Nasi Lemak

Decided this post needed a little bit of an update, now that I ate it in not just Singapore, but in Malaysia as well. To learn more about nasi lemak, read below the divider.

As pictured below (with words detailing the different parts of the dish), I finally got to try a dish that I have been dying to enjoy when I visited Johor Bahru, Malaysia. There, at a place called "Yummy Nasi Lemak" (pretty self-explanatory, right) I ordered nasi lemak with otak-otak, also known as fish cake. Much better than the Singaporean version in not just taste, but quantity as well - I think the difference is pretty apparent in the pictures. :) I could actually taste the coconut curry in the rice this time!

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It took me one bite of this delicious dish to get me so hooked that I ate it twice in the same day! Nasi lemak is Malay for 'rich rice'. Normally, this dish is eaten for breakfast in Malaysia, but today, I ate it for both lunch and dinner.

I was at the Marina Bay Sands Convention Center for a tech conference and decided to walk over to the food court for a quick lunch. There, I was surprised to find a dish that I had never seen before, and after I saw how aesthetic the food servings looked, I knew I had to at least give it a try.

I definitely paid a little too much for this meal given the quantity of food, but I figured that this rare find made it worth it.

This particular version is known as Butterfly Pea Flower Chicken Wing Nasi Lemak. The dish comes with all sorts of meat and has variations in the assortment of items served with the rice, but I decided to be safe for my first try and go with the most basic kind.

The centerpiece of the dish is aromatic rice infused with coconut curry and pandan leaf. To be quite honest, the rice looks great, but it laced the coconut flavor it should have had. :(

To the left are 1) a small serving of fried anchovies and 2) the famed sambal sauce. The sambal sauce is a version of chili paste and tastes yummy when mixed with the rice.

This nasi lemak also came with fried chicken wings, egg, and some rice crisps.

After trying this dish for lunch, I was excited to try to find an even better version, so I hunted around the Albert Hawker Centre near my apartment for another stall that sold this. This time, I was absolutely not impressed with the food.

As you can see above, the nasi lemak looks hurriedly put together. The meat tasted shady at best, and the only good part about the dish was that I could taste the coconut curry in the rice a bit better than the morning. So, I decided to finish up the rice and left the rest of the meat and side dishes on the plate.

Overall, I am dying to try a better version of nasi lemak (even after 2 failed attempts!) and will definitely keep hunting around Singapore or go to Malaysia to find a tastier version.