Urban Food Culture: Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore in the Twentieth Century [1st ed.] 978-1-137-52223-8;978-1-137-51691-6

Table of contents :
Front Matter ....Pages i-vii
Introduction (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 1-16
Sydney Flavours: From Convict Colony to Cosmopolitan City (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 17-52
Shanghai: From Treaty Port to Global City (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 53-81
Singapore: Tasting the City (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 83-111
Colonial Legacies: Curries and Other Hybridities (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 113-136
Restaurants, Cafes and Street Food (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 137-164
Markets and Supermarkets (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 165-187
Cookbooks: Recipes and Culinary Tales (Cecilia Leong-Salobir)....Pages 189-213
Back Matter ....Pages 215-256

Citation preview

Urban Food Culture Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore in the Twentieth Century Cecilia Leong-Salobir

Urban Food Culture

Cecilia Leong-Salobir

Urban Food Culture Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore in the Twentieth Century

Cecilia Leong-Salobir History Discipline University of Western Australia Perth, Australia History Discipline University of Wollongong Wollongong, Australia

ISBN 978-1-137-52223-8    ISBN 978-1-137-51691-6 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6 Library of Congress Control Number: 2019931878 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover credit: Maram_shutterstock.com This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature America, Inc. The registered company address is: 1 New York Plaza, New York, NY 10004, U.S.A.

Acknowledgements

I started this book as a Vice Chancellor Research Fellow at the University of Wollongong. I am grateful for the many resources accorded to me at UOW. I would like to thank Vera Mackie for advice and assistance, and Julia Martinez for her mentorship. Peter Gibson was generous in his sharing of Chinese sources. Colleagues in history who became friends: Georgine Clarsen, Sarah Ferber, Deborah Mayersen, Vicki Crinis, Frances Steel and Claire Lowrie, thank you. Further afield, thank you to Nicole Tarulevicz (University of Tasmania) for alerting me to new research and leads on food history; Jean Duruz (University of South Australia) for food discussions; Jeremy Martens and Jenny Gregory (University of Western Australia) for friendship and support. I continue to benefit as Honorary Research Fellow from my alma mater, the University of Western Australia. Grateful thanks must go to the staff at the following institutions where I conducted research for this book: Xujiahui (Zikawei) Library of Shanghai; Shanghai Library, National Library of Singapore; National Archives of Singapore; State Library of New South Wales and National Library of Australia; Monash Cookbook Collection, Monash University; Culinary Collections, Schlesinger Library, Harvard University; Fales Library, New York University and the New York Public Library. Much appreciation for the assistance of Connie Li, Carolyn Zhang and Sarah Crowley-Vigneauat at Palgrave Macmillan.

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Acknowledgements

On a personal level, I would like to express love and thanks to my husband Stane Salobir and daughter Nena Kim Salobir, to my siblings who provided the backdrop of a good and decent family and, lastly, to the loving memory of my parents.

Contents

1 Introduction  1 2 Sydney Flavours: From Convict Colony to Cosmopolitan City 17 3 Shanghai: From Treaty Port to Global City 53 4 Singapore: Tasting the City 83 5 Colonial Legacies: Curries and Other Hybridities113 6 Restaurants, Cafes and Street Food137 7 Markets and Supermarkets165 8 Cookbooks: Recipes and Culinary Tales189 Bibliography215 Index235

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CHAPTER 1

Introduction

The recent food history of Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore traces a complex narrative of empire, trade networks and migration patterns. This book discusses aspects of each city’s cuisine in the twentieth century, examining the oft interwoven threads of colonial legacy and globalization, as set in restaurants, cafes and street food, markets and supermarkets, and cookbooks and other archival material. The three cities were chosen primarily to quench an interest in imperial urban networks and the evolving foodways of these centres, assisted by the availability of resources. All three cities have been ranked in the top 20 global cities in recent years (Kearney 2017, https://www.atkearney.com/ global-cities, accessed 31 May 2018). Culinary offering, under cultural experience, is one measure of a global city’s attributes. Collectively, the three cities present a miscellany of traditional and contemporary foodways in societies and communities, both local and global. As I embarked on this project with specific themes and topics in mind, it grew organically and valiant attempts have been made to rein in some of the fascinating but imponderable aspects. In this, I have been guided by the work of food scholars Ken Albala, Jean Duruz, Jeffrey Pilcher, Krishnendu Ray and Nicole Tarulevicz, among others. It seems de rigueur to begin a piece of food history by explaining or defending it as a new field of study or by justifying one’s existence as a food historian. It was only in the 1980s that historians began delving into the histories of material life and of mass culture, consumerism and © The Author(s) 2019 C. Leong-Salobir, Urban Food Culture, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6_1

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c­ onsumption. Prior to this, food history was studied against the backdrop of labour relations and agrarian or industrialization movements. Food and foodways, previously seen as merely quotidian and related to women’s work, are now part of a growing field in academic enquiry spanning such diverse fields and disciplines as sociology, nutrition, agriculture, communications, public health and social and cultural histories. Most university presses now feature food series lists, and reviews on food history in academic journals are commonplace. Over the past two decades, a critical mass of academics has assembled around food supply, patterns of eating and other aspects of food culture. Regular international conferences, academic journals, monograph series and the emergence of food studies as a scholarly field in the United States and Europe are testament to its significance (Albala 2014: xv). Food history looks at attitudes towards class, gender, race and other cultural values. It is a broad academic discipline—some insist on calling it a field rather than discipline—engaging in a variety of methodologies and theoretical positions. Primary sources include cookbooks, household manuals, menus, personal records and the like. It employs both qualitative and quantitative approaches and borrows conceptual models freely from other disciplines (Scholliers et al. 2012: Conclusion). Much scholarship exists on the history of globalization. In the imperial context, the flow of goods was not just between colony and metropole. With the global flow of migrants came goods and ideas. Trajectories were made in different directions, forming long-lasting links and networks. Historian Tony Ballantyne argues against a “metrocentric” understanding of imperial history and prefers the notion of “webs of empire”, or “a complex system of overlapping and interwoven institutions, organizations, ideologies, and discourses” (Ballantyne 2003: 104, 113). In a similar vein is Thomas Metcalf’s argument that the ties of empire not only took a trajectory to London but spread outwards to Africa, the Middle East, the islands of the Indian Ocean and Southeast Asia (Metcalf 2007). Indeed, food consumption was another means in which the British, through her Indian colonial connections, helped spread ideas on colonial cuisine. Curry is a particularly good example of the proliferation of culinary knowledge through empire and its links. As the British established their colonies and settlements, they brought their colonial hybrid dishes with them. Curries and other dishes underwent further modification, with ingredients added or discarded and different cooking methods being employed. Curry, more than any other dish, illustrates the way in which

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ideas, goods and services travelled the nodal networks of empire, undergoing changes at each point (Leong-Salobir 2011: 39–59). By the end of the 1900s, curry was well and truly entrenched as a universally recognizable dish, its links with empire quite forgotten. Every colonial cookbook published in the twentieth century in the three cities featured several curry recipes. Cultural and trade connections in culinary forms have existed for centuries. Food historian Jeffrey M. Pilcher points out that examining earlier forms of cultural contact and innovation “can help evaluate claims about present-day globalization”. He adds that “previous experiences with imperial conquest or global migration can inform both public policy and personal initiative” (Pilcher 2017: 7). The cities examined in this book share a history of colonial encounter (Sydney as convict colony, Singapore as Crown colony and Shanghai as port treaty) and cultural exchange. This book investigates the extent to which each city inherited and retained culinary legacies from the British— such as curries, kedgeree, chicken chop and condiments—as other Asian colonies did. However, this hybrid cuisine only formed a small part of the numerous cuisines that existed in Shanghai and Singapore in the long twentieth century. The colonial and semi-colonial communities were small and segregated from the rest of the local inhabitants. The diet of the settler community in Sydney was different; the abundance of meat and a predominantly British population meant the colonial hybrid dishes that developed in India were consumed less frequently. There was also a quandary faced by the settler community to be reconciled: whether to view itself as the Australian nation, or to be forever beholden to Britain and her culinary offerings (including the British colonial cuisine from India). Both Singapore and Shanghai suffered the ignoble reputation of being sleepy fishing villages until the arrival of the British, who were credited with immediately transforming them into flourishing metropolises. In fact, Shanghai was a prominent maritime centre in the eighteenth century and had become one of China’s major ports. Its coastal trade was important for exporting goods to Southeast Asia via its junk boats. Singapore was already a major regional centre in the maritime trade between the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea by the fourteenth century. More importantly, the three cities were nodes in the imperial network that segued into global cities. The exchange of goods and services that circulated among the three cities and the migration of people from across the globe to work and to trade in the urban centres helped trigger the

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growth of these metropolises. Different ingredients and cooking methods introduced by the various groups resulted in new ways of eating. Nevertheless, the culinary cultures of Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore were essentially different from each other, the food practices of Sydney being predominantly European-based, while Shanghainese and Singaporeans relied on staples and cooking methods from Asia. The globalization of food cultures from the 1900s, however, have blurred the lines of distinction as residents from the three cities have been continually introduced to new ingredients, food fads and fashions, rendering the unfamiliar recognizable. While there are cities that feature a homogenous and independent food culture, most modern cities embrace a pluralistic food culture consisting of numerous competing culinary cultures from all over the world (Lim 2014). The global city has been described as a partially denationalized space that enables migrants to lay claim to partial and aspirational forms of cosmopolitan urban citizenship (Sassen 2001). Sydney is the most populous Western city close to Asia. From its colonial beginnings, Sydney’s culinary history was entrenched with Asia’s, particularly with the Chinese people. Driven by famine, natural disasters and social unrest, millions of Chinese left China for a better life in the nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries, destined for the southern seas. Singapore and Sydney were such destinations. Michael Williams’ (2018) recent important study on the Chinese diaspora and transnationalism from 1849 to 1949, focusing on family, home village connections and the huaqiao (the Chinese who travel and live outside their native place), opens up perspectives for further studies on food and foodways. Generations earlier, other Chinese had settled in Malaya and Singapore. Some of these Chinese married the local inhabitants and a unique blend of Chinese and Malay cuisine emerged, known as Peranakan food. Australian dairy and other fresh food produce were exported to Singapore and Shanghai. International students from Shanghai and Singapore introduced Asian cuisine to Sydney residents. Chinese food outlets, from the humble family-run to fine dining to street stalls, were and are permanent fixtures in the three cities. From market gardeners to cooks in affluent homes and restaurants, the Chinese have been central to food production in the three cities. Chinese activities, through their cuisine and occupational activities, changed the character of Sydney and Singapore in various ways. Whether through the efforts of individuals or groups, links were forged that resulted in new ways

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of eating and, indeed, new identities. Entrepreneurs among the Chinese diaspora brought back new ideas to Shanghai too. For example, Jereme Leung, founder of the famous Whampoa Club in Shanghai, is of Chinese origin and grew up in Singapore where he helped his grandparents sell wontons from a food stall. He opened Whampoa Club in 2003 and has been credited with pioneering modern Chinese cuisine by adopting ingredients and cooking methods from the different regions in China. Similarly, the Guo brothers arrived in Sydney as teenagers, working in market gardens and hawking vegetables door to door. They started a fruit store, Wing On, and in 1918 opened the well-known Wing On department store (and several textile mills) in Shanghai, bringing with them new ideas of largescale business organization and strategies (Yen 1998: 48–52). Wing On in Shanghai sold food too, and its restaurant was reputed to serve more than five hundred banquet meals at a time (Kuhn 1986). Chinese migrants to Sydney and Singapore started market gardens, supplying the cities with fresh vegetables. The vegetable farms in Singapore were replicated without any changes from South China (Blaut 1958: xiv). The use of night soil as manure was a contentious issue, triggering anxiety over health concerns. It also gave rise to articulation of racist remarks by the colonials in Singapore and Australians in Sydney on the “barbaric” practices of the Chinese, adding to the litany of racial abuse. In any event, in the early years of legislated racial discrimination against the Chinese, Australians ingested the foods prepared and served by the Chinese. In the 1850s, makeshift Chinese restaurants dotted the goldfields, including those in the surrounds of Sydney. At the same time, Chinese servants cooked for the wealthy European families. Singapore’s colonial and European population depended on Australian food produce, and its first “cold storage” Western-style grocery store was started by Australians (Tregonning 1967). As the development of modern metropolises gathered pace from the twentieth century, so too did the opportunities increased for human mobility and transnational exchange. This book explores the culinary histories of Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore from 1900 to 1980 within an Asian Pacific network of fluxes and flows.

