100th Anniversary of CCC Batu Pahat

I attended the 100th anniversary dinner cum Karaoke Competition of the Batu Pahat Chinese Chamber of Commerce on the fourth floor of Lien Hoe Plaza. It was held at the former Imperial Restaurant which was renamed after it was taken over by Batu Pahat Ocean Restaurant. It seems the Chinese Chamber of Commerce is in tune with the Chinese population here as karaoke is a favourite past-time of the young and old. The karaoke competitors, all polished performers came from various states of Malaysia.

The food served up by Ocean Restaurant was equally good. I don't know which state won as I left early.

The refurbished restaurant at Lien Hoe Plaza

A new dish: steamed prawns and otak-otak

Herbal pork-rib soup

A combination dish of fried and steamed grouper

Steamed cabbage with dried scallop, dried oyster, diced chicken and diced water-chestnut; a really delicious dish

Below are shots of some of the competitors from various parts of Malaysia

This competitor is from Batu Pahat

Secrets To Sexual Health

Many ageing males would be green with envy with 54 year old Abu Bakar’s undoubtedly sexual prowess. Having fathered 25 children, he hopes to round it up to 40 children by taking a fourth wife 30 years his junior, with the consent of his other three wives of course. The secret to his stamina? Bathing with water in the morning by pouring a pail of water on the right leg first before washing other parts of the body.

“This technique is deemed a must for those with several wives,” he said.

Those of you out there, I mean you ageing acrobats, should feed your Viagra to the chickens and start bathing your right leg. Why the right and not the left leg, I wonder. It would be enlightening to hear his explanation.

Something Different

Alston has been my prolific supplier of information through email - many weird, interesting and informative - that at times I felt overwhelmed by it. However, one of the email that I received illustrates the creativity of designers, what we would call people who are able to think out of the box.

Maybe many of you have seen these pictures. But I haven't and I thought I would like to share them with you.

Exotic Food To Beat Infation

With the recent price hikes in fuel and food items, Malaysians should in keeping with the government's advice, seriously consider a change in lifestyle, particularly in their eating habits. They should start learning to eat crickets, cicadas, centipedes, house lizards, worms, grasshoppers, beetles, even stray dogs and other edible insects and sea creatures. It is time for Malaysians, especially those living in the urban centres to make forays into the country side for edible plants and creatures; scour the beach for sea urchins, star fish and tiny crabs for the table to cut down food costs.

It has been said that since Vietnamese workers made their presence felt in Batu Pahat, dogs have disappeared from the streets of Batu Pahat. One hypothesis is that Vietamese (no derision intended) being eaters of dog-meat have cleaned out the population of stray dogs in Batu Pahat, which is a good thing for the Public Health Department as it would have saved on bullets in hunting down stray dogs and prevented the animal rights supporters from kicking up a big row.

In some parts of the African continents, Thailand, the Philipines and China, insects are eaten as a delicacy, and it is high time for Malaysians to feel less squeamish about eating these insects and creatures which purportedly contain high levels of protein.

The Chinese have been known (somewhat contemptuously) to eat anything on earth and these pictures from G. Pollack and hq chinadaily.cn testify to, shall we say, that adventurous appetite?

Frog being put into a juicer

A customer enjoying frog juice

Video on Exotic food in China by tinfamily

Fish Barbecue

We recently had a fish barbecue. The fish were merely covered with salt and wrapped in aluminium foil and grilled over an electric grill. There was a particular fish, ikan terubok from Sarawak that was grilled without removing its scales or its internal organs. I thought that was gross. However, my fish lover friends thought otherwise. They said the best part of the fish was the cooked internal organs. Yuk!! Anyway, I ate sparingly and focussed more on the hot-dogs which were grilled later.

Grilling some fish

Grilled fish covered with salt

Spreading salt on aluminium foil

Placing the whole ikan terubok on a layer of salt

Covering the fish in salt

Wrapping up the fish

Grilling the fish

After grilling for about an hour, the fish is unwrapped

Removing the skin completely to expose the meat

The ikan terubok is a very boney fish. Note the fine bones

Grilled hot-dogs