Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Cold Storage, Cooking School, Culture Shock

To stave off the onset of boredom and fully settle into my new role as "lady of the house", I signed up for several local cooking classes. After all, Motorola is footing the bill and perhaps learning the local cuisines will help me navigate the anxiety-inducing hell that is the grocery store in Singapore. I'm sorry, the "cold storage" or I mean "wet market". Even the names sound unpleasant and confusing.

One of my favorite things to do (since childhood, mind you) is go to the grocery store. Second only to doing laundry. I know...I was born a 1950's housewife. I love every aspect of it. The list making, all the shiny new things, bringing home ingredients that will be turned into something nourishing and delicious, and the best part of it all, organizing the cupboards and the fridge to fit in all the new goods - with all the shiny new labels facing out and organized by type of course!

Singapore has stolen this joy from me. The store's are chock full of stuff - too much stuff strewn about in the most counter intuitive way and too little of the stuff you'd think are pretty basic. They carry 18 flavors of Pringles and they have an entire aisle devoted to sugar - white, raw, palm, Indian - but they don't carry brown sugar. ANYWHERE. When I asked a clerk if they carried it, he just looked at me like, "of course we don't". All this while stocking shelf after shelf with Doritos. How foolish of me to assume you'd carry such an outlandish product as I direct my line of sight to the bakery, where they sell all sorts of gooey, brown sugar-y confections.

This is not to say that I don't blame my own ignorance. My new geography is not lost on me and it's certainly not Singapore's fault that I can't locate a good that may or may not be used here. I appreciate that I can still get most of my comfort products just about anywhere even though I'm so far from home. I even kind of understand why all those products are 60% more expensive than if I bought them in the U.S. ($17 for one pound of sandwich turkey, people). And I'm sure that I'll learn to really enjoy all those prickly, misshapen, even stinky fruits and vegetables I've never seen before but right now, it's Thanksgiving darn it and all I want to do is make this brown sugar and pecan topped pumpkin pie.

But I digress; the cooking class. First up, Vietnamese. The class was held at a restaurant/cooking school that can seat about 10 students. It wasn't one of those hand's on classes, more like a live demo of several courses while you nosh away on each serving. Then the main's and dessert are served up at a big communal table and you can yak it up with the fellow student's and teacher - who happens to be somewhat of a local celebrity who has her own cookbook. Our agenda for the day began with prawn and jicama spring rolls with peanut dipping sauce, calamari and fennel salad, curried chicken and coconut noodle soup, shaking beef and mushroom and asparagus stir fry, and creme caramel for dessert. Each course was delectable and I truly learned a lot. Who knew coriander and cilantro were basically the same thing? Not me! One less puzzle next time I visit cold storage. Success! I've been here long enough to know it's the little things.














I was so inspired after the class, I made the curried chicken and coconut soup for dinner. I even added my own flair - sliced red onions I soaked in lime juice to get rid of some of their royal onion-ness. It added color and another dimension of flavor, which I learned was the essence of Vietnamese cooking. I think Chef Samia would have been proud. Next up, a hands-on course on petite cakes!

See my own version of Curried Chicken Coconut Noodle Soup below.

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Happy Deepavali

My third day in Singapore, Christian and I took a trip over to Little India to explore and visit what was rumored to be the biggest one-stop shop ever. Mustafa didn't disappoint. Four expansive floors filled with everything from household appliances, team jerseys, luggage, sunglasses, food stuffs, and three aisles of deodorant. They're open 24 hours a day and employ over 1200 staff to keep it running. I expected to round a corner and find an aisle full of live goats or perhaps a post office. I thought a trip to Costco on a Saturday morning required special breathing techniques to navigate, but this was just crazy. The over-the-topness almost scared the sense right out of me and I attempted to buy a pair of bright green crocs. Don't judge - the floor of our condo is cold, hard marble and my poor dogs ache.

In the end, we bought a package of sponges, some outlet converters, a box of sandwich baggies, and a mop that I think was made for hobbits as it's about 2 feet long and makes sweeping for this 5 foot 10 girl a real hunched pleasure. Aside from learning that Little India's megalo-mart can be thrown over on the "done and never needs to be done again" list, we did make it out of there with the knowledge that the Indian community was preparing for Deepavali (or Diwali). Celebrated in the Hindu community, Deepavali is known as the "festival of lights" and from what I understand, it's a pretty major celebration. One important and admirable practice that Hindus follow during the festival is to light oil lamps in their homes on Deepavali morning. By lighting the lamps, Hindus are thanking the gods for the happiness, knowledge, peace and wealth that they have received. See how much I'm learning?

As luck would have it, a co-worker friend of Christian's invited us over to his home (which happens to be in our building) to help he and his wife kick-off what was to be a whole weekend of festivities for them, their family, and friends. It was also going to be our first dinner out with people who weren't each other. I love spending time with Christian but needless to say, I was pretty psyched to have this to look forward to.

Shankar and Raka had also invited two other couples from the building. Andrew and Steph, a couple from Australia who are expecting their first baby next Spring, and Christie and Simon. Christie just moved here from oddly, San Francisco, and her boyfriend Simon is British. Shankar and Raka were amazing hosts. Their home is just like ours, only with real extravagances like actual furniture and real live serving dishes and floor pillows. Their home is gorgeous and filled with all sorts of antique delights from their travels across India, China, and the rest of Asia. If we were impressed by their pad, it only deepened when they began serving us food. Delicious homemade Indian food - little fried balls of minced meat (pork? chicken?), braised lamb, fresh naan, curried potatoes, and the best yogurt sauce ever. Add to that wine glasses that never seemed to stay empty, good conversation among a group of strangers who seemed that night to have known each other for years, and a warm, cozy setting and Christian and I not only experienced our very first Deepavali, but a night out with folks who I can only imagine we'll be seeing a lot of.

One of my biggest fears coming here was whether or not we'd be able to make friends. With our um, quirky, sense of humor and the fact that we've managed to never really need to make "new" friends, I was a bit worried it would be hard for us to get out and meet like-minded people. We have between us such a fantastic troupe of besties who we've been lucky enough to know for most our lives. We've never really had to try and meet new people. But all those fears diminished that evening - the eve of Deepavali. In one evening, four couples, all from very different parts of the world, shared delicious food, some great laughs, and a warm home. I think I can speak for all of us when I say we left feeling very grateful and happy for the "wealth" that was shared with us. Happy Deepavali everyone!