Sydney Sydney’s culinary beginnings got off to an unpromising start when the first colonists and convicts faced starvation on landing at Sydney Cove in Australia in 1788. This came at a time when America’s doors were closed

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to British convicts, and Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, was the port of call for offloading its captive cargo. In the ensuing two centuries, the city’s cafes, restaurants and homes started serving the cuisines of countless nationalities and ethnic groups that have since called Australia home. Fresh and quality produce from the oceans and inland waterways, rich harvests from the land, numerous innovative chefs and a sophisticated dining public ensured that the global city showcased a wide spectrum of eating-out venues. World food exchange had been well established, as were cuisines from when Europeans first settled in Australia, laying the foundation for new foodways. Immigrants to Sydney opened restaurants; started market gardens, orchards and vineyards; operated butcheries, bakeries, greengroceries and delicatessens; and imported foods and hospitality staff. The Chinese made their mark with Chinatown and the ubiquitous Chinese restaurant in every suburb. Initially, they came to work in the goldfields as gardeners and cooks, and later as university students. The Jewish community first came in the early years of colonial settlement and in greater numbers from the 1920s. Jewish entrepreneurs started businesses selling kosher foods. Other migrants who contributed to Sydney’s culinary landscape were the Spanish, who set up shop at the Spanish Quarter, the Portuguese community in Petersham, and the Vietnamese in the suburb of Cabramatta. Other restaurants and cafes were operated by Italians, Greeks, Indians and other Southeast Asians. Innovative home-grown chefs from the 1970s were responsible for creating “Modern Australian”, a cuisine that marries fresh ingredients with modern light cooking styles.

Shanghai Shanghai gained “treaty port” status from the British in 1843, and became China’s largest, most industrialized and modern city in the 1900s (Bickers 1998). In its modern history, Shanghai residents have used food as a means to define itself as a focal point for Chinese identity and sense of place. Rapid migration from both domestic and foreign sources took place from its time as a British treaty port. Chinese migrants began recreating their regional cuisines in the city restaurants. The culinary landscape of Shanghai was continually changing and renewing through the years. It was this exposure to the food practices of other regions and countries that brought Shanghai its fame for a sophisticated and varied cuisine.

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Some scholars even list Shanghai or eastern Chinese cooking as China’s leading regional cuisine and, indeed, the one closest to being China’s national cuisine. Consequently, Shanghai residents used “culinary nostalgia” to make sense of and define their relationship to the city, to other parts of China and to the world (Swislocki 2009). Shanghai became well known for its Western restaurants from the twentieth century, cementing its reputation as a modern and cosmopolitan city. However, early culinary encounters between Westerners and Chinese were doubtful, with suspicion emanating from both sides. The Chinese thought Western food culture unappetizing and primitive, as they saw the consumption of large amounts of beef and mutton as distasteful. Likewise, the British in Shanghai found Chinese cuisine disgusting (Bickers 1999). The majority of Shanghai residents lived in shikumen, two- or three-­ storey brick, wood and concrete houses set in rows along narrow alleys, with a front yard and heavy gates (Lu 2004: 143). These dwellings had no cooking facilities (Feng 2009: 118), and so the residents depended on buying meals and snacks from itinerant food vendors. In part, the lack of cooking facilities gave rise to the numerous “travelling kitchens” or “wheeled kitchens” plying the alleyways. From the mud and plaster stoves suspended on poles and carried on the hawker’s shoulders were hot kettles of tea, pots of rice, bread buns, chestnuts and sweet potatoes. Workers in the 1920s usually bought these food items home for the evening meal (Enders 1923: 20; Pan 1992: 135).

Singapore Singapore became a British Crown Colony in 1826 and, from its early history, its port became an important bread basket, feeding the nation with food imported from elsewhere (Tarulevicz 2013: 11). By the twentieth century, Britons, migrants from China, the Malay Peninsula, India and elsewhere had all contributed to the emerging hybridized and unique cuisine that Singaporeans today readily recognize as their own. The hybrid character of the British colonial cuisine in Singapore was also derived from the food practices of Britons, from local food traditions and from India. Significantly, this cuisine (including dishes such as curries, mulligatawny, kedgeree, chicken country captain and sago pudding) developed largely through the reliance of colonizers on their domestic servants.

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Singapore’s racial and ethnic diversity has resulted in a cross-cultural culinary pluralism. Chinese food in Singapore is divided according to main dialect groups: Fujian, Cantonese, Teochew and Hainanese. Chinese market gardeners grew Chinese leaf-stem vegetables from the 1900s. Malay food, as its culture, is a mixture from China, India, the Middle East and Europe, this blend of cultures bearing strongly similar culinary ties with Indonesian food practices. Rice, as in many Asian cultures, is the Malay staple, and is served with many coconut-based dishes, chillies and other spices. Indian dishes are derived from influences from North and South India. Finally, there are also Eurasian and Peranakan cuisines, the former of European and Asian heritage, and the latter of Chinese and Malay origins. Further, there are crossovers of cuisines from these different cultures. Chinese, Malay and Indian food co-exist harmoniously, while retaining distinct, separated culinary and thus “racial” or ethnic identities (Chua and Rajah 1996). All these cultures were represented in street food stalls in Singapore in the 1900s and remain so in today’s pristine food courts. The history of twentieth-century Singapore, from a thriving colonial outpost to a modern city, is very much the story of its first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew. In particular, street food was transformed when Lee continued the colonial enforcement of regulating street food and hawker stalls to efficient and hygienic venues for eating out (Lee 2000).

Colonial Legacies: Curries and Other Hybrid Dishes This chapter discusses the ways in which culinary relics remained long after the departure of the British. It will investigate whether the kinds of political structures put in place had any bearing on the types of foods the British consumed in each territory. Did Shanghai’s status as part of the “informal empire” influence its British residents in keeping Chinese food at arm’s length? Shanghailanders and other Britons did emulate other cultural practices from the Raj in India, in vocabulary and domestic service (Bickers 1999). Colonials in the Crown Colony of Singapore, on the other hand, enjoyed curries, mulligatawny, kedgeree, country captain, pish pash and sago pudding on a daily basis. The colonial hybrid cuisine evolved over time and was a combination of culinary practices derived from European and Asian foodways. The hybrid dishes did not replace entirely British food practices, as roast beef, saddles of mutton, European-style desserts and other dishes were often consumed in tandem.

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The curry consumed in Sydney in the twentieth century was a curious concoction of meat or poultry with apple, raisins, chutney and curry powder all cooked in a stew-like mixture. It is likely that the abundance of meat and seafood meant that curry did not feature as prominently as in the Asian colonies. There, supplies of beef, lamb and pork were limited and of poor quality, and leftover meats were curried to stretch meals. As with other analyses of colonial discourses, there was no single predominant factor that precipitated a particular development. Colonial foodways were mired in the complexities of colonial rule. The prestige of imperialists had to be maintained; Asian servants were racially denigrated for their filthy and dishonest habits and yet colonizers ingested the foods prepared by their servants.

Restaurants, Cafes and Street Food Food consumption in public spaces such as restaurants, cafes, street stalls and others is a microcosm of the social fabric of a city. Restaurants represent the ethos of cities, regions, ethnic groups and even nations (Beriss and Sutton 2007). The vibrancy and dynamism of Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore can be attributed to the immigrants who thronged there from the 1850s. The different types of restaurants that emerged were a direct result of the waves of migration, as immigrants often find the restaurant business to be their only viable source of revenue (Sun and Chen 2009). Restaurants can be seen as homogenizing cultures globally when a fine dining restaurant is no different to any other in any global city. McDonaldization has indeed rendered all stores under the McDonald’s brand identical in every city. Sydney’s first MacDonald’s was opened in 1971; in Singapore it was in 1979; in Shanghai, 1994. On the other hand, restaurants have also played an important role in reclaiming the local—in growing, supplying and cooking local produce, and adhering to local customs and foodways. Sydney’s multicultural population is reflected in its smorgasbord of restaurants. Similarly, Singapore’s gourmet dining venues, food markets, food halls and hawker centres are at the forefront of the city’s image. Although Shanghai residents had experimented with Western food since the nineteenth century, regional foods and native-place taste preferences continued into the twentieth century (Swislocki 2009). This chapter highlights the emergence of the Chinese restaurant in all three cities, analysing its symbolic representation of Chinese culture, its place in Shanghai (sense of national identity), in Sydney (sense of exoticism)

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and in Singapore (sense of familiarity) between 1900 and 2000. I will discuss other types of dining-out venues, including European fine dining, midrange restaurants, cafes, fast food chains and street food.

Markets and Supermarkets In 1876, a Chinese farmer had established a market garden near Parramatta in Sydney. Another market garden was established in Rushcutter’s Bay by a “John Chinaman” (Morris 2001: 6). The Chinese contribution to Sydney in the early settler years was in supplying market produce. They had grown vegetables and reared pigs in the goldfields, and when the gold rush years ended they took their market gardening skills to the city, growing cabbage, cauliflower, turnips, salads, carrots, onion and eschallots. In the following decades, Chinese market gardens were established all over the Sydney area. Almost all the farmers were male. Before Singapore became wholly urbanized, Cantonese farmers had traditionally practised a highly intensive form of commercialized vegetable farming, growing leaf-stem vegetables for the Chinese population. In the 1950s, several thousands of these types of farms of two or three acreages were found in Singapore (Blaut 1958: 2). Over the decades, urbanization and global city developments have increasingly encroached on market gardens and small farms at the fringes of urban centres. Supermarkets have gradually replaced the traditional fresh food shops. The chapter looks at the historical development of fresh food markets, market gardens and how globalization has resulted in the advent of the supermarket.

Cookbooks and Other Culinary Paraphernalia This chapter examines cookbooks, memoirs, newspapers, magazines, government archives, memoirs, cookbooks, travelogues and diaries published in the twentieth century in the three cities. Cookbooks as a genre can only tell part of the history of foodways of a place. When used in tandem with anecdotes in memoirs, news items and advertisements in newspapers and magazines, records in archives and narratives in travelogues and diaries, cookbooks are a means to confirm the historical veracity of the food practices of communities. Cultural and social historians have increasingly employed cookbooks and household manuals as texts on domesticity and commensality. Just as

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fiction, diaries and biographies do not totally mirror lived events, conduct guides and cookbooks, when examined alongside other genres, add nuance and significance to the historian’s analysis of the cuisine of a community (Humble 2005). In Singapore, cookbooks used by colonial mistresses were similar to those used by memsahibs in India and Indian cooks. Apart from illustrating the types of foods consumed, cooking methods used and types and frequency of meals eaten, cookbooks are insightful for analysing the relationship between colonizer and colonized. There were only a handful of colonial cookbooks published for Shanghai residents. The Anglo-Chinese Cook Book published in 1916 in Shanghai was both in English and Chinese, the latter for “the mistress to give instructions to the cook with the least possible trouble”. Another cookbook was written by Lady Maze and Mrs V.G. Bowden in 1940, entitled Bon Appetit: Secrets from Shanghai Kitchens. The colonial cookbooks were written by British men and women, and the circulation of these publications helped to spread the colonial cuisine from colony to colony and reaffirm their rulers’ status in the colonies. Australian cookbooks written in the 1900s were mainly by women, and recipes were usually of English origin. Understandably, they served to maintain cultural and historical bonds with Britain, but dishes of imperial culture also crept into the cookbooks, such as curries, kedgeree and mulligatawny soup. Additionally, the early cookbooks included native ingredients like kangaroo, wonga-wonga pigeon and warrigal greens.

What Constitutes a Cuisine? There is no apparent consensus among food scholars on what constitutes a cuisine. Many have tried, proffering a list of criteria. Sydney Mintz (1996: 96) defines a cuisine as legitimate when the community claims ownership of it through knowledge of, and familiarity with, the dishes. This ties in with sociologist Priscilla Parkhurst Ferguson’s assertion that ‘culinary preparations become a cuisine when, and only when, the preparations are articulated and formalized, and enter the public domain’ (Ferguson 2006: 18). Others argue that a cuisine emerges when there is sufficient literature that critiques the food culture of a particular group of people. However, this would exclude those cultures with no written tradition. Yet, it is important that food scholars are able to agree to a set of criteria for cuisines, to write and analyse them, if nothing else.

