Beauty and The Feast: Sayur Bayam Dhal

Sometimes, when we eat something, all sort of memories will be rushing into the mind. The most desirable nasi lemak that I can never get myself to forget is the one in my primary school's canteen. Hot rice, with sambal that's full of onions, with fried anchovies sprinkled on top. 50 cents a plate. Memory..priceless.

When I was small, we lived in a flat. There's this one apek who would be selling a kind of sweet which I don't know what the name was. He will come up from floor to floor with his big tray of the sweet on his head. He will carry a makeshift table's leg on his shoulder and a small hammer. I called him apek tok tok based on the sound that he made from the hammer when he made his rounds. He will spread the table legs and rest his tray on it and he will start hammering the sweets into tiny bits and pieces. He'll put the sweets on tracing paper. I can't remember how much it cost..maybe about 10 cents. So sedap...and because of that every night I had to endure the itchiness caused by worms. My mum had to give me daun mambu which she pounded and rolled into majun like forms...or I had to drink the mambu juice. That is one memory I don't wanna recall. It's so bitter..imagine what the poor worms had to endure too.

Last night I cooked sayur bayam dhal. Whenever I cook this, I would surely think of my mother and all the sweet memories of my childhood. This dish being my favourite and I would make mak to feed me. I would eat 2 to 3 helpings. It's more syiok to pair up with fried anchovies but last night, I paired it up with sambal tumis ikan kering. With every mouthful, I became younger and younger and there I was at my mother's kitchen in our flat.

All you need for this is just to boil 1/2 cup of dhall till it breaks. Pound 1 clove of garlic and 1cm of ginger. Add to the boiling dhall with 1tsp of tumeric powder. Add the spinach. Add thick coconut milk. Salt. In a wok, fry sliced onions and 3 pieces of cili kering that has been cut into 3 each. Once brown, transfer to the dhall. Done.

This is the sambal tumis ikan kering which is so fiery hot. People said match are made in heaven..but mine was made in the kitchen.