It is always a pleasure walking around a local night market in Malaysia; this one was a mixture of food and hardware stalls. I felt like the locals had not seen many Westerners; most smiled at me and giggled, and one young lady asked the usual questions (Where are you from? Why are you here?) and then welcomed me to Bintulu and hoped I had a good time. Perfectly charming and so Malaysian!
Daun Getah are rubber tree leaves! This lady was pounding raw leaves and presenting them for sale with some lemongrass stalks on top. None of my Malaysian friends knew how this would be eaten, but suggested it was probably eaten raw, like a salad.
It is rare for Malaysians to pound herbs and spices nowadays in the way that their parents would have done. Complex spice mixtures are bought in packets from the supermarket. But we all know that pounding fresh spices produces a different flavour than grinding them in a blender.
In the photo below, there is another lady pounding something, but I do not know what it was! On the brown box in front of her is a local fern which we ate later that night. It was delicious, a bit like very thin asparagus.
Malaysians seem to love dried anchovies and they are used as a garnish on top of coconut rice. Sarawakians seem to like Sago grubs, big fat squirming things, full of protein I presume! Although I saw plenty of these Sago grubs for sale, I did not see anyone buying them. (They are about an inch long and very active.) Sarawakians do like their chicken, and it is always interesting to see how whole cooked chickens are presented for sale in different countries.
As we left the market, the sky changed colour to a dramatic orange-pink colour. By the time we got to the Mid Valley Seafood restaurant for a really delicious dinner, the sky made it look like the end of the world was nigh! Indeed, that night we had a terrific thunderstorm.
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