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Global cities are dense, complex spaces inhabited by heterogeneous populations, and are constantly changing and evolving. The effects of travel, immigration and globalization have added layer upon layer of ways of eating: in taste, in use of local and imported ingredients, and in cooking methodologies. Early migrants to cities, in desperate attempts to eke out a living using the barest of capital, racked their minds on what they were capable of cooking, trying to anticipate the desires of the eating public and figuring out a reasonable price to charge. The fragile world in which they constructed their existence determined street food. Underpinning the food practices of these three seemingly different cities were connections and exchanges that inextricably linked the three urban centres. Social histories on food linking nation-states and national identities have often subsumed the significance of cities. Essentially, national cuisines are constructs built up from regional cuisines (Mintz 1996), and governments have used cuisine as a tool in the cultural project of nation-building (Pilcher 2016). However, it is within city boundaries, such pivotal centres for the transfers of knowledge, in monetary, political and cultural terms, that the constant evolution of rich and varied cuisines takes place. I am persuaded by sociologist Krishnendu Ray’s questioning that culture must be contained within the nation and has to be contained at the borders. He observes that national imaginations of taste are often constructed against the neighbouring regions that are “culinarily proximate, albeit ideologically distant”. In his study of culture in the spaces between territories, Ray notes that culinary histories have been “obfuscated by methodological nationalism” (Ray 2014: 258–259). I also argue whether a uniquely Singaporean cuisine exists given that many of the “iconic” dishes that Singaporeans deem their own can be found in several Asian countries. Dishes from the Chinese, Malay, Indian, Eurasian and other communities can all be found in nearby Malaysia, bearing the same names and indeed all over Asia under different names. This has not deterred Singaporean authorities, the Singaporean Tourism Board, the National Heritage Board and even private corporations from recording and codifying dishes as a way of claiming ownership. Joan Catherine Henderson suggests that defining a national cuisine is complicated in ­multiracial societies, and questions the ownership of specific dishes. She notes this as problematic given the “diverse cultural elements and constant evolution” (Henderson 2014: 904–917). As historian Donna R. Gabaccia puts it succinctly:

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People crossing borders carry along the tastes and sometimes also the seeds, recipes and ingredients of their homes. Mobility requires, inspires and facilitates commerce in familiar and exotic goods. Similarly, travel inspires a cook to experiment, to borrow and to adapt. It is extraordinarily difficult to apply national labels to people and products in a mobile world. (Gabaccia 2018)

Although Shanghai was administered as a treaty port, the British established cultures and norms that were semi-colonial. Keen to emulate the trappings of the Raj in India, the British mistress supervised the European household. Chinese cooks purchased, prepared and served their British employers. Did the semi-colonial nature of British rule influence the food practices of Shanghailanders and other Britons? No Anglo-Chinese cuisine in Shanghai nor other Chinese treaty ports emerged as did an enduring Anglo-Indian one. However, the British in Shanghai continued to consume European meals, in contrast to the British in India and other Asian colonies who adopted a hybrid colonial cuisine. The Anglo-Indian or colonial cuisine, originating from colonial India, spread across South and Southeast Asia, and was transported back to England and other parts of the world (Leong-­ Salobir 2016: 79–99). The British imperial structures that were put in place in her colonies impacted on the local populations far beyond governance and trade. While there were no significant footprints left by the British cuisine on her colonies, this book also discusses the different ways in which the mechanics of colonialism impacted on the food practices of Britons and colonized societies. Singapore and Sydney made a smooth transition from colonial settlement to global city, whereas Shanghai was cut off from the world after 1949 (Bracken 2015: 27). Cooking is a part of culture which remains closest to people, more than music, painting and clothing, more than language and sometimes even more than religion. Indeed, for some, it may be all that is left, long after everything else has been lost (Roden 1993: 112). The disparate cuisines of Asia are linked through flows of knowledge (cooking methodologies) and resources (ingredients), and yet distinct worlds of taste and comestibles are promoted by each nation-state. It was the combination of these ­various developments that defined the distinctly recognizable Asian features in Australian cuisine, in high-end restaurant fusion meals, in home cooking, in grocery stores, at greengrocers and in the proliferation of Asian restaurants and cafes in towns and cities across Australia.

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Methodology, Justification and Disclaimer The historical approach adopted for this book includes sources from colonial and postcolonial newspapers, cookbooks, magazines, government archives, memoirs, travelogues and diaries. In engaging with a range of historical perspectives on chapters relating to each city’s food history, colonial culinary legacies, restaurants and other public dining outlets, markets, supermarkets, market gardens and cookbooks, this book offers new insights on the shared histories of the three cities. Writing the food history of three major cities is an indomitable task, one that can take decades to research and write. This is a snapshot of the historical exchanges and linkages that were forged when people moved internally within national borders and externally to new lands and cultures. As such, not every facet of the food history of each of the city will be examined. Inevitably something will be left out. For a book of this size, it can only offer historical sketches of food practices. It is not the intention of this book to present a neat chronological reading of the food history of the urban centres. Where networks and migration patterns formed, food ingredients and dishes made culinary leaps among the three cities. I have not applied in equal measure of any particular theme or strand for each city. Culinary and food history (being two different things) develop in surprising and untidy ways. Overlaps are bound to occur. The book is limited in its use of only English language sources. Further, it does not discuss the food practices of the different Aboriginal groups that have inhabited the Sydney metropolitan area for more than 65,000  years, nor the culinary influences that they absorbed over the course of the twentieth century.

References Albala, Ken. 2014. Introduction. In Routledge International Handbook of Food Studies, ed. Ken Albala. London/New York: Routledge. Ballantyne, Tony. 2003. Rereading the Archive and Opening Up the Nation-State: Colonial Knowledge in South Asia (and Beyond). In After the Imperial Turn: Thinking with and Through the Nation, ed. Antoinette Burton. Durham: Duke University Press. Beriss, David, and David Sutton, eds. 2007. The Restaurants Book: Ethnographies of Where We Eat. New York: Berg.

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Bickers, Robert. 1998. Shanghailanders: The Formation and Identity of the British Settler Community in Shanghai 1843–1937. Past & Present 159: 161–211. ———. 1999. Britain in China. New York: Manchester University Press. Blaut, J.M. 1958. Chinese Market Gardening in Singapore: A Study in Functional Microgeography. Unpublished PhD Thesis. Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University. Bracken, Gregory. 2015. Introduction. Asian Cities: Colonial to Global. In Asian Cities: Colonial to Global, ed. Gregory Bracken. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. Chua, Beng Huat, and Ananda Rajah. 1996. Hybridity, Ethnicity and Food in Singapore, Working Paper, No. 133. Singapore: Department of Sociology, National University of Singapore. Enders, Elizabeth Crump. 1923. Swinging Lanterns. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Feng, Shaoting. 2009. Shikumen: Experiencing Civil Residence and Alleys of Shanghai Style. Translated by Li bing shi. Shanghai: Shanghai People’s Publishing House. Ferguson, Priscilla Parkhurst. 2006. Accounting for Taste: The Triumph of French Cuisine. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Gabaccia, Donna R. Pizza, Pasta and Red Sauce: Italian or American? History in Focus, Issue 11: Migration. https://www.history.ac.uk/ihr/Focus/Migration/ articles/gabaccia.html. Accessed 30 Mar 2018. Henderson, Joan Catherine. 2014. Food and Culture: In Search of a Singapore Cuisine. British Food Journal 116 (6): 904–917. Humble, Nicola. 2005. Culinary Pleasures: Cook Books and the Transformation of British Food. London: Faber and Faber. Kearney. 2017. https://www.atkearney.com/global-cities. Accessed 31 May 2018. Kuhn, Irene Corbally. 1986. Shanghai: The Way It Was: A Glance Back at a Short, but Extraordinary Era. Los Angeles Times, October 19. Lee, Kuan Yew. 2000. From Third World to First. The Singapore Story: 1965–2000. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. Leong-Salobir, Cecilia. 2011. Food Culture in Colonial Asia: A Taste of Empire. Abingdon/New York: Routledge. ———. 2016. Mem and Cookie: The Colonial Kitchen in Malaysia and Singapore. In Cooking Cultures: Convergent Histories of Food and Feeling, ed. Ishita Banerjee-Dube. Cambridge University Press. Lim, C.J. 2014. Food City. New York: Routledge. Lu, Hanchao. 2004. Beyond the Neon Lights: Everyday Shanghai in the Early Twentieth Century. Berkeley: University of California Press. Maze, Lady Laura G., and V.G. Bowden. 1940. Bon Appetit: Secrets from Shanghai Kitchens. Shanghai: Publisher not listed.

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Metcalf, Thomas. 2007. Imperial Connections: India in the Indian Ocean Arena, 1860–1920. Berkeley: University of California Press. Mintz, Sydney W. 1996. Tasting Foods, Tasting Freedom: Excursions into Eating, Culture, and the Past. Boston: Beacon Press. Morris, Colleen. 2001. Chinese Market Gardens in Sydney. Australian Garden History 12 (5): 5–8. Pan, Lynn. 1992. Tracing It Home: Journeys Around a Chinese Family. London: Secker & Warburg. Pilcher, Jeffrey M. 2016. Culinary Infrastructure: How Facilities and Technologies Create Value and Meaning Around Food. Global Food History 2 (2): 105–131. ———. 2017. Food in World History. New York: Routledge. Ray, Krishnendu. 2014. Migration, Transnational Cuisines, and Invisible Ethnics. In Food in Time and Place: The American Historical Association Companion to Food History, ed. Paul Freedman et al. Oakland: University of California Press. Roden, Claudia. 1981. Cooking in Israel: A Changing Mosaic. In Oxford Food Symposium. Cited in Spencer, Colin, and Claire Clifton, eds. 1993. The Faber Book of Food. London: Faber and Faber. Sassen, Saskia. 2001. The Global City. New York: Princeton University Press. Scholliers, P., et al. 2012. Conclusion: Contours of Global Food Historiography. In Writing Food History: A Global Perspective, ed. K.W. Claflin et al. London: Berg. Sun, Jiaming, and Xiangming Chen. 2009. Fast Foods and Brand Clothes in Shanghai: How and Why Do Locals Consume Globally? In Shanghai Rising: State Power and Local Transformations in a Global Megacity, ed. Xiangming Chen. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Swislocki, M. 2009. Culinary Nostalgia: Regional Food Culture and the Urban Experience in Shanghai. California: Stanford University Press. Tarulevicz, Nicole. 2013. Eating Her Curries and Kway: A Cultural History of Food in Singapore. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Tregonning, K.G. 1967. The Singapore Cold Storage: 1903–1966. Singapore: Cold Storage Holdings Ltd. Williams, Michael. 2018. Returning Home with Glory: Chinese Villagers Around the Pacific, 1849 to 1949. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Yen, Ching-hwang. 1998. Wing On and the Kwok Brothers: A Case Study of Pre-­ war Chinese Entrepreneurs. In Asian Department Stores, ed. Kerrie L. MacPherson. Richmond/Chicago: Curzon Press.

CHAPTER 2

Sydney Flavours: From Convict Colony to Cosmopolitan City

Curried Rabbit [A]nd clean a nice young rabbit, wash it well, and dry it, and cut into joints. Put an ounce of butter in a saucepan and allow it to get quite hot. Chop up one or two onions and fry them a very pale brown. Add the pieces of rabbit and fry them, too, turning them frequently. Peel, core, and chop up a cooking apple, add it also. Mix a teaspoon of curry powder with enough cold water to make it into a smooth paste. Add a pinch of salt and a seasoning of nutmeg. Mix well with the meat. Add a teacupful of boiling water and stew very gently for an hour. Serve with a border of boiled rice. (Australian Worker. Sydney. 11 December 1913, page 13)

The first five rabbits to inhabit Australia arrived when British settlers brought them on the First Fleet. They quickly multiplied, becoming in turns pestilent to providing life-saving meat to families during the Depression. Men, known as “rabbitohs” went around selling freshly killed rabbits from door to door in inner-city Sydney. They even featured on formal menus in the grand houses of Sydney. Sometimes known as “underground mutton” for the poor, rabbit had had a doubtful reputation, although European migrants value the meat. Still, cookbooks consistently featured rabbit recipes, ranging from rabbit pie to fricassee of rabbit and curried rabbit. Curried rabbit included all the ingredients that were typical of Australian curries from the days of settlement to the 1980s: butter, onion, frequently just a teaspoon of curry powder (for a whole rabbit) and an apple. Australia had inherited curry powder and curry recipes from British imperial networks, illustrating the reach of empire. © The Author(s) 2019 C. Leong-Salobir, Urban Food Culture, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6_2

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In historicizing the many influences on the culinary practices of twentieth-­ century Sydneysiders, this chapter considers its colonial or settler background and its migrant intake of a diverse range of people from all over the world. Australians travelling overseas from the 1960s also brought back new ways of cooking and eating from Asia and Europe. This chapter does not look into the food practices of the different Aboriginal groups that have inhabited the Sydney metropolitan area for more than 65,000 years nor into the culinary influences that they absorbed over the course of the twentieth century. Indeed, the continent’s flora and fauna had sustained the Aboriginal peoples for millennia. While the first British settlers did not embrace the Aboriginal people’s food practices carte blanche, some adaptation and creative efforts did go into preparing and cooking local foods from the early years. Captain Arthur Phillip and about a motley group of over a thousand men and women from England arrived at Sydney Harbour in 1788. The lack of knowledge for foraging native foods and colonial-type attitudes towards the indigenous Eora people meant that it was an unpromising start for the early settlers. There were fears that the group of colonists and convicts could face starvation at Sydney Cove, particularly as supplies from the fleet ran out. This came at a time when America’s doors were closed to British convicts, and Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, was the port of call for offloading its captive cargo (Mallos and Argyriou 1988: 36). In the ensuing two centuries, the city’s cafes, restaurants and homes started serving the cuisines of countless nationalities and ethnic groups that had since called Australia home. Fresh and quality produce from the oceans and inland waterways, rich harvests from the land, numerous innovative chefs and a sophisticated dining public ensured that the global city showcased a wide spectrum of eating-out venues. World food exchange had been well established as were cuisines from cultures when Europeans first settled in Australia, opening the way for new foodways. Until recently it was thought that early settlers starved because they were too ignorant or reluctant to consume native foods at the landing of the First Fleet. It is true that for the first two years, supplies from their ships ran out and they were facing dire circumstances. In fact, native game, local vegetables and seafood went into meals. Native fruits such as lilly pillies, quandongs, rosellas, “wild” raspberries and “native” currants were harvested for both commercial and domestic purposes until the 1930s (http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/austn-food-and-drink, accessed 15 November 2017).

