Friday circuit-breaker lunch — ordered from a home-based cook who was selling nasi goreng with ikan bilis and chicken wing for $3.50, with a complimentary slice of home-made cake thrown in. Lockdown turned many home cooks into mini-businesses, and the food coming out was often more thoughtful than commercial alternatives.

We ordered:

Nasi goreng with ikan bilis and chicken wing — $3.50
Complimentary home-made cake (included)

Nasi goreng was the proper Malay-style fried rice. Cooked with sambal belacan paste, garlic, shallot, dark soy and a touch of sugar to balance the chilli heat. The rice picked up that distinctive red-orange tint from the sambal, with a slow build of spice that lands warm rather than burning.

Ikan bilis (crispy fried anchovies) were the texture-and-flavour bonus. Scattered through the rice, they bring saltiness and a fine crunch with each spoonful. Home-cooked ikan bilis tends to be crisper than the commercial pre-fried kind because the home cook fries them in small batches in fresh oil.

The chicken wing was the protein. Marinated in soy, garlic and a touch of sambal, deep-fried until the skin went crispy and the meat stayed juicy. One whole wing per plate, which is the right portion.

The complimentary home-made cake was the surprise win. A slice of pandan chiffon or a small kueh (depending on what the home cook had baked that morning), wrapped separately so it stayed fresh. The kind of small generous gesture that home-cooks tend to do and commercial restaurants don’t.

At $3.50 with a free dessert, the value math is the lockdown small-business model in a nutshell — friend pricing, home-made care, neighbour-to-neighbour delivery.

Lockdown taught a lot of people that home cooks were quietly running better operations than they got credit for.

Overall: 4.5 / 5. 😋👍🏼 Excellent home cook nasi goreng — would absolutely re-order.

Original IG post