Singapore Food: The Decline Of Nasi Padang
Of all the cuisines in the world that I have experienced, my favorite is the cuisine of the Indonesian islands. Indonesia is a vast archipelago of 17000 islands stretching 2000 miles and more from New Guinea to Sumatra, from Sulawesi to Kalimantan. The great diversity in people, language, culture brings forth great diversity in cuisine. Nasi Padang is steamed white rice accompanied by a variety of meat, fish and vegetable dishes. 'Nasi' means 'rice' in Indonesian and 'Padang' is a town on the island of Sumatra where this dish is said to have originated. The people of Sumatra, being part of a culturally distinct Riau archipelago are more akin to the Malays of Singapore and Malaysia than to the Javanese and Balinese next door . So Nasi Padang is also a common dish in Singapore and Malaysia. Unfortunately, the standard of Nasi Padang in Singapore has deteriorated so much, that I find most of the stalls serving almost inedible Nasi Padang. No more only sold by smal...