Nasi Lemak is one way to cheer people up

i remember how farah revealed to me while she and i were eating nasi lemak in college that roughly translated, nasi lemak means 'fattening rice' and she'd constantly refer to nasi lemak as that so that she'd feel guilty and not eat it as often as she'd like to. of course me being the glutton i was (and in some ways still am), it didnt quite bother me that much because nasi lemak was too good to pass up.

last night josh and i had some friends for dinner, one of whom particularly needed to be cheered up, and what better to cook than nasi lemak!
essentially the rice is cooked with one part coconut milk and 6 parts water (i.e. if you cook 3 cups of rice, pour 3 cups of water mixed with 1/2 cup of coconut milk into the pot with the washed rice) and a drop of pandan paste (because we didnt have pandan leaves).
of course you HAVE to have the crispy ikan billis which i had brought from Singapore and deep-fried till crispy before pouring salt over it while still in the hot oil (very important to keep it crispy!), accompanied with lots of cucumber (the only vegetable for the evening) and hard-boiled eggs.
made some beef rendang from Brahims packet paste - which josh improved on with extra coconut milk and sugar.
thankfully the fried chicken turned out delicious - my mom had brought some packet 'fragrant chicken flour' which you had to add 60ml of water to to create a paste to marinade the chicken in for a few hours. it smelt like really strong Maggi chicken instant noodle flavouring and once the juices from the chicken started to come out (because of the salt content - salt brings out the water in meats), the paste started to become some sort of batter (like tempura batter) that coated the chicken, afterwhich you deep fry.
and we cannot forget the sambal that accompanies the rice. we used 2 cans of Cintan sambal ikan billis and added some onions to it while heating it up. the sambal's not quite the same as what you'd get in Chinese versions of nasi lemak in Singapore but equally yummy.

and the verdict? 5 people eating in silence for half of the meal. :)