Favourite People
Best thing about working with food is that this niche universe are populated by some of the nicest people. From chefs, restaurateurs and entrepreneurs, we think they are all stars in their own right.
Favourite Food Designer
13/ Prima of Ice Design, Thailand (Ice Cream Wizard)
During the Bangkok Design Festival 2009 last October one of the best showrooms was run by IceDea. Imagine that, ‘Ice Cream Designer’ is an actual professional job for its founder, Prima Chakrabandhu Na Ayudhya of IceDea Thailand. Her design evolves around ice cream concepts, recipes, packaging, identity, and whatnots in a one-stop shop. We have never met her in person, but if we do have a chance one day, we’d say “geez, you have one of coolest job in the world!”
Favourite Overseas Chef
14/ Chef Tatang, Jakarta (Cheery Philanthropist)
This Indonesian Chef with his friendly grin and delicious recipes warmed his way into our hearts. So much so that we made it a point to attend all his cooking slots during the Malaysia Asean Heritage Trail, an event that showcased the talent we have throughout the region. His satay lilit recipe was sooo good that we made sure to try it at home. And before he flew down to KL, he was serving up free food to the earthquake victims and volunteers in Padang.
Favourite Local Chef
15/ Chef Celine (Kristang Doyen)
We didn’t know much about Kristang food until we sat down with this lovely Chef. She taught us that to devil something is to add mustard to it, hence the name devil curry. She also invited us into her home and cooked a Cristang Christmas feast, which we happily devoured. "The history of our cuisine, holds the history of Malaysia, on a Kristang table you can find Chinese, Malay, British, Dutch and Portuguese influences," explains Chef Celine.
Favourite Entrepreneur
16/ Ren Jan (Frozen Food King)
It takes a certain kind of chutzpah to come up with ready to eat frozen meals. Especially since there is a 24 hour mamak practically on every corner. But then again, never underestimate human laziness. If people can call in for fast food delivery then they can certainly keep some of Sri Kulai's meals in the freezer. 4 minutes and you get hot nasi lemak, dim sum and all sorts of local dishes. Best of all, there's no MSG. Huzzah!
Favourite Restaurateurs
17/ Helen + Tong (Tastiest Couple)
http://www.friedchillies.com/index.php/fctv/detail/new-york-taste-good/
While editing our World's Best series last year, this lovely couple stands out not only as cool restaurateurs but as just nice people you want to have a meal with. Their Queens restaurant, Tastes Good is exactly that- everything tastes good and it's truly a little taste of home in bustling New York. Uncle Tong makes the meanest assam fish head and is looking for an apprentice (hint, hint). And Auntie Helen... you had us at, "I thought you were pulling my leg when you said you're coming to New York!"
Favourite Event
18/ Annual Foodsters Award 2009
Not wanting to toot our own horns but our favourite event last year was our very own Street Food Awards. It was a 5-year dream for us to do an award like this and about time that we award street hawkers and local restaurateurs that devote their lives to dishing out good food for decades.“Whilst people spend tons of money to buy happiness, these people bring joy to Malaysians for less than RM10 a dish,” quips Adly, our CEO.
Favourite Speech
19/ Minister Ng Yen Yen saying that we should appreciate our food heritage better
It's time that the world knows how good Malaysian food is and for it to be truly a national agenda rather than something on the side. Her speech was a major leap forward in terms of a much needed commitment from the Malaysian Government.
Favourite Yay for the Little Guy!
20/ McCurry Wins Against McD
Oh come on, you have to love it. McDonalds Malaysia decided to sue McCurry Restaurant for trade infringements for using the Mc prefix. The eight-year David and Goliath court case against US fast food giant McDonald’s ended early 2009 when the Malaysian court favoured the little Malaysian Curry Chicken restaurant.
"Here it is again! All the cool stuff that inspired, amused, wowed, gobsmacked and made us salivate over."
FC Kitchen
One of the most exciting things to happen to us this year is the completion of our office kitchen. It takes up half our working space but how can we not resist? It's spanking gorgeous if we say so ourselves. Here are some favourite things that came out of it.
Most Friendly Ingredient
21/ Lemon
This is probably the most used ingredient in our kitchen this year. The amount of lemon rind we grated is enough to turn our fingers yellow. Indeed it's the most superb of fruits, zested- gives our cakes a heady fragrance, preserved- it's tartly wonderful for tagines and paellas, candied- gives crunch to desserts and squeezed out lemons are terrific as sink cleaners!
