no. 46: come eat

Hullo to readers old and new!

I have a couple more pop-ups in Cambridge and Somerville coming up, because once you start cooking it’s hard to stop.

TODAY! Sunday 14 Nov, at Backbar (indoor dining only, no take out, proof of vaccination required) – loh arh png – more on this below.

Sunday 21 Nov, at Backbar (indoor dining only, no take out, proof of vaccination required) – most likely Teochew char kway teow (if global and local supply chains permit).

Some undetermined time early in 2022, at Elmendorf Baking (outdoor seating, or take-out) – another round of kueh (because we sold out too quickly last time)!

If you are in the Boston area, I hope you’ll stop by!

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This isn’t really the usual kind of newsletter, more an announcement that you can come and eat food I made.

Today it’s loh arh png – duck braised in soy sauce, eaten with rice. It’s not a very photogenic dish. Especially in the preparation. But then again, does all food have to be photogenic?

I could say this is my family recipe. But I’ve never loved this sort of attribution. Surely one of the billion households in the Chinese diaspora does this exactly the same way. There are so few variables, you can do the combinatoric math. And truth be told, nobody else in my family cooks this dish the way I do, because I do it wrong (and everyone in my family cooks this).

We keep demanding that food comes with a story, often an individual story. It’s easy to sell something as the culmination of one person’s formative experiences. Consumerism and capitalism both love natural monopolies.

Even when I talk about a dish being distinctively Singaporean, I’m framing it as something you can only get in one of the 150+ countries on earth, but the truth is, you could get something like this in most of South East Asia or southern China. Or, for that matter, in your nearest Chinatown.

But these are much murkier, more complicated stories, and harder to tell. I’ve had this idea rattling round my brain lately, but I’ve also had too little time to write.

More on this theme soon. For now, if you’re on this side of the planet, come and eat.