Sabah Land below the Wind III

Local cuisines 
By AV Latinggam

Most of the time we recommend restaurants and eateries to our guests and hope they like the food served there. However for those who are promoting Homestay, they have to concoct local food that are acceptable to overseas visitors. It is well and fine to promote the local Bambangan pickle and pickled fish, but these are not instantly edible and ‘butod’ the delicious sago grub is not easy to find and they are expensive as well. So it may be commendable to look at the backyard vegetable patch and be innovative. One such vegetable that are usually grown there is the Amaranth or Bayam. This is one way to cook Amaranth. Wash and prepare the amaranth. Wash flowering chives trim off tough lower ends of stalks. Cut into bite-sized lengths and combine with amaranth leaves and then put it into sieve, dip into hot water until cooked, mix with a bit of oyster sauce and arrange on plate. They can be used as a bed for fried fish or prawns. 

Other vegetables that can be served are tapioca leaves. Only young leaves should be picked off the tree. They are then placed in a basin, salt is added and then they are crushed thoroughly with the hands. The juice from the crushed leaves is drained off and they are fried with onions, garlic and anchovies. The tapioca tuber is also delicious when cooked and eaten with piping hot local coffee. One way to cook it is by putting short lengths of peeled tapioca into a pan of boiling water with salt and a teaspoon of turmeric. Let it cook and then serve with grated coconut and brown sugar. This can also serve as dessert. We are very proud of our Tenom Coffee and most of the time we will serve this drinks to our guests. However we should also be proud of our Tambunan ginger and Sabah tea. So we should concoct ginger tea. The ginger should be cleaned thoroughly and bring to boil in a kettle. When it boils, the water should be poured on a teapot with tea in it. Leave it for five minutes and strain into a serving pot. Add a bit of sugar and there you have ginger tea ala Sabah. Deliciously natural, so they say. 

A full set of food derived from nature...that's local for you.