For the gringos

Roti prata

Roti prata is great stuff! If you like spicy Mexican food, you'll probably enjoy this Singapore-Malaysia Indian dish.

Roti prata is made from flour, water and oil. First the dough is rolled into tennis ball sized lumps. The prata uncle then flattens these balls with the palm of his hands, until he gets a flat circle of dough. But this is not all. To achieve the flakey and crispy texture, the prata uncle then flings this flat circle in a circular motion, making it much thinner and much larger. (You really need a video of this, my description doesn't do it justice.) He then folds it all over itself back into an airy, multi-layered lump of dough again. This is then cooked over an iron skillet to get what you see on the plate in the picture on the right.

Roti prata is eaten with curry. The best prata is crispy on the outside, and flakey, warm and "full" on the inside. You can ask for egg or onions in your prata too. Prata with fillings are square, prata without are round. New fancy fillings include cheese, mushrooms, etc. The going price for a plain prata is 60 cents (US$0.35) and an egg prata $1 - $1.20 (US$0.60).

A trivial fact: you can always tell a Singaporean when he is in Malaysia when he orders Roti Prata: "roti prata" is known as "roti canai" across the causeway.

Milo Dinosaur

Milo is an Australian produced malt beverage. Milo dinasaur is iced milo with a generous sprinkling of malt powder over the beverage (see left). A variation of milo dinosaur is milo godzilla (iced milo with whipped cream and vanilla ice-cream). We obviously love our large prehistoric animals here in Singapore.