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Australian food historians Barbara Santich (2011), Charlotte Craw (2012), O’Brien (2016) and Blake Singley (2012) have argued against the presumption that nineteenth-century colonists systematically ignored or excluded indigenous foods in their diets. Although there was rejection of native food by the early settlers (most likely through ignorance of those foods), at Sydney Harbour, they soon consumed foods like fish, crabs, oyster, kangaroo, wild duck and other game birds (Santich 2011: 66–67). Early Australian cookbooks, most notably by Mrs Lance Rawson (1890) and Mrs Hannah Maclurcan (Maclurcan 1901) from the 1890s onwards contain numerous recipes on how to prepare indigenous foods. A description of kangaroo steamer appeared in 1820—a dish of kangaroo mince, stewed with salt pork. In the early 1900s, Ernest Charles Buley wrote of game shops selling wild duck, magpie-geese, black swan, wallaby, wild turkey (bustard) and tails of large kangaroo (Buley 1905: 119). Native fauna was replaced by cheap beef and lamb that were developed by the pastoral industry towards the end of the nineteenth century. In an interview, Hilda Cross described about shooting rosella parrots and making parrot pies when she was growing up in Yarrowitch. As the parrots were small, it took about a dozen to make a parrot pie. Cross recalled using onion, thyme and parsley for baking the pie. The family also had hare, rabbit and kangaroo during the Depression. In summer, they had eel—boiled, steamed or fried (http://nla.gov.au/nla. obj-216193656/listen Hilda Cross interviewed by Jenny Salmon in the NSW Bicentennial oral history collection [sound recording]). Australia remains culturally a locality outside of Asia, but the increasing global flows of people, culture and capital from the Asian region mean that the lived everyday experiences of all are affected by this intercultural exchange. The food history of Australia within the Asian context remains the one area that has been under-researched. The interchange of Asian culinary practices can shed light on how cultural and commercial exchanges between Asians and Australians could be further enhanced. Among the handful of historians (Bannerman 1998; Santich 1995, 2012; Symons 2000, 2007; Wessell 2013a, b; Wessell and Brien 2013) who have written on the various aspects of the food history of Australia, no scholar has attempted to analyse and integrate the food cultures of Asia into the Australian cuisine. Cultural studies scholar Ien Ang points out that ­mundane cross-cultural encounters (such as conversation exchanges about food) can lead to “incremental and dialogic construction of lived identities which slowly dissolve the boundaries between the past and the future, between ‘where we come from’ and ‘what we might become’, between being and becoming”(2001: 159).

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Immigrants to Sydney opened restaurants; started market gardens, orchards and vineyards; operated butcheries, bakeries, greengroceries and delicatessens; and imported foods and hospitality staff. In the areas of high concentrations of ethnic communities there, food businesses formed a high percentage of enterprises. The Chinese made their mark with Chinatown and the ubiquitous Chinese restaurant in every suburb. Initially, they came to work in the goldfields as gardeners and cooks, and later as university students. The Jewish community first came in the early years of colonial settlement and in greater numbers from the 1920s and 1930s. Jewish entrepreneurs started businesses in selling kosher foods not only in Sydney, but to the rest of the country. Jewish coffee shops and delicatessens opened in Bondi and Kings Cross. The Italians arrived in large numbers from 1920 and the aftermath of World War II. They were responsible for introducing Italian food products to Australians in the 1960s and 1970s, including cheeses like parmesan, pecorino, provolone, mozzarella and ricotta; Italian salamis and prosciutto; pasta, olive oil and olives; tomato-based pastes and sauces; and, of course, espresso coffee. Italian market gardeners and greengrocers also introduce vegetables such as zucchini, broccoli, globe artichokes, fennel, eggplant, radicchio, capsicums and flat-leaved parsley (Dyson 2002: 146). Sydney’s Spanish Quarter was born when six Galician families started selling olives and chorizo sausages in Liverpool Street (Sydney Morning Herald (http://www. smh.com.au/national/end-of-an-era-as-developers-move-in-to-spanishquarter-20090417-aa7k.html), accessed 1 December 2017). The Spanish Club, started in 1962, was a hive of activity with sangria, paella and flamenco music (http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/hindsight/adiosto-the-spanish-club/5093288, accessed 1 December 2017). The Portuguese community in Petersham started their grocery stores and eating outlets. The Vietnamese “heartlands” spread around the migrant hostel where Vietnamese refugees were first housed (Symons 1993) in the suburb of Cabramatta from the 1960s and 1970s, displacing the postwar European immigrants between the 1950s and 1960s. The area was transformed into a bustling hub of Asian food stores and restaurants. Other restaurants and cafes were operated by Greeks, Indians and other Southeast Asians. By the twentieth century, Sydney’s eating patterns, like the rest of Australia, have developed from a rudimentary British-based diet in goldfields and farmsteads to a modern Australian cuisine. In the first two centuries of white settlement, Australian food consumption was defined by the British tradition. The population, mainly of British stock, consumed British-type

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meals, based heavily on meat due to a thriving pastoral industry. Beef and mutton were cooked as roasts, chops, steak and sausages (Daunton-Fear et al. 1977: 31). There were sporadic attempts in utilizing local ingredients, but these never become permanent fixtures in Australian foodways. For example, cooks experimented with roast wallaby instead of roast beef, and parrot pie instead of chicken pie. Damper, an unleavened bread, is perhaps one of the more enduring items from colonial times to the present time. In Sydney, vegetables came from the Chinese market gardeners from the 1870s (Bannerman 1998: 40), heralding one of the early Asian influences in Asian foodways. Apart from growing vegetables familiar to European Australians, the early Chinese also grew Chinese vegetables for their community, selling them from horse-drawn carts (Markey 1986: 399–400). At the time of Federation in 1901, the population of Australia was about 3.8 million, comprising British, New Zealand and European settlers. Asians numbered 1.2 per cent. Until 1967, indigenous people were not included in censuses. Even then, recipes and narratives from cookbooks, newspapers and magazines tell us that Asian dishes were consumed in Australia, particularly curries, mulligatawny and other dishes from colonial India. It was postwar European immigration from the 1950s, however, that visibly changed the culinary landscape with delicatessens, cafes and fine dining restaurants. Subsequent waves of Asian arrivals as migrants and students from the 1950s and 1960s were seen as the beginning of Asian food practices becoming fixated on Australian food culture. In fact, Chinese dishes and curries were already familiar to Australian consumers from the 1850s, as evidenced by numerous recipes in cookbooks and newspaper columns.

Home Cooking At the time of Federation in 1901, Australia home cooking comprised “one meat and two or three veg”, the standard meal harking back to British origins. Meat was in plentiful supply, with mutton, meat pies, colonial curries and lamb chops appearing frequently on the dinner table. Increasingly, a growing sense of nationalism and the shedding of its colonial past stimulated the appetite for new tastes. As far back as the 1890s, there were calls for Australia to develop its own cuisine. As well, there were sporadic attempts at developing a national dish. Medical doctor Philip E. Muskett from Sydney Hospital, writing in the 1890s, lamented the “injurious amount of meat” consumed by Australians and called for

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eating more vegetables (Muskett 1893: x). Muskett suggested a national dish could be “a macédoine of vegetables, or a vegetable curry, or some well-concocted salad” (Muskett 1893: 125). Decades passed and a national dish did not eventuate. It was only from the 1930s that there were strident calls for the cultivation of a distinctive Australian cuisine. Primarily, these were made by columnists in the women’s pages of newspapers, to shake the shackles off its colonial past and unimaginative “meat and three veg” diet. Thus, it was in the kitchen that the cultural values of Australian housewives would either prolong a retrograde colonial mentality or advance the nation’s eating habits (Junor 2016: 478). By all accounts, life in the Australian city at the turn of the twentieth century was seen as “the paradise of the working man”. Buley wrote of the average family being able to rent a five-roomed cottage, at walking distance to work, for ten shillings a week. There was usually half an acre of land by the house, enough to grow fruit and vegetables and to keep poultry (Buley 1905: 108–109). Buley painted a comfortable life in the Australian city, praising the plentiful and reasonably priced fruit and vegetables. Fruit, in season especially is cheap. Fresh grapes, peaches, apricots, pears, and plums can all be bought at prices ranging from twopence to threepence a pound, and all of the very finest quality. I have often seen twenty pounds of ripe tomatoes offered at the door for a shilling, and a ripe water-melon a foot in diameter, with flesh pink and crisp and luscious, for threepence. Sixpence buys three good pineapples from the hawker’s barrow. And the wine-flavoured passion-fruit may be had at threepence a dozen. (Buley 1905: 110)

Meat was plentiful too, he continued: As a rule, the Australian is content with three meals a day, and has meat at every meal. The working-man will breakfast on chops or steak, and at midday if unable to go home, may patronize a restaurant, where a plentiful dinner costs him sixpence. At six o’clock, he has a substantial tea, with cold or hot meat, and very wisely dispenses with supper. At every meal, he probably drinks two or three large cups of tea, … City workers lunch in the middle of the day, and are able to reach their homes in time for a dinner at six o’clock, so that they have little time or inclination for the afternoon break. The professional and upper middle classes dine a little later, as a rule, and the cup of afternoon tea may or may not be taken; but in Australia, afternoon tea is recognized as more exclusively a feminine privilege. (Buley 1905: 170–171)

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Afternoon tea may be a feminine privilege, but the beverage became firmly lodged in Australian life, both at home and in public. Australia was a tea drinking nation through British Empire connections and British culture and commerce. It was omnipresent at breakfast, lunch and dinner, and morning and afternoon tea. From the early years of settlement, billy tea, or tea brewed over the campsite fire, was drunk from morning to night and had become memorialized of bush life and white frontier masculinity (Rappaport 2017: 189). Tea consumption declined from the 1930s, due in part to the rising popularity of coffee, fruit juices and milk-based drinks, especially among young people (Rappaport 2017: 288–289). Cheap and plentiful meat meant that Australians could afford to eat large amounts of it. Each Australian consumed 264 pounds of meat annually, as against 109 pounds eaten by the average Briton and 77 pounds by the Frenchman (Buley 1905: 171). Some medical doctors advocated eating less meat for health reasons and in keeping with the Australian climate. Some did heed this advice in later years, as there was a gradual, but noticeable, tendency in some Australians to consume less meat and eat more fresh fruit. For example, some Australian doctors advised a breakfast of fruit followed by toast and coffee, instead of meat and tea of the old Australian regime (Buley 1905: 170–171). Australia came to Britain’s rescue in the years of food shortages from 1947. Australians donated money towards the Food for Britain scheme, including food parcels of macaroni cheese, dripping, condensed milk, honey, a pastry mixture and meat (Olds and Chan 1997: 336). Old habits die hard, however, and cookbooks continued to suggest meal plans ­including the “meat and three veg” variety. The Sydney-published cookbook, Commonsense Cookery Book, in its numerous editions throughout the twentieth century, suggested meat and three veg menus. Even the 1990 edition suggested five dinner menus (Commonsense Cookery Book, 1990: 23–24): One: Two: Three: Four: Five:

Meat, three vegetables, dessert, beverage. Soup, meat, three vegetables, dessert, beverage. Meat, two vegetables, salad and dressing, dessert, beverage. Fruit, fish or savoury cocktail, soup, meat, three vegetables, dessert, beverage. Fruit fish or savoury cocktail, soup, fish, meat, tree vegetables, dessert, coffee, biscuits and cheese, nuts, sweetmeats.

