Malaysian food customs and etiquettes

Rice or rice-based dishes form the staple diet of a Malaysian meal. Various meat dishes and vegetables accompany a meal. It is the norm for a family or a group of friends to sit around a table with various dishes, helping themselves from the spread. It fosters a closer sense of friendship whilst at the same time enabling diners to try different dishes than if they were to eat alone. Malays ( melayu ), being Muslims, eat only food that is halal, i.e. cows, lambs, deer and chicken must be slaughtered by a Muslim according to the Islamic rites. Pork or pork by-products are forbidden. When dining with a Muslim, respect their sensitivities and do not order pork-related dishes, nor liquor. Intoxicating drinks in any form are prohibited in the Islam. The fingertips of the right hand are used for eating. A finger bowl is used for washing before and after. Polite by nature and courteous in his behaviour, exercise restraint when dining with your Malay friends and don’t grab the best portions for yourself. The Chinese have no food prohibitions. Food is eaten with chopsticks. Everyone reaches out for choicest morsel with his chopsticks. So, be quick or use a fork or spoon when dining out with Chinese. You may feet squeamish about picking food where everyone has dipped their own chopsticks. To avoid this, take your portion and put it on the side plate. Slurping, belching and spitting fish bones, chicken bones or shrimp tails onto the table are normal Chinese customs. So is smoking at the table. Be tolerant.

When finished, set your chopsticks on the table or on the chopstick-rest provided. Placing them parallel on top of your bowl is considered a sign of bad luck. Also, don’t use chopsticks to spear food, and don’t stick chopsticks into a bowl of cooked rice. Indians places great emphasis on ‘clean food’, i. e. parts of lambs, chicken and fish such as feet, fins and offal are not eaten. Most Indians are Hindus. They do not eat beef as the animal is venerated in Hinduism because it gives milk, works on the field, gives manure for fuel and fertiliser and so on. So, one does not eat an animal whose very human existence is tied up with it. Indians also do not eat pork, as pigs are natural scavengers. Nor do Hindus enjoy clams, shellfish, prawns and other crustaceans that live in shallow waters the site of effluents. These restrictions may seem to limit variety, but the burst of the vivid colours in Indian cooking, spicy aromas, textures, flavours and creative ways with vegetables do make up for for it. Like the Malays or melayu boleh, the fingertips of the right hand is used for eating. Most popular melayu boleh like eat nasi lemak every morning.