Popiah feast at Evan's Chris'

I've We've had enough of waiting. How long is a man supposed to wait, before he starts tearing his hair out in frustration? How soon can the man be served his food, before he perishes in hunger?

Whatever happened to the popiah feast my blogosphere friend Evan was supposed to organise? I can understand Evan's concern in hesitating to meet Victor and Chun See, despite Victor's offer to get the popiah skin on his account. After all, mummy always warns little girls about the danger of meeting strangers in the Internet. Is Evan worried that Victor or Chun See might turn out to be wolves in sheep clothing? Hey Evan, I'm certainly no wolf, ok? And I'll come to your rescue.

I guess Evan was just being cautious. She wouldn't want to end up like Lil Red Ridding Hood, I'm sure. ROTFL.

Thankfully, I don't have to depend on Lil Red Ridding Hood for my craving of popiah. The Slim Lady has been on a 1-week leave, and today, she said she wanted to try out my mum's popiah recipe.

She bought the ingredients yesterday and did much of the chopping and cutting of the veggies. It took her about 3.5 hours just to get all the veggie ready. It's really a lot of hard work.

I too took a day off from work today, just to spend time with the Slim Lady and to help her prepare the popiah. But it turned out that I was the one who actually did all the cooking (and most of the eating as well). It's really quite tedious - preparing the different veggie, cooking them separately, and having to mix them up in a big wok in the end. But we had great fun cooking the popiah together, husband and wife. All the hard work in preparing the popiah is worth it.

Having cooked the dish myself, I also appreciate my mum's popiah even more. When she prepares the popiah during CNY, she always get up at the crack of dawn at 5 am to prepare all the ingredients herself. I've no idea how tiring this is, just the tossing of the veggie! I'm still quite amazed at how she could accomplish that herself all alone.

So, what's the verdict of our first attempt at cooking this special dish? The popiah veggie tasted a little sweet, quite unlike those prepared by my mum. We thought perhaps we've added more carrot then we should. But my mum told us that the sweetness was actually from the turnip. Here're some photos of the yummilicious popiah...











The cut veggie also didn't look as "refined" as my mum's. I told the Slim Lady that it was probably because of the old grating board which has been with us for years. Time to change a new one, and maybe the next time round, the veggie would be refined as sugar. I know what Victor is probably thinking when he reads this: "hmmmm.. here's a workman blaming his tools but himself ...."

All things considered, I rated the popiah 8 out of ten. Though the veggie is a wee bit sweet to my liking, once it's wrapped up in the popiah skin with the sweet dark sauce, the chilli and the peanuts, it tastes almost as scrumptious as the popiah prepared by my mum. In fact, my Dad said our popiah tasted better! (I'm inclined to believe that Dad has lost his taste bud... considering he's getting on in years...) LOL.

So Evan, what you waiting for? When can I see photos of your popiah in your blog.... Hee!

Category: Food