Malaysian Cuisine Essay

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In order to fully understanding the food and wine aesthetics of Malaysian culture, it is important to understand the multi-ethnic and religions of Malaysian as food and culture are closely intertwined. Malaysia has three main distinct culture with freedom of religions believes and the ethnic groups consist of Malay (67.4%), Chinese (24.6%), Indian (7.3%) and others (0.7%). (Census, 2010) Malay is officially Muslim and strictly followed the Halal (permissible) code which forbids to eat pork and alcohol consumption. Chinese believe Buddhist, Taoism and Christian and small Muslim population. Indians follow Hinduism, Christians and Muslim (Mamak). (Dalat 2004) The remaining of 0.7% are Eurasian, indigenous peoples (Orang Asli) and others. Majority of Malaysian Buddhists and Hinduism do not eat beef. The following is a brief description of their religions and its impact on kinds of food used and eaten by that race. In addition, multi-races are accepted each other's food and drink habits after living side by side with a long time of history. The staple Food of Malaysian Cuisine are rice, noodles, bread, meat (chicken, beef, mutton and pork), seafood (fish, shrimp or prawn, crab, squid, cuttlefish, clams, sea cucumber and octopus) and vegetables. (4th Plain International Festival, 2012) Malay Food Malays began practice Islam in the 1400s from Hinduism and Buddhism and also largely influenced by Malacca’s palace (Odssey Media Group 2012). As the early influence of the first rulers of Malacca, Parameswara (prince of Palembang, South Sumatra, Indonesia), some of Malay food has the similarity with Indonesian food, such as beef rendang (spicy stew meat) , satay (skewered meat), asam pedas (sour spicy), soto (soup with noodles) and others. Malay food is rich in spices and herbs, such as fresh chili, dried chili, lemon grass, pandan leaves (screwpine), kaffir lime

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