Mom's Dishes

Everyone in life has a god-given talent. Some can sing, some can write, some are good with numbers... you get the idea. Mom's God-given talent was she was an incredible cook. She can take the simplest ingredient and make them into something so unbelievably scrumptious.

Mom's legacy to those left behind was the pleasure she made other's feel after sampling her cooking.

A cousin second time remove said when she met me at the hospital while visiting Mom last year, that her family still kept Mom's handwritten recipe of the delectable Madelines that Mom was famous for when she was in her early twenties.

Mom used to bake a lot of desert type things. She was a desert queen. But later in life, she kind of grew tired of making those deserts, she just kept her cooking to the savory daily dish.

My most favorite Mom dish is Nasi Minyak with Rendang Daging. I thank to heavens that I learned how to cook Mom's signature dish before she passed away.

Regretfully, there are scores other recipes that only Mom knows how to make that I didn't get to inherit from her. I always figured that I still had a lot of time to learn them from now.

How was I to know that time would run short on Mom and that I will never get the opportunity to learn how to make ikan sarak, kerabu paku, karipap, to name but a few of the dishes that Mom was a master of.

Regret. It's a useless thing that serves no purpose other than to make you feel miserable. Yet that is how I feel. Regret at the opportunity lost to learn all of Mom's culinary tricks.

My only solace is in the knowledge that at least I've learned the recipe to my most favorite Mom's specialty dish.