#I was channeling all my knowledge from the cake section of my cooking class in high school with this one folks

[chibifox2002]

Lil cupcake cutie

(I tried to make her hair and clothes look like frosting but idk if I did good 😅)

turns ur kirby oc into something sugary and sweet with my mind

[macam2malaysia]

Right after Chris’s kueh-filled book launch earlier this afternoon, I sat down on my yellow vintage armchair at home and devoured about half of Chris’s The Way of Kueh — his latest labour of love that documents and narrates the tales of Singapore’s — & this region’s — heritage desserts.

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The book is in Chris’s usual style of education, reportage, and recipe creation — all of which gives the home cook a holistic view of heritage and knowledge of ingredients and the marketplace before they delve into the detailed steps in Chris’s recipes. This time, I particularly enjoyed reading the interviews he’s done with notable kueh-making cooks and bakers. 

In the book, the kueh recipes are divided into steamed, fried, leaf-wrapped, baked, yeasted, layered, stirred and boiled. (With a “new” recipe section for “Cashew Cocoa Kole Kole” and “Kueh Bongkong Durian”!) 

Then there are the wonderful food history nuggets… Like how our kueh/kuih/kue have Dutch and Portuguese, even Swedish, connections; and factoids drawn from the 1940 Singapore (colonial) Government Publication Bureau booklet which documented over 225 desserts, sweets and snacks, e.g. Javanese rice-flour Kueh Lapis had 4 layers of white and four layers of red; there was a Hokkien kueh called “low lian ko” which featured durian flesh sandwiched between layers of sweetened rice flour dough and steamed. 

With Dorothy, Chris’s mom, who herself used to helm the food programme on a Mediacorp radio channel

I’ve to confess I most likely won’t make more than a handful of recipes in the book but I’m looking forward to making chwee kueh (this quintessentially Singapore kueh), kueh lompang, yam and radish cakes, and the kueh lapis legit and its bumbu recipe looks so amazingly LEGIT(imate), I’m going to have to try it one fine day!!! Funnily, in Penang, we have always just called it “layer cake” and it wasn’t until I came to Singapore that I learnt the Malay word for it!!! ( I much prefer Penang’s version, over Singapore and Indonesian’s, given that Penang’s is boldly spiced with fresh nutmeg. So I have to try Chris’s!)

Plenty of thrills every time I came across Penang references ️️ and the abok-abok and kueh talam brought back memories of domestic science classes. (I never knew that kueh talam meant kuehs steamed in trays!)

Ok, unashamed brag ahead, but I did get a pleasant jolt of surprise when I flipped to the Acknowledgements page…

This book is a gem, to be treasured not just those who want to cook and bake, but by any one who loves history, food history, and appreciates beautiful writing!! GET IT AT THE BOOKSTORES NOW, OR ORDER VIA EPIGRAM’S ONLINE PAGE! 

CONGRATULATIONS, CHRISTOPHER!

#cookbook #dessert #heritage #kueh #kuih #kue #foodhistory #slowfood

Food writer/historian, recipe creator Christopher Tan’s latest book, The Way of Kueh, is a must-have in any cook/historian/reader’s shelf! Right after Chris's kueh-filled book launch earlier this afternoon, I sat down on my yellow vintage armchair at home and devoured about half of Chris's The Way of Kueh -- his latest labour of love that documents and narrates the tales of Singapore's -- & this region's -- heritage desserts.