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The move to break out of the “meat and three veg” mould encountered opposition. On the one hand, it was seen as growing up as a nation, and, on the other hand, many viewed it with a sense of regret for abandoning British cultural heritage. The sheer variety and abundance of fresh produce and other ways of eating brought in by non-British immigrants meant change was inevitable. This was to come later. Not every Sydneysider enjoyed the bounty of the land as living standards were uneven, and, at different periods, world events caused hardship to many in the community. Many inner-city Sydney residents went through hard times from the first part of the twentieth century. There was the bubonic plague from 1900, the flu epidemic of 1919, the two world wars and, of course, the Great Depression. Small backyards featured vegetable patches and chicken runs. Men took up fishing by the harbour. Rabbitohs went around selling freshly caught rabbits to households to be used as meat. For decades, rabbit meat was known as “underground mutton” for the poor. The 1957 edition of the influential The Commonsense Cookery Book listed four recipes for rabbit: baked, fricasseed, stewed and in a pie (compiled by the New South Wales Public School Cookery Teachers’ Association and published by Angus and Robertson, Sydney, with 500,000 copies sold by 1957). More often than not, rabbit was curried. Ingredients for the curry included one tablespoon of curry powder for a whole rabbit, raisins and cream (“A moveable feast”). It made a revival as a gourmet meat in restaurants towards the end of the twentieth century. However, rabbit has always been a much-loved meat in the Greek, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese communities. Chinese market gardeners sold fruit and vegetables from door to door, with their wares suspended on a pole slung across shoulders, as in Shanghai and Singapore. Most food purchases were delivered to the home. In the early 1920s, the baker delivered to households, bread from a basket that he would carry on his horse. Fish was delivered on Friday on horse and cart, with the seller cutting the heads off, cleaning the fish and placing it on a plate provided by the householder. Gladys Timbs provided these details of life in the early 1920s in the Sydney suburb of Woollarah (Timbs and Rapley 1987). The sight of Chinese vendors carrying their produce for sale from door to door could be a scene in Shanghai or Singapore. Buley wrote The distinctive sights of the Australian streets include the Chinese vegetable merchant, with his two heavy baskets of vegetables, balanced on a bamboo pole, supported on his shoulders. A group of Hindoo or Syrian hawkers may

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be seen passing from house to house, pressing their cheap wares in the most imperfect English. More peculiarly Australian is the rabbit-man, with his stentorian yell of “Wild rabbits, oh!” and his cart with a frame on which dozens of pairs of slaughtered bunnies are hanging. One shilling a pair is the usual price, and the rabbit man does a thriving trade in the face of an expiring Australian prejudice against the rabbit as food. (Buley 1905: 118–119)

Timbs remembered it was a great treat to go out with a plate when the rabbitoh come round, and he’d have the rabbits hanging with their two legs joined together, and they were one and threepence a pair and he’d cut the heads off and throw it to the cats that would be following him along … he’d skin it and he’d put it on the plate. (Timbs and Rapley 1987)

Rabbits were not always seen as desirable. An introduced species to the continent, they caused extensive environmental damage, including loss of native wild life. They also caused soil erosion to farming land. From time to time, government authorities carried out mass destruction of the rabbits. For example, in 1950, an “all-out war on the rabbit plague” was declared by the Rabbit Destruction Authority with a grant of 500,000 pounds (Olds and Chan 1997: 346). Electricity first became available in Sydney in 1904, and electric cook stoves started appearing in kitchens in the 1920s. However, less than half of Sydney homes had electric power at the time, and it was not until the late 1940s that electric cooking equipment were a reality for most. One of the pioneer Australian manufacturers of cooking appliances, Hecla Electrics Pty Ltd, manufactured electric kettles grillers, cookers and stoves (Olds and Chan 1997: 247). Sydney’s ice first came from Boston, American, a journey taking over four months. The imports last a few years from 1839. The ice helped to develop the frozen meat trade and the introduction of salmon to Australia (Isaacs 2011: 26–31). In the home front, the domestic refrigerator was introduced to households in the 1920s in Australia, and, as elsewhere, forever changed the ways in which families purchased and prepared food. The usefulness of the new home appliance did away with chunks of ice stored in the “ice-box”. The iceman delivered ice twice a week. This was a problem in summer, as the block of ice delivered one day would have melted by the next (Timbs and Rapley 1987).

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Together with other labour-saving appliances, the refrigerator freed up women’s chores at home. The Commonsense Cookery Book, first published in 1914, and with numerous editions later, devoted a whole chapter on refrigeration. The cookbook, selling in total of more than a million copies throughout the years, states: The main purpose of a refrigerator is the short-term storage of food, which allows for many economies, as food can be kept until it is required. It eliminates the need for shopping every day, and left—over dishes will keep safely, while many dishes can be prepared from food that would otherwise be thrown away.

The advent of milk bars in Sydney from North American influences was also duplicated at home. Milkshakes were promoted as a health drink in cookbook recipes from the 1930s to the 1940s. The 1937 edition of The Commonsense Cookery Book advertised in its pages a Sydney “milk specialist” company, suggesting readers to use only its milk for recipes given in the book (The Commonsense Cookery Book 1937). In another edition of the same cookbook, the N.S.W.  Fresh Food & Ice Coy advertised that its “pure rich milk” supplied to “all leading hospitals” (The Commonsense Cookery Book, No publication year). The Milk Act of 1931, enabling it to fix milk prices, was enforced when thousands of people became unemployed and milk consumption went down (Wilkinson 1999). Housewives were also encouraged to prepare milkshakes using fresh fruit instead of syrup flavourings. Banana milkshakes were popular (Dyson 2002: 234). The scarcity of restaurants encouraged picnicking outdoors, and these later developed into smart elaborate events. Scones, Johnny cake, fruit pasties, fruit salad, and passion fruit and cream were suggested as ideal offerings for a good picnic (Knight 2011: 26). Picnics were sites of leisure, suggesting a sense of adventure in open spaces. It was also an inclusive recreational activity, as men, women and children ate and socialized together (Knight 2011: 26). Tellingly, one of Australia’s earliest food historians, Michael Symons, in one of the nation’s first substantial food history works, titled his book, One Continuous Picnic: A gastronomic history of Australia. Attributing “one continuous picnic” to novelist Anthony Trollope, Symons observes We brought our food with us and we have been kept well supplied with portable provisions. We called our spot the “working man’s paradise” in the nineteenth century and the “lucky country” in the [twentieth]. But we have invariably consumed preserved, packaged fare. (Symons 2007: 9)

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By all accounts it was indeed the working man’s paradise. In good weather, the weekend meant “a picnic of lamb chops and the national beverage, billy tea – with perhaps a crate of apples, good honey or cream being brought back to town” (Symons 2007: 165). Picnics also paved the way for the weekend barbecue from the 1920s. From the 1940s, sausages and chops were grilled over the barbecue in most Australian homes. The mild and sunny climate and the prevailing view of being in a young country helped to popularize the barbecue. Eating outdoors over an open fire also promoted the nostalgia of bush cooking and, in some ways, masculinity. Friday night tea was usually fish and chips, bought from the suburb’s fish and chip shop (Gill 1993: 27). Delicatessens in the city were then known as ham and beef shops, selling cooked chicken and rabbits. Many commuters bought from these ham and beef shops (Gill 1993: 63). Over the decades, the nation’s taste buds changed to embrace newer flavours. This did not come about principally from eating out but from grocery shops, markets and delicatessens (Beckett 1984: 151). Women’s pages in newspapers and women’s magazines played a significant role in this.

Eating Out To map out the history of the ways in which dining out developed in twentieth-century Sydney, it is necessary to look at what happened the century before. The earliest and most rudimentary eating-out experiences were simple pie shops or inns in the goldfields. When Chinese goldmine workers started market gardens, their vegetables provided a welcome change to a diet of stewed mutton and damper for the Australians. The Australians were soon attracted to the aroma from the Chinese camps, and soon “Chinese cafes” were set up (“Life on the goldfields”. http://www.dpi. nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0009/109917/life-on-the-goldfields-living-there.pdf. Accessed 25 April 2018). In what was probably Sydney’s first restaurant advertisement, the Sydney Gazette on 26 June 1803 reported that Rosetta Stabler’s eating house in Old Sydney Town served boiled mutton and broth every day at noon and a joint of roast meat was prepared at one. The menu is unambiguously of English origin, and other restaurants featured similar fare for the next 50 years. On 20 June 1831, The Herald noted that there were 20 applications for public house licences for Sydney. On 19 September 1831, George Sippe posted an advertisement in The Herald that the Royal Hotel would be opened for business, informing the public that dinners could be ordered on short notice and that imported wines were served.

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Until the 1960s, dining out (as opposed to casual eating out) for the average family was limited to special occasions when they celebrated in the formal dining room of the local hotel (Kirkby 2008: 30). Casual eating out for the largely working class homogeneous Anglo-Celtic community was from cheap pub meals that were popular until the 1980s. The early pub food culture in Australia was dictated by liquor licensing laws from 1830, when it was stipulated that hotels provided food and accommodation to travellers. Pubs then started introducing informal bistro meals. The licensing laws were instrumental for the drinking culture relating to pubs. Between 1916 and 1954, Sydney pubs had to close by 6 pm, and the patrons’ frantic rush to drink as much as they could in the hour before closing was known as the “six o’clock swill”. Tanja Luckins (2007) has examined the emergence of the term “six o’clock swill” as not just a description of Australian drinking practices but associated with the temperance movement, patriotism and masculinity. Food served in these pubs in the hotels were mainly British. The formal dining room in the same hotel frequently served French or French-named meals. The dinner menu of 17 April 1914 at The Australia Hotel featured: Huitres Natives Potage Minestroni Schnapper Bouilli, Sauce Hollandaise ou Whitebait au Poivre Noir Sarcelle aux Champignons Filet de Mouton aux Petit Pois Poulets a la Broche Salade Asperges, Sauce Supreme Pudding Souffle au Chocolat Glace Palestine Welsh Rarebit Dessert Café (Richard Stone. 2005. Fragments of the Everyday: A Book of Australian Ephemera. Canberra: National Library of Australia. Page 65)

Twenty-one years later, the dinner menu at the same hotel again featured in French: Huitres Cocktail Consomme Paysanne

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Filet de Sole aux Fruit de Mer Granite au Curacoa Poulet Roti au Lard Petit Pois au Beurre Coeur de Laitue Asperges froides Ravigotte Biscuit Glace Praline Friandises Cafe Most twentieth-century grand hotels in Australian cities served haute cuisine, emulating the British’s penchant for giving French names to homegrown dishes. This was seen as adding prestige and sophistication to a menu. Formal dinners at Government House and European hotels in the colonies almost always featured menus in French. Australians, like other colonials and settlers, consumed foods and drinks that were European, particularly French, in the belief that this culinary preference distinguished them from the native or local people. Hannah Maclurcan, a colonial cookbook author, from Queensland, arrived in Sydney in 1901 to manage the Wentworth Hotel until 1932. At the Wentworth’s Palm Court, she served cold buffet luncheons, featuring seafood, prepared in the French tradition, including bêche-de-mer, turtle soups, barramundi au gratin or à la Normandie, fish à la Victoria and homard en Bellevue à la Wentworth. Maclurcan’s cookery book (Mrs Maclurcan’s Cookery Book) included recipes for several tropical fruits such as granadilla, pawpaw, pineapple, prickly pears, mangoes, rosellas and bananas (Dyson 2002: 134). This cookbook continued to be published until the 20th edition in 1930. As immigrants or settlers to another land inevitably do, Australians compared life in the Antipodes to the old country. Australians found plentiful and cheap meat a welcome change to what they were used to in Britain. As Buley wrote, The cheapness of food is another circumstance in favour of the Australian workman. He can dine, if he wishes, at a cleanly kept restaurant where a substantial meal of meat and vegetables, with pudding to follow, can be had for sixpence. A better served meal, with a small bottle of Australian wine added, can easily be got for a shilling, and this includes all those extras of bread. (Buley 1905: 110)

