Indian breakfast

Growing up, the only Indian food that I was familiar with was the nasi kandar. It originated from the Indian-Muslim community in this country where the travelling hawkers of Indian ethnicity but Muslim in faith, thus the term Indian-Muslim, would go around selling their nasi kandar from pots which they carried at the ends of a sturdy pole that was slung over their shoulders.

But in truth, this was my only exposure to Indian or Indian-Muslim food throughout my school life. I wouldn't even call it a cuisine yet. Most mornings when I was in secondary school, I would buy a packet of nasi kandar from a vendor selling from a coffee shop at the back of my home in Seang Tek Road. At 6.15am or 6.30am, I would be lined up at his stall awaiting my turn. And it would invariably be a small piece of fish and two pieces of ladyfingers (okra) bathed in a generous curry gravy that landed on my plate. All 30 cents' worth. I would consume it by 7am, just in time to finish dressing up before cycling to school. The heavy meal would last through recess time and indeed, it would last until 3pm or later when I usually arrive home. 

Then when I went for my studies in Petaling Jaya in 1973, I came across an Indian stall at a market's hawker centre in State PJ selling not nasi kandar, although that was what I wanted to eat to satisfy a craving for the stuff, but real Indian food. For the first time in my life, I ordered a piece of thosei and a glass of milk tea to wash down this strangely delicious meal. And down the years, I've also become firm friends with the various forms of thosei, roti paratha (or roti chanai), chapati, idly, puri and the various types of vadey. Also, banana leaf rice. When it comes to banana leaf rice, I greet the food like it is a long, close friend to me, but that's a story for another day!

This morning, I decided to visit one of the Indian food stalls at the neighbourhood market in Bukit Mertajam. There are several such stalls at the hawker centre but somehow I find myself gravitating towards this one more often than the rest. My normal order would be for a thosei and an apom, and a piece of chapati for my wife. But today, I blurted out suddenly to the vendor, enquiring whether she also had an idli. So I ended up with all four on the plate today! 😄😋 Talk about gluttony indeed!