oh coconut milk! oh hot chilli peppers! oh putrid soybeans!

First, my apologies for the less than stellar quality of the picture! Two things weren't in my favour at the time of picture snapping - time of day (early morning when the sun was still unsure about what kind of day it wanted today be) and the camera (mobile phone camera - ugh, I know, I better get back into the habit of toting my camera everywhere with me again!)

I had this (Lontong) for breakfast today - I found a place a 2 weeks ago which served lontong for breakfast - imagine my delight :)

Anyway, today's breakfast was at another place (a lucky find) - I had originally just wanted a warm lime juice drink to help a cough i developed from not sleeping 2 days in a row - serves me right, right?

Back to the topic of lontong for breakfast. The first time I had lontong was probably way back in 1992. I was immediately appalled by it. By the ingredients, or rather combination of ingredients.  Which were basically putrid soybeans (and assorted vegetables) boiled to almost mash in coconut milk, chilli and tumeric root. I wanted to puke that first time, but out of respect of the cook, I downed the whole thing with a grimace.

Fast forward some 20 odd years... aah, how some food are an acquired taste... I've become quite the fan of lontong - I love the coconutty, spicy flavour, that sweet and savoury smell of coconut milk, the sting of extra spicy bird chilli on the tongue together with the indescribable exotic sense of tumeric root. I even adore the slightly off taste of fermented soybeans (it's true name is TEMPEH by the way).

It's definitely not something I would eat every day though, or even every week! Maybe bimonthly. Yummm.