The Malaysia, Truly Asia, campaign is one of those that has stuck in my head. And I believe Malaysia has a confluence of people from almost all parts of Asia including South Asia and East Asia, and so does Malaysian food.
And you will find this amazing homogeneity at the Malay Melange festival at the Four Points by Sheraton. Executive Chef Sanjay Mitra has curated a special Malaysian food menu for his guests, which will be on offer through 20th November to 29th November.
If you have no idea of what Malaysian food includes, the chef has made your task easier by selecting the best and offering them in a set menu. You have an option to choose a completely vegetarian meal, or explore the meat and sea.
Tasting a new cuisine is like an adventure. Each new dish is an exciting ride where you sometimes get to taste new herbs and spices or get to know a new combination of spices that gets your taste buds flowing.
But all adventures need a little bit of a guideline. At Panash, we had our perfect guide waiting for us on the table. Our menu for the day was a mix of vegetarian and chicken and seafood preparations that you will taste during the Malaysian Melange festival.
The dimly lit restaurant is a cozy, elegant place to spend a quiet evening. The set menu ensures that you don’t spend a lot of time discussing what to order and is better than a buffet as you don’t have to leave the table to get food.
Based on your choice, you will get a couple of starters, a soup, two main course dishes with an option of noodles or the flaky and crisp Roti Kanai.
Vegetarians get to begin their Malaysian food adventure in the familiar territory with Vegetable Tembossa. Closer to South Asia, this starter is puff with potato and peas filling with a subtle Curry spice flavor.
Meat lovers get to plunge in the East Asian cuisine from the word Go. You will love the Chicken Satay with a spice rub and the Peanut Sauce.
But the best kick-off is reserved for seafood lovers who will get some good-sized Prawns sauted in spicy Sambal. East Asian Sambal comes in various forms in a combination of onions garlic and red chilies. The Sambhal Udang at Panash is thick enough to coat the prawns and gives you a flavorful gingery bite every time.
The star of the Starters, if you ask me, is the Ikan Pepes. The steamed fish in a Banana leaf is cooked with fiery chili based sauce and a surprise herb – the Minty Basil.
Malaysian cuisine is influenced by many cultures and ethnicity. You will find familiarity with Malaysian food again and again as you move further in your adventure. Murtabak is another dish that will keep you in the familiar south asian food territory.
Murtabak is close to a stuffed paratha and much closer to a Mughlai Paratha that you will find on the streets of Kolakata.
With the Easterlies gaining strength, the chill in the air brings an opportunity to enjoy an array of soups this season. The Soto Ayam or Malay Chicken Soup then becomes the perfect accompaniment for our Malaysian starters.
The clear soup is slightly tangy with a flavor of lemongrass, but the real taste differentiator for me here was the boiled egg. The boiled egg gave this simple soup a very unique taste that you won’t encounter in your other usual Asian clear soups.
After the sharp curve of the spicy Ikan Pepes, get ready for a slightly relaxed part of your Malaysian ride. The main course will not disappoint you. Seafood lovers get to experiment with a new type of fish curry – Ikan Masak Menas – fish cooked in curry flavored with Pineapple. Thai Pineapple rice is one of my favorite dishes and I loved this combination of curry sweetened with pineapple as much.
Another mainstay of the Malaysian cuisine is the Kari Kapitan. There are some interesting stories about how it got this name on the WWW, but I will leave it to you to explore.
For all those veggies wondering what’s in store for them, you have Sayur Tumis with a sweet and spicy stir fried vegetables exploding with a garlicy flavor.
When you are out for a nice dinner, it has to end with some dessert. The Malaysian Melange festival gives you some amazing desserts. Based on the meal you choose, you will either get to gobble Pisang Goreng, which is pieces of banana wrapped in bread and deep fried.
Or will get to taste the Rujak Medan or the spicy fruit salad. The competing flavors of the spicy dressing and the sweetness from fruits keep your taste buds guessing. And just when you think you know what it is, that one-off lemony tang will keep you interested in this unusual dessert.
So get ready for this fabulous Malaysian food adventure at Panash beginning 20th November 2015. You can opt for a Vegetarian menu for Rs. 650, a non-veg menu for Rs. 850, and explore the seas for Rs. 1050.
Call Panash at 020 30931031 and reserve your very own view of Malaysian cuisine from atop the Petronas Towers.
Leave a Reply