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Competition came with the spread of Chinese restaurants and Greek milk bars selling cheaper food. Australians brought their saucepans to Chinese restaurants to buy takeaway meals of chicken chow mein or sweet and sour pork. Modest Chinese restaurants sprouted all over Sydney and, by the late twentieth century, many fine dining Chinese restaurants were established. Italian chef Beppi Polese was one of those arrivals to Australia in 1952 after working in numerous well-known restaurants in Europe. Polese spent his first years in Sydney working at various restaurants, namely, Romano’s, Milano and Prince. Together with his wife Norma Polese, they opened Beppi’s in 1956, and became the longest running restaurant under one owner for Australia. Polese introduced mussels and calamari to Sydneysiders. Finally, weaned from the meat and three veg meals, Australians took to relishing foods from every culture. Food scholar John Newton quotes Polese, “I find Australians very interesting because they’re willing to try anything” (Newton 1996: 197). Alongside the milkshakes and ice-cream sundaes, the Greek café also offered mixed grills and salads (Kirkby 2008: 38). Department stores and larger grocery stores also had cafes and restaurants on their premises, serving not only shoppers but also workers in the city. The emporium, known as Civil Service Stores, devoted a large grocery and cake department at their King Street store on the ground floor. The cake counter had displays of a large bundt-type cake, decorated with cherries and other dried fruit. Gill remembers the restaurant there serving strawberries and cream (Gill 1993: 20). Two floors of Coles, on Pitt Street, had cafeterias, while the basement had a “sit-up” grill counter. Here, one could order a mixed grill of sausage and small cuts of chop, steak and bacon, for six pence. David Jones department store on Elizabeth Street had a restaurant and cafeteria on its fifth floor. It was a popular venue “for lunch before a matinee, dinner on Friday, a special celebration for a special afternoon tea” (Gill 1993: 132–133). Tea and Tearooms Tea, the empire’s produce, became the national beverage of Australians as early as the 1890s. Tea drinking at home, both as a day-long beverage and afternoon tea ritual, and in tearooms dated back to the early settler days when men brewed their tea in billycans in the bush. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the average Australian was drinking four kilograms of tea

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annually (Blainey 2003: 367). In the 1890s, Australians were drinking half of all the Ceylon tea sold outside Britain. Chinese tea did not stand a chance due to anti-Chinese sentiment and the British and Indian aggressive marketing efforts in propagating information that Chinese tea was adulterated and unhealthy (Rappaport 2017: 188–189). In the rural setting in Australia, there was a direct link between tea and masculinity, so that men had direct access to tea in a manner that was denied to women. As well, in the Australian bush, tea drinking also indicated independence and egalitarianism, virtues manifested in the metal kettle known as the billy (Knight 2011: 21). However, in the urban, domestic setting, it was women who enjoyed that suburban ritual, the afternoon tea (Harper 2010: 87). Aspirational middle-class Australian women used the ritual of afternoon tea to gain respectability. Close attention was paid to the material goods of particular tea sets and kinds of cakes served. In “A Page for Women” of the Sydney’s Sydney Morning Herald, “a writer on the philosophy of afternoon tea” wrote “anyone who serves wafers with tea is lacking in gastronomic imagination. Drinking tea and eating a wafer is like having a picnic in the woodshed, or wearing an Eastern hat with galoshes”. The minutiae of sandwich-making laid out in great detail reflect a yearning for middle-class respectability or plain admiration for frippery. The hostess was encouraged to prepare fillings in such a way that consuming them could be done with delicacy and decorum. Fillings for the sandwiches should be eaten effortlessly, lettuce should not be “indivisible” and preference is for bread that is “daintier”. The writer condemned the “hard obstinate biscuit, and the sloppy, oozing sandwich”, and wrote: one of the first principles in making sandwiches is to avoid the “indivisible lettuce leaf ”… If meat of any kind is used, such as ham, tongue or chicken, it should be chopped almost to a mince, but not minced. Cucumber and tomato, if properly prepared, can be bitten easily but parsley and lettuce are always likely to be proven indivisible, if not broken into small pieces. Nuts should be either chopped very fine, or else put through the mincer. Cutting the bread, is of course, a most important part of sandwich-making. The loaf known as “compressed tin” is the general favourite although some people prefer the Vienna bread, which, though a little more trouble to cut, perhaps is certainly daintier. If the knife be dipped into hot water before using it will be found that the bread does not crumble. If the butter be hard it should never be melted, for the flavour is instantly spoiled by this process. (detailed description on how to soften the butter)…. There was a time when ham or tongue, or those horrible pastes were the only

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sandwich fillings; but the hostess of to-day has more imagination, and indeed there is scarcely anything which may not be used. For savoury sandwiches the following ae excellent. Cream cheese and Olive; cream cheese, walnut and celery; cream cheese and lettuce; walnuts, celery and olives; mushrooms; fresh parsley; egg and curry; egg and tomato.

For the sweet sandwiches, the writer suggested minced walnuts, peanuts, figs, dates, raisins, almonds and grated chocolate. These should be mixed with butter or cream. Presentation was important. It was suggested that care should be taken “to make them look as attractive as possible, and if they are cut into different shapes, it helps to distinguish them, while it is a good plan to have the sweet ones rolled” (Sydney Morning Herald 1913, 3 December page 5). The opening of tearooms in Sydney was linked to the imperial tea trade and to the entrepreneurial efforts of a Chinese personality. From the 1880s, Sydneysiders had embraced the beverage at home and also developed its own public tea drinking culture. However, unlike Britain, Sydney’s tearooms were not deliberate attempts to assist the temperance movement. It was a Chinese man, not a Briton, who was responsible for transferring the British tearoom to Sydney (Knight 2011: 51–52). A tea merchant, Quong Tart, established the Loong Shan Tea House at King Street in 1889, and it lasted well after his death in 1903 (Travers 1981: 120–121). The Loong Shan featured cool fountains, grottoes, ferneries and pools of gold fish. Champagne was served at special dinners. It was a restful place for Sydneysiders to have tea, play chess or rest (Travers 1981: 121). By all accounts, the cakes, pastries and other food items were of superior quality in Tart’s tearooms. It was reported that his waitresses were fed well with steaks, chops or fish, buttered scones and jam and Chinese tea (Travers 1981: 124). Quong Tart was one rare Chinese individual who attained acceptance and even high regard by the Australian community. His Chinese appearance and close links with China were overlooked by his acquired taste for Western, or Scottish, accoutrements, in both dress and business practice. His marriage to an Englishwoman and conversion to Christianity drew him closer to the Australian community. Chinese grocery storekeepers or Chinese market gardeners were not accorded the level of acceptance as Quong. While Quong Tart’s tearoom became a symbol of modernity and sophistication and was a designated space to be seen, Sargent’s tearooms were more robust and popular with the city’s workers and shoppers alike. Many high-end restaurants closed during the Depression, leading to the

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opening of modest cafes, including Sargent’s chain of tearooms (although the cafes served coffee too). By 1939, there were 43 branches of Sargent’s, serving English food. They sold pies, sandwiches (Sargent’s was reportedly the only place in Sydney that sold roast beef sandwiches), coffee cake, walnut buns, sponge lady fingers, chocolate eclairs and, at Christmas, individual puddings. The Sargent’s shops were popular with workers in the city. A large pie with tomato sauce, a crusty bread roll with butter and a pot of tea or milk coffee provided a quick meal (Pittwater Online News, Sept 2–8, 2012, issue 74). By 1939, there were 43 branches of Sargent’s, serving “excellent food in well appointed surroundings” (http://www. ferneries.com.au/ferneries-articles/2006/4/18/new-restaurant-of-theyear-1831/, sighted 4 Feb 2014). One particular Sargent tearoom occupied several floors of a building on the south side of Market Street. Its main dining room’s menu included “bouillin or consommé, lamb and mint sauce and three vegetables, roast beef with Yorkshire pudding or roast pork with crackling and apple sauce, then sweets, fruit salad and cream, apple pie and cream, baked bread and butter custard or steamed pudding. These were served with bread rolls and butter and coffee or tea for 1s 6d (1s 6d became 15 c on decimal conversion) (Gill 1993: 81) It was reported that by 1939 there were forty-­three Sargent branches, serving ‘excellent English food in well appointed surroundings” (http://www.ferneries.com.au/ferneries-articles/2006/4/18/new-restaurant-of-the-year-1831/, sighted 4 Feb 2014). The Sargent’s shops started to close in 1962 and by 1964 all had gone (Pittwater Online News, Sept 2–8, 2012, issue 74). Fishcafs The first settlers encountered the wealth of seafood in Sydney waters and provided much sustenance in the early years. Fish cafes or “fishcafs” and oyster bars or saloons were the popular eating-out venues in Sydney from the 1930s where customers could order freshly shucked oysters or oyster mornay or Kilpatrick and various fish dishes (Gill 1993: 132–133). Some have suggested that the fish cafes were the only true Australian restaurants of the 1950s. The “fishcafs” were casual, serving freshly opened oysters or oysters mornay or Kilpatrick, and fish in different ways. There were numerous fishcafs throughout the centre of Sydney, the most famous being Victor’s in King Street in the 1950s. There were also oyster bars (Downes 2002: 20–21).

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At the railway end of George Street in the 1930s, there were several fish cafes which Lydia Gill described as “unassuming cafes, spotlessly clean, mostly owned by Greeks, … the fish was cooked to perfection. Snowy white tablecloths, with a huge jug of celery on the table, about half a loaf of sliced bread piled high, and tiny balls of butter filling small dishes. One café’s specialty was Murray cod, always fresh and succulent” (Gill 1993: 95). Fernandez Fish Café and shop served fish meals from three storeys of dining rooms at Pitt Street. Some of the fish dishes offered were sweet garfish, deep sea mullet and snapper (Gill 1993: 19). Coffee and Cafes Tea drinking Sydneysiders were introduced to “real” coffee when Ivan Repin started the Repin’s chain of coffee houses in a small shop at 152 King Street, in 1930. Repin arrived in Sydney via Shanghai in 1925 after leaving Russia to escape the revolution. Although it was at the height of the economic depression, it became an immediate success, and more shops, designed in Art Deco style were opened, catering to shop workers, lawyers, public servants and shoppers. They became Sydney’s landmark and continued to thrive until the 1960s. Prior to this, coffee in Sydney was a “weak, milky concoction” or just hot water and coffee “essence”. European migrants were happy that they could enjoy coffee made in the style from St Petersburg in Tsarist Russia. Repin’s coffee houses were the precursors of Australia’s Italian espresso bars. In the early 1930s, Repin roasted coffee in his shop windows and sold freshly ground beans over the counter, and the cafes pioneered the sale of coffee in Australia. The success of the Repin coffee houses was attributed to Repin who “ran his business on American lines – fast, clean service at a minimum price”. A breakfast menu from 1933 featured toasted American-style fried egg sandwich with tea or coffee for three shillings six pence and savoury mince on toast with coffee or tea included for four shillings six pence (http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/?irn=366535, sighted 9 Feb 2014). Cafes serving hot meals survived until the late 1950s. Another cafe that was providing reasonably priced food was the Parisian Coffee Shop Milk Bars, which attracted younger customers. The Greek café had developed from the oyster saloon from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the American-style soda parlour of the 1910s and the American milk bars of the 1930s. The efficient service, entertainment in the cafe and long opening hours were the hallmarks of the Greek café (Alexakis and Leonard Janiszewski 2014: 15).

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Effy Alexakis and Leonard Janiszewski’s study of the Australian Greek café states, Greek cafes were part of the process of the Americanisation of Australian popular culture during most of the twentieth century – affecting eating and social habits, commercial food-catering ideas, products, technology, and even cinema, architecture and music. They also provide insights into the racial and socio-cultural relationships between Greek-Australians and British Australians. (Alexakis and Janiszewski 2014: 4–5)

Most of the Greek café proprietors had worked in the United States in the food industry, and between the late nineteenth century and the early 1920s, many had made their way to Australia. Like the Chinese migrants who opened eating outlets due to limited skills and capital, the Greeks started cafes for the same reason. Unlike Chinese cafes that served Chinese food, Greek cafés served food that were familiar to Australians, of the “meat and three veg” variety (Risson 2014: 5). Greek cafés served steaks and eggs, American-style milkshakes, soft drinks and ice-cream sodas (Alexakis and Janiszewski 2014: 16). Australia’s first American-style milk bar, the Black & White 4D Milk Bar, was opened at 24 Martin Place in Sydney by Joachim Tavlarides in 1932 (Alexakis and Janiszewski 2014: 32). By 1939, there were 4000 milk bars across Australia (Sydney Morning Herald, June 18, 2016). The milk bar sells milk as a nutritious beverage as well as associating new trends from America such as sodas, sundaes, milk chocolate and the jukebox playing in the bar. George Andrew ran The Orion Café in Ashfield, Sydney, from 1946 to 1949, and was one of the first to have a jukebox in the milk bar (Alexakis and Janiszewski 2014: 57). The Olympia Milk Bar opened in 1939 in Stanmore, Sydney, and traded until the early 1960s (Alexakis and Janiszewski 2014: 74). In 1962, Greek George Alexopoulos established the Attiki Pty Ltd Food Products in Sophia Street, Surry Hills, later relocating to Newton, and later still to 21 Buckley Street in Marrickville. Among other food stuff, Attiki also sold cheese and yoghurt (Cashman and Meader 1990: 77). Another American influence on Australian cuisine was in the area of serving vegetables. The English manner of boiling vegetables to a pulp gave way to serving them raw. Monterey’s on George Street was probably the first to serve uncooked vegetables in their salads, slivers of red and green cabbage, raw carrot, florets of cauliflower, raw tiny mushrooms and orange and pineapple (Gill 1993: 83).

