Melaka - Cucumber or no cucumber?

That daft game show, Deal or No Deal, has made it to this part of the world. You know, the show with members of the public standing behind boxes with an amount of money shown on the inside lid. Fortunately they have made two major changes to the UK version. One, no Noel Edmonds. Two, instead of local chavs holding numbered boxes there is a stage of 26 shapely young ladies holding numbered briefcases containing a value of money on the inside lid. They are all very attractive and even have short chats and a flirt with the host and player before revealing........the contents of each briefcase. In the UK there is allot we could learn from this part of the world.

Today's dish is a local Peranakan dish.....Peranakan being the term used to describe the first chinese settlers in the Straits of Melaka. (You see...this blog is also very educational!!) This dish was called Nyonya Pongten Chicken and, accordingly to the menu, was chicken cubes braised in bean paste with rice. It arrived in a claypot and looked spicy but was actually pretty tame and the sauce was actually very sweet. I was expecting a chicken and potato curry (as a good potato curry is a much maligned dish) but it was not to be. The chicken and potato, along wish some mushrooms not mentioned on the menu, were cooked perfectly as was the rice...although more rice really was needed to soak up all the sweet sauce in the claypot. A rare example of a ratio greater than 100% in the RSAR.

All that was missing was a nice cool slice of cucumber. It's been a good 48 hours since my last slice and oh how I now miss the cool, crunchy properties of this so much undervalued vegetable.