Mr. M.K. Kumaravel's Late-night Homesickness Emergency Noodles

Preeta Samarasan serves up the second course of Object Permanence 2

We’ve all been homesick at one time or another, and food can take us home when we need it most. Preeta’s fictional nonfiction character, Mr. M.K. Kumaravel, from FED’s Object Permanence Series has more to share with us on the very subject.

Big love, Ashley

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Mr. M.K. Kumaravel's Late-night Homesickness Emergency Noodles

Those days when I had just landed in England I used to go out drinking with one great bloody group of flers. One Jamaican, one chap from Barbados, one Ghanaian who looked so timid and bookish until he had a few, two Singhs and myself. Come home in the wee hours of the morning feeling maudlin, thinking about everything I gave up and left behind.

Hungry like a dragon too. That’s when I’ll make this mee goreng using whatever I could dig up from the fridge. No need to follow any measurements exactly because I certainly never measured anything. Just throw it all in and eat and picture yourself at a mamak joint in the tanahair.

Ingredients

For the sauce:

• normal kicap (soy sauce)

• black kicap (dark soy sauce, now don’t go and get those disgusting sweet ones from Indonesia and god knows where else, if you can’t get normal black kicap then leave it out and just add a pinch of sugar to the sauce in the mixing bowl

• Maggi chilli-garlic sauce or similar, no matter if it is so old that there is that crusty ring around the mouth when you open the bottle, you will be fine

• pinch of sugar if you don’t have black kicap, see above

For the noodles:

• cooking oil

• Noodles sufficient for one person, either Maggi or spaghetti if you are really desperate, cook until not too soft, put a drop of oil and set aside

• 1 or 2 small onions, sliced, can use normal onions if you cannot find the small red type

• 3 or 4 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped up

• whatever vegetables you have in your fridge—few leaves of Chinese cabbage, an old carrot, handful of greens, spring onion, coriander leaves, cut all these as necessary

• 1 or 2 eggs depending on just how hungry you are

• one fresh red chili, sliced, if you have it

Method

1. Mix up the sauce in a small bowl. It should be salty, tiny bit sweet, and as spicy as you like it. About 4 tbsp normal kicap, 1 tbsp black kicap, and a good sized dollop of chili garlic sauce should be okay for one person’s portion.

2. Heat up a generous amount of oil on high heat till almost smoking in a small kuali or frying pan. Keep the heat high throughout.

3. Throw in the onions and garlic and fry until fragrant.

4. Put in the vegetables, in the order that makes sense depending on what you have (carrot first, then cabbage, other greens after that. No matter how drunk you are don’t be stupid, and go and put the softer veggies first. Keep the green part of the spring onion and the coriander leaves for garnish at the end, I know what you’ll say, cheh wah, high also can think of garnish, but why not I say, one must have standards at all times).

5. Throw in the noodles and quickly pour the sauce while stirring (best to use chopsticks or a big fork).

6. Stir until noodles are starting to char a bit.

7. Dish out into a bowl.

8. Now add a bit more oil to the kuali if necessary and quickly fry the one or two eggs until the edges are nice and crisp, keeping the yolks intact. Back home we call this buffalo-eye eggs, don’t ask me why a buffalo and not a cow but that’s how it is.

9. Lay the egg(s) on top of your noodles and sprinkle the spring onions, coriander leaves and sliced chili over the top if you have them.

If you have some hot stuff from a jar—sambal or what have you—then you can add that on the side too, ah, first class with that I tell you. After a few drinks who doesn’t like things spicy?

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For more goodies…

Learn more about Preeta and FED’s entire Summer 2024 global crew of musicians, artists, writers, growers, gleaners, cooks, and craftspeople, and be sure to check out Mr. M.K. Kumaravel’s story.