste or use chicken stock granules in place of these. That day, to cook the remaining half, I used these…
– finely-chopped garlic, sliced chillies, a few prawns and chicken stock.
Just heat a bit of oil in the wok and fry the garlic till golden brown, add the chillies and the prawns and stir for a while till the prawns are cooked. Throw in the midin and add a tablespoon of chicken stock and stir till the midin is cooked…
Then, it is ready…
Very easy, don’t you think? I’m sure you would agree that it certainly looked a lot nicer than the ones here…and of course, the most important thing is – it tasted good and was a welcome change from the usual.
...STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! 