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As part of the temperance movement, coffee palaces were established in the 1880s, serving meals and coffee in multipurpose built halls. There were function rooms and even rooms for accommodation. Some of the coffee palaces in Sydney included Sydney Coffee Palace, Grand Central Coffee Palace, Bee Hive Coffee Palace, Great Western Coffee Palace, Town Hall Coffee Palace and Rose and Crown Coffee Palace. University students frequented the Italian and Greek cafés, a welcome change from campus canteens. It was all very adventurous. “Bring Your Own” licences were still something in the future, and cheap wine was drunk out of tea and coffee pots (Beckett 1984: 148). Lucio Galletto, with his Australian wife Sally Galletto, started Lucio’s, an award-winning restaurant in Sydney in 1981. Speaking of her Australian upbringing, Sally Galletto stated, I had come from a background where food was just a necessity, and you never thought about it. … in 1977, (coming back from Europe) I was disgusted by the Australian approach to eating at the time. I was horrified you couldn’t get fresh bread on a Saturday, and people were still serving tinned spaghetti and people didn’t know the difference between a fresh pasta and a dry pasta and didn’t know how to cook a fish properly – all things I never would have thought about before. My mother got out a Women’s Weekly cookbook and made Lucio a lasagne so he’d feel at home. (Dale 2007: 175)

The couple found most of the Italian places “boring because they believed they had to cater for Australian tastes” (Dale 2007: 177). Fine Dining As in the North America, early fine dining in Australia started with French cuisine as it was seen as the height of gastronomy and culture, alongside restaurants that served British-based fare. Indeed, French high cuisine or haute cuisine had started to spread globally in the twentieth century, and was the cuisine of choice for monarchies around the world. As Rachel Laudan observes, “to eat French was to be civilised” (Laudan 2013: 280). French influence in Australian cuisine was at its height in the post-1860s gold rush era. Sydney’s first French restaurant arrived as early as 1854. The Parisian-­ style restaurant was advertised on 27 May 1854, in the Sydney Herald, announcing the opening of Aux Freres Provencaux, Café Restaurant de Paris at 491 George Street North. It catered for “dinners, picnics and

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lunches executed on the shortest notice and sent to any part of town”. Aux Freres Provencaux’s breakfast at one shilling six pence comprised a cup of coffee of chocolate with milk, bread and butter, and dinner at eight shillings featured two hors d’oeuvres, a soup, “two plates”, an entremets, two desserts, half a bottle of “fine wine” and “bread at discretion”. Another French connection was the Rocklily Hotel/Tavern, built in 1887, and has lasted well into the twenty-first century. Even in the days of horse and carriage, eating out was a social outing. The hotel also became a coaching inn, where horses were changed (Park 1973: 271). The Rocklily advertised itself as “a superb modern restaurant, featuring ‘delicious modern Australian cuisine which includes a fresh seafood menu’” (http://www.out4dinner.com/ place/40/rocklily-bar-restaurant, 26 Feb 2014). Frenchman Leon Hourous did the cooking and “it became the thing to do for the haute monde of Sydney to drive out and lunch and dine at the Rocklily” (http://www. pittwater.nsw.gov.au/library/local_history/Pittwaters_past/rock_lily_ hotel). Even as the Wentworth Hotel (between 1901 and 1931) dining room experimented with indigenous foods, serving jugged wallaby, baked pawpaw, prickly pear jelly and roast wonga pigeon, its menu also featured Galantine de Poulet a l’Ecarlate. When Australian food writers attempt to discuss the Australian cuisine, they often choose fine dining to represent what they view as the hallmark of “Modern Australian”. But first, what is Modern Australian? The creation of the so-called Modern Australian cuisine, or Mod Oz, replacing classical French and traditional Italian fine dining can be explained by the cohort of chefs from the 1970s and 1980s who engage in creating dishes from fresh local produce and employ new ways of cooking less heavy dishes. In a conversation with Sydney-based food writer, John Newton (at the Food Studies Conference, Adelaide, February 2014, and subsequent email conference) dismisses it though as “it’s mod but nothing Oz about it”. The emergence of “Modern Australian”’ cuisine from the 1980s has often been attributed solely to the culinary efforts of ethnic chefs. Instead, “Modern Australian” is a gastrological reading of modernity itself, as it was through the innovative and individual work of “home-grown” Australians who created a unique bill of fare by combining the traditions of Europe and Asia with fresh local produce. The emergence of the so-called Modern Australian cuisine then, replacing classical French and traditional Italian fine dining, can be explained by the new cohort of chefs who engage in fashioning dishes from fresh local produce and engage in new ways of cooking less heavy dishes. As well, as Stephen Downes points out, “about half of the major chefs have been

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migrants, it’s true, but most couldn’t cook when they arrived in Australia” (Downes 2002: viii). Only a few came to Australia as trained professional cooks. Most learnt to cook professionally in Australian restaurants and many relied on rich eating experiences from their homelands (Downes 2002: ix). Indeed, Downes noted that seminal in the development of the Sydney style has been Anders Ousbäck, who trained a generation of young chefs to try new dishes as well as revisit old Australian dishes such as brisket and rhubarb crumble (Downes 1990: 21). Modern Australian came at a time when influential French restaurant guides such as Gault et Millau and Champérard and renowned professional cooks started promoting “new land cuisine”. The phenomenon became international, and cuisines such as new Californian, new German and new Catalan became popular (Poulain 2000: 9). Pilcher notes that in 1975, several years before Pacific fusion became avant-garde in California, Malaysian-born Chinese Cheong Liew (Pilcher 2006: 116) promoted East-Meets-West cuisine in his restaurant, Neddy’s, Adelaide. Most fine dining restaurants in Sydney from the 1970s were started by innovative individuals who saw cooking gourmet meals in restaurants as a way to express their creativity. The majority of them were not technically trained, and many travelled to Europe to learn from acclaimed chefs there. In those years, restaurants were heavily influenced by the dishes and techniques from French restaurants. At the same time, some of the early chefs who introduced fining dining to Sydneysiders were Tony Bilson and Gay Bilson of Berowra Waters Inn, and the chef there, Janni Kyritsis; Damien Pignolet, owner-chef of Claude’s on 10 Oxford Street, Woollahra; David Thompson of Darley Street Thai, 597 King Street, Newtown; Paul Merrony of Merrony’s, Circular Quay; Stefano Manfredi of The Restaurant, Ultimo; Neil Perry of Rockpool, The Rocks; and Peter Doyle of Trianon, Potts Point. Some of these remain in the business today, and continue to adapt and change according to fads and fashion (Bilson 2004). It was not only the chefs’ personalities and their innovation, however, that helped develop the light and flavoursome of the modern Australian cuisine. Gay Bilson, restaurateur and writer, states it was a small group of players from the 1970s who were responsible for developing an inchoate notion of an Australian cuisine, “not from the soil up but from the commercial kitchen down, heralding a new era of public dining”. In Sydney, chefs called for growers for better produce. “In Sydney, for instance, Serge Dansereau nurtured particular suppliers and shared them generously, and David Thompson shopped with confidence for Thai ingredients in

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Chinatown”. Bilson goes as far as to say that by the end of the twentieth century, “with a far greater and surely more geographically logical interest in Southeast Asia and China, and with gratitude to the cuisines of our immigrants and neighbours, we might even call the transformation of our palates a version of regionalism” (Bilson 2004: 8). Italians first arrived in Sydney in the 1880s and many more had settled in the city by the late 1930s. Stefano Manfredi, one of Australia’s most well-known chefs, came to Sydney with his family from Lombardy region in 1961. His earliest sensorial experiences started in the sterile migrant hostel for new migrants. The food served was prepared in hygienic kitchens with nary a thought for flavour. Even as a little boy, he missed all the senses associated with food preparation and the eating of food from a previous life. He wrote, We had left behind more than a country when we got off the boat from Italy and went to live in the migrant hostel: we’d left behind an entire culture. And in daily life, that culture was expressed in the preparation and eating of food. It was a feeling, touching, smelling culture. (Manfredi 1993: 10–11)

Manfredi calls the mixing of two or more cuisines from other cultures, “bastard cuisine”. He explains that bastard cuisine emerges from the “adapting, inventing, gathering and swapping” of food procurement and food preparation by people in the “ethnic ghettos” of the outer suburbs of Sydney and other cities (for his family, it was in Blacktown in the 1960s) (Manfredi 1993: 11). Like other successful chefs in Sydney, he started off doing menial work in restaurant kitchens. One of Manfredi’s first jobs was making sandwiches at the Observatory Café. After several years of working and learning from several restaurants, he opened The Restaurant in Harris Street, Ultimo, an inner-city suburb of Sydney. The Restaurant, renamed Restaurant Manfredi in 1992, served “Italian dishes with an Aussie twist”. Manfredi explains that his was “a radical approach to Italian cooking in this country: an approach based on cultural attitude and regional skills rather than a repertoire of variations on an ‘International Italian them’” (Manfredi 1993: 14). He opened a succession of other restaurants. In 1982 Tetsuya Wakuda came to Australia from Japan as a 22-year-old with limited knowledge of English (Wakuda 2000). He first worked as a kitchen hand at Fishwives restaurant in Surry Hills. His next job was making sushi at Kinsela’s, run by Tony Bilson. It was at Kinsela’s that Tetsuya

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learnt classical French techniques. In 1989, he opened his own restaurant, Tetsuya’s (Wakuda 2000: viii). Tetsuya’s has been Sydney’s most enduring fine dining restaurant since, serving food based on the Japanese philosophy of using seasonal produce prepared with French technique. Neil Perry, Sydney’s foremost important restaurateur, attributes his love for Asian food flavours to his early childhood experiences in Chinatown with his father. Like other important chefs in Sydney in the 1980s and 1990s, Perry had no formal training in the food industry, but he learnt from Sydney’s best chefs and developed his own style (Wilson 1991: 82). He moved from restaurant to restaurant (Downes 2002: 252) in his self-­imposed apprenticeship to prepare himself for starting his own. Perry wrote: It all started for me when I was young – very young. I was lucky enough to have a father who was not only a very good cook but also fascinated by all things Chinese. I have memories from when I was as young as six or seven, of going down to Sydney’s then-very-small Chinatown. … Dad and I would wander through the old food stores and he would pick out exotic ingredients to cook for us that night. I can still remember the smell of dried squid and abalone – a kind of dusty aroma with a pleasing scent of the sea over the top. When we had finished shopping I would be thrilled if I could see a tin of poached abalone in Dad’s grasp. I knew that meant a fabulous steamed soup or stir fry of one of my favourite ingredients in the world. To this day I believe the green lip abalone from Tasmania that I serve in all my restaurants is as luxurious and delicious an ingredient as truffles, foie gras, Iberico ham or caviar. (Perry 2008: 11–12)

Two waiters, Ken and Jenson, from The Mandarin restaurant in Sydney were also important influences in Perry’s love for Chinese food. The Mandarin served mud crab with black bean or chilli sauce, crisp omelettes, steam fish and sweet pork spare ribs. However, it was the dishes that Ken and Jenson cooked for Perry’s family, red-braised pork shoulder and master-­ stock chicken, that Perry was convinced he needed to master. The two waiters went on to open The Shanghai Village Restaurant (Perry 2008: 12). It was only from the early 1990s that Perry placed his love for other Asian flavours commercially. He had discovered Thai cooking that exhibits “balance, harmony, fire, sourness, strength and beauty” (Perry 2008: 13) from a trip to Thailand in 1991. He opened Wockpool in 1994, a “Modern Asian” restaurant, “a place that respects tradition, and draws from both China and South-East Asia to create a balanced menu of dishes that work together”. The idea of calling this fresh and light cuisine as modern

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Australian cuisine could probably have origins from Perry’s food p ­ reparation. Perry has opened several other restaurants before Wockpool and since then, including several with the Rockpool name. Yet another of Sydney’s chefs, Janni Kyritsis, rose to great fame in the restaurant world from no training in food preparation. An electrician by trade, he first learnt to cook from one of Margaret Fulton’s cookbooks. In 1977, Kyritsis went to work for Stephanie Alexander, a restaurateur in Melbourne. Janni Kyritsis migrated from Greece to Australia as an electrician and learnt to cook in Melbourne, and later worked in Berowra Waters Inn for 12 years, from 1982, creating signature dishes with classical flavours and techniques (Downes 2002: 291). Tony Bilson and Gay Bilson, both university dropouts, were fascinated by French cooking and laid the foundation for fine dining in Sydney. Bilson (Tony) based Berowra Waters Inn on Restaurant Troisgros, after visiting the three-star restaurant of the Lyon area when he visited France in 1976. He described going to Troisgros as “part of the theatre of the experience. The trip allows you to leave your day-to-day existence behind. When you arrive you are no longer, say, a bank manager from Lyon, you are a special guest of Troisgros, the finest restaurant in the world. …the cuisine at Troisgros was absolutely classic and regional but modern in its light touch and clarity of flavour” (Bilson 2011: 79–82). Undoubtedly, the Bilsons had modelled this concept on Berowra Waters Inn, one of Sydney’s best and most well-known restaurant from 1977 and which they ran for 18 years. It was 45 minutes from Sydney, sited on a tidal tributary of the Hawkesbury River, and the building could only be accessed by boat. The Bilsons’ aim was “to turn the Inn into a gastronomic destination rather than a tourist service outlet” (Bilson 2011: 96) and served food in the nouvelle cuisine mode. Bilson observes that “modern food was not a cuisine of the classics, cooking that had to be imitated from books, but rather the cuisine of inspired individuals” (Bilson 2011: 134). Indeed, other chefs who contributed to the ideas of Modern Australian were more inspired individuals rather than chefs from particular ethnic groups. The Barracks Café, run by Anders Ousback, the Centennial Park Café, the Art Gallery Café and Bennelong at the Opera House served food that was to become known as Modern Australia, described in the Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide of 1989–1990 as “Gone is the generalised European cuisine of the early days, replaced now by light fresh offerings that often showcase Aussie produce” (Bilson 2011: 175–176).