Most Fiendish Ingredient
22/ Buah Kaluwak
Bought it, hammered it, stomped on it, threw it under a bus. Can't get it open. Enough said.
Most Foolproof
23/ Lindt Chocolate
For chocolaty goodness, nothing beats Lindt dark chocolate. It melts into a wonderful consistency, flavouring our chocolate cakes, topping our cupcakes, thickening our stews and chillies and well, a good healthier snack when sweet munchies attack. Melt a bar of Lindt chocolate in the microwave and whisk in a dollop of cream for instant chocolate ganache.
24/ Favourite Recipe
Moist chocolate cake - from BBC Food
This cake is fantastic because you don't need a mixer to make it. And it comes out tender. Check the recipe here and the mouthwatering picture!
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/3092/ultimate-chocolate-cake
25/ Favourite Eureka Moment
Healthy Nasi Lemak
There was nothing but squeals of glee when this little idea actually worked! We swapped out the santan for virgin coconut oil, microwaved the ikan bilis instead of frying it, and baked the chicken. This was delicious and probably till this day still one of the tastiest things to come out of the FC kitchen.
26/ Food Dioramas
Quite possibly the most fun you can have. We started out with Halloween creating ghouls out of jello, spider cookies and vampire cupcakes. Our Christmas Diorama sees us high on sugar, making gingerbread men do all kinds of things and a pretty wicked coconut snowman. Watch this space for our love diorama. "Telling a story with food! Could there be anything more fun than that? Conjuring up characters and making up plots and putting together elaborate scenes with food. I can hardly believe that this is part of my job!" grins our Food Editor, Alexandra.
27/ King of Leftovers...
Goes to Sjaiful! He saunters in, raids our fridge and comes up with the most delicious things. Everyone can learn a thing or two from this guy. And his most used phrase? A toss up between "Just add a knob of butter..." and "Eh... kalau letak cili api sedap ni..."
Favourite Everyday Things
There are plenty of everyday things that makes life just that little bit better in our everyday circus. Here are our Favourite 5 under the FriedChillies' Big Top.
The Fire-eater
28/ Tongs
It was the spatula last year. And this year, tongs- kitchen tongs that is that wins hand's down. We flip meat on the barbi, fry things with it and shake loose pipping hot noodles. Wherever, we don’t want to burnt our fingers- our trusty tongs are there. Why they are even useful to grasp things fallen into tight spaces.
The Contortionist
29/ Chopsticks
Neon green ones, light blue ones, blood red ones- it's everywhere from back alley hawker stalls to 5 star hotel 10 course Chinese meals. It can be used to eat almost anything, noodles, rice, tofu, beans, fish, chicken, duck, you name it. You can cook with it- twirling Maggi noodles, frying chicken, stir frying- you name it again. It is the earliest eating utensil ever invented, so simple yet so useful and hardly weighs anything. Help out the environment by carrying your own instead of using the instant ones at eateries.
The Juggler
30/ Cuisineart Ice Cream Maker
We’ve been dying to make ice cream and once we found out we could actually play with a Cuisinart ice cream maker we were bouncing off of the walls with excitement!” Best of all it juggles churning your ice cream, infusing cream with flavour and freezing it at the same time. The results? Near-perfect ice cream all the time. We had to narrow down our long list of ice cream recipes and settled on dark chocolate with peanutbutter cups, vanilla yogurt, and dragonfruit lychee sorbet. Yumminess!
The Illusionist
31/ Colour Correction in Post
If models get plastic surgery then food deserves a few color enhancements here and there. Sometimes its simple things like just adding a tinge of red in chillies or lobster. Or just adding the contrast and saturation in a wok full of mixed vegetables and meat. This is why our editors are always hungry.
The Confectionery Girl
32/ Single Kitkat
The new kit kat singles is nifty and comes in a nice lil’ ciggy sized box. You don't have to worry about getting your fingers messy again and great for a not-so-guilty sugar rush when we are working late on projects.
Gadget of the Year
33/ Olympus PEN
As far as cameras go, this is pretty fabulous. “It was lust at first sight with one of the sexiest bodies around. But it’s got substance too because eventhough it looks like a compact it actually works like a dSLR,” smiles Honey, our Head of Content who owns the camera but hardly sees it. It performs in low-light conditions and the ART functions- OMG! The pin-hole effect is our absolute favourite. And who have thought food still looked yummy with a grainy effect?
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