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Although Kylie Kwong did not open her own restaurant until 2000, she worked for Neil Perry from the 1990s. Today, her restaurant, Billy Kwong’s, situated in Surry Hills, promotes its bill of fare as adhering to the ideas of sustainable food and ethical eating. Philip Searle was another self-taught chef who operated the award-wining Oasis Seros Restaurant. Tetsuya Wakuda, from Tokyo, first worked for Tony Bilson (Wilson 1991: 88), having worked his way up as a kitchen hand. In the process, he learnt classical French techniques and combines these with Chinese and Japanese influences. He employs these in his Singaporean restaurant. Manfredi is best known for serving modern Italian cuisine, marrying the classic Italian approach with the freshest ingredients. Giuseppe Polese (Beppi) is one of the few Sydney cohort of illustrious chefs who was trained in the dining rooms of Europe. He opened Beppi’s in 1956, winning numerous awards over the years, and is the most enduring Italian restaurant in Australia. Jewish and German-born Walter Magnus was yet another who went into the food industry with no prior training nor experience. On being refused registration as a dentist after his arrival to Sydney in 1937, Magnus bought the Claremont Café at Kings Cross, specializing in continental food. Together with Harry Jaton, they opened La Palette in Double Bay in 1940, and the following year they were responsible for the catering of the Journalists’ Club. In 1943, they opened Le Coq d’Or on Ash Street, near Martin Place and George Street. In 1946, they opened the Savarin, a fashionable city restaurant in George Street, and were able to obtain a kosher licence (http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/magnus-walter-1103). In 1973, Tony Bilson and Gay Bilson opened their restaurant, Tony’s Bon Goût, at 174 Elizabeth Street near Central Station. Their first three-­ course lunch menu of watercress soup, braised oxtail and pears poached in red wine was at a fixed price of $1.95 and soon rose to $2.50. Bilson’s innovation in his restaurants came from a trip to France in 1976, where he visited many of the country’s influential restaurants at a time when the new wave of French chefs was creating innovative dishes (Bilson 2011: 67–71). He was particularly impressed by the L’Oasis at La Napoule (owned by Louis Outhier) restaurant that was located in the gardens at the bottom of coastal hills near a large marina (Bilson 2011: 68). This may have given Bilson the idea to start his restaurant, Berowra Waters, where diners could reach only by boat. Bilson liked the attention to detail that his French counterparts followed in their restaurants. For example, at Fernand Point’s La Pyramide, menus were written by hand every day. This was replicated at Berowra Waters, where the menus were written daily by his then partner, Gay Bilson (2011: 70).

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Stefano Manfredi of the Restaurant Manfredi (1983–1996, originally The Restaurant) “interpreted the food of his childhood through a modern-­ Australian lens, outraging certain heavy-weight reviewers and challenging diners with his ‘bastardised’ version of classic Italian cuisine. Ingredients and dishes we now take for granted like polenta, pannacotta and risotto all appeared first at The Restaurant”.

The Chinese Connection The arrival of the Chinese to New South Wales began with the gold rushes in the 1850s, reaching its peak in 1891. There were 3500 Chinese living in Sydney and surrounding areas in the 1890s, compared to 2000 gold miners in the field. At the time, the population of Sydney was around 100,000. While the lure of gold brought the Chinese to the Australian goldfields, they also provided sustenance to the miners, including the non-­Chinese miners. Following the gold rushes in Australia, the United States and Canada, a large number of Chinese migrants set up factories to sell manufactured items to non-Chinese customers. In the United States, mainly in San Francisco, they set up clothing and boot factories (Chen 2000: 52–69). In Australia, they established furniture factories in Sydney and Melbourne. In most cases, between 10 and 30 Chinese workers were employed in these factories (Gibson 2017). Chinese factory workers in Australia generally ate better than manual labourers back in Shanghai. The poor diet of factory workers in the cotton mills of Shanghai is discussed in the chapter on Shanghai. Sydney factory workers also earned enough money to remit back to China to support their families. Furniture factory workers in Australia were always provided accommodation by their employers, usually on the upper floor of the buildings used as factories, but sometimes in dormitories close by. As a part of this accommodation, workers were also provided with food. Various court records from the early twentieth century show they had three meals a day, prepared by factory cooks specifically employed for this purpose. Cooks were normally professionals, as was Yit Yung who cooked in a Sydney Chinese restaurant before going to work in a furniture factory in the early 1900s (Gibson 2017: 110). There seems to be little adaptation to eating the Australian way, apart from the fact that the workers had more meat and fish than when they lived in China. Factory workers in Sydney had an abundance of fresh beef and pork, sourced from a combination of Chinese and non-Chinese butchers in Australia. The records of one Sydney factory operator, Sun Kwong

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Loong and Co, who went out of business and owed money to Qwong Hop the butcher, showed the large quantities of meat purchased. Qwong Hop produced a list of the items that he sold to the factory in a bankruptcy court in order to recoup some of his money. The meat items bought to feed the factory workers included pork, beef, pig head and pig trotters (Qwong Hop’s Proof of Debt, 18 August 1915: 50–73). Employers’ financial records also show that workers were served many staples of Cantonese cuisine, including Cantonese sausage, rice, noodles, tofu, lychee nuts, black fungus, bamboo shoots and lotus root. There were also records of delicacies like shark fins, bird nests, lobsters and abalone (Gibson 2017: 112). Cantonese staples were imported to Australia by Chinese merchant grocers and then sold to furniture factory proprietors. Workers had access to chicken and duck as well. Chickens and ducks were usually kept in pens in factory yards and killed as needed, causing strife from city health inspectors. Workers had access fresh fish too, from Chinese fishermen working the waters around Sydney. Fresh vegetables were provided by Chinese market gardens. Although most of the produce from the Chinese gardens was for European customers, gardeners also grew Chinese vegetables for the Chinese community. As gold workers and market gardeners turned their hand to cafes or restaurants, their cooking styles were Cantonese, as the majority of Chinese who lived and worked in Sydney were farm workers from the Pearl River Delta area of Guangdong. Not all were impressed by the Chinese eating places in Sydney. Chen Cheng-Siang, an agricultural geography expert who was sent by the Chinese government to study climate research at Sydney University, ate only once in a Chinese restaurant. He described it as “so bad” and preferred “cuppa tea and pie”(The Sun, [Sydney, NSW] 29 Sept 1946, page 8). It would not be surprising if the “bad” food in the Chinese restaurant that Chen experienced was cooked for Australian tastes. Even today, many suburban restaurants cater to what Chinese restaurateurs think Australians prefer to taste and eat. In Peter Gibson’s work on Chinese factory workers from 1890 to 1920, he listed ingredients cooked for workers by Chinese cooks. Gibson also reveals that Chinese furniture factory workers in Sydney had three meals a day, prepared by factory cooks (Gibson 2017). There were staples of Cantonese cuisine: salted fish, Cantonese sausage, rice, noodles, tofu, lychee, black fungus, bamboo shoots, lotus root and, perhaps for special occasions, shark fins, bird nests, lobsters and abalone.

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Factory workers typically lived in employer-subsidized accommodation and were provided with food. At the Sun Kwong Loong and Co. factory, a factory worker, Ding On, had 10 shillings a week deducted from his wages for food in 1915 (Gibson 2017: 112). Sydney’s first Chinatown at The Rocks was a collection of boarding houses for travellers from the goldfields as well as grocery shops and other businesses. Market gardens were soon established. Later, a second Chinatown developed in the Haymarket area around the Belmore fruit and vegetable markets in 1869. This area expanded and by 1900 it was mainly occupied by Chinese. The Chinese settlement moved a third time to the nearby Dixon Street area when Sydney’s new produce markets relocated there in 1909. Today, this remains the centre of Sydney’s Chinatown. The White Australia Policy, enacted under the 1901 Immigration Restriction Act, effectively prohibited the migration of Chinese and other Asians into Australia. Under this policy, Chinese migration was limited to the temporary entry of the wives and families of merchants and those with cultural skills like clerks literate in Chinese and market gardeners and cooks. Up to the 1920s, only half of the Sydney Chinese lived in Chinatown. Many of these were market gardeners, cabinet makers and cooks. The market gardeners spent some nights at their gardens and the rest in the city where they also hawked their vegetables. Urban Chinese market gardeners gathered in Chinatown to eat at Chinese restaurants, buy at grocery stores and meet other Chinese after delivering their produce. Usually the market gardens were located near Chinatowns. Chinese merchants in Chinatown were instrumental in assisting newly arrived Chinese to make contact with business networks. In Sydney, for example, merchants played a key role in housing newly arrived countrymen, providing them with food, lodging and information about job opportunities in Sydney and rural areas. They helped market gardeners negotiate with bureaucracy and acted as banks, providing them with finance for their enterprises, helping them remit money to their families in China and bailing them out if they were arrested for gambling. They also arranged return travel to China and sponsored new migrants, both legally and illegally (Boileau 2017: 230). Two food suppliers, Hong Sing and CM Ping, stocked Chinese sausage, roast pork, ginger, dry vegetables, rice, Chinese tea, preserved duck, chestnuts, melon seeds, black bean, salted fish, soya sauce, bean curd, sharks’ fin, canned fish, preserved plums, mooncakes and cooking lard, all imported from China or Hong Kong (Wilton 2004: 75). Evelyn Yin-lo lived in Campbell St in Surry Hills in the 1920s and 1930s. Her parents

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ran food shops in different locations, and her father, G. Lai Park, was the first to make spring rolls in Sydney, in the 1930s. Those with mushrooms were sold for sixpence and those without for eightpence. They also sold prawn and fish balls (Fitzgerald 1997: 124). As is the way on how foodways travel, there is evidence to show that Australian salted fish was also exported to Hong Kong in the mid-1940s when wartime shortages were experienced there. The Say Tin Fong and Poy Kin Fong family had a fish shop in Harris Street in Ultimo. They sold some of it fresh and exported the rest. Fish was gutted, salted, compressed and covered in canvas for a week. It was then hung on the clothes line in the backyard to dry in the sun for a day (Fitzgerald 1997: 174). When the White Australia Policy ended, more educated and affluent Chinese arrived, and these later arrivals did not require the networks and infrastructure of Chinatown. Similarly, English-proficiency enabled the Chinese to move out of the enclave. Aspirational Chinese followed the Australian dream of moving into the quarter-acre block (i.e. a free-­standing home on a 1000 sq metre plot of land). As more Chinese settled in the suburbs, Chinese restaurants and provision stores opened, attracting more Chinese labour and developing their own Chinatowns. Some of the suburbs in Sydney that now have high concentrations of Asians/Chinese are Hurstville, Cabramatta and Parramatta. Chinatown in its many connotations is a moveable feast, and it has never been static, both within and outside the Chinese community. Towards the late twentieth century, the survival of Sydney’s Chinatown depended on the Chinese food industry— in the form of restaurants, cafes and grocery shops. Both resident and transient Chinese (including international students) consume and purchase Chinese goods in Sydney’s Chinatown for two reasons: to consume the familiar foods of home or childhood and to practise Chineseness in Australia. As Jean Duruz observes, the occasional purchase of roast ducks from Chinatown appears as a neat reference to the traditional food sold in markets of the original home cities. Indeed, the roast duck can be seen as the dish that universally symbolizes the essence of culinary Chineseness. Non-Chinese Sydneysiders flock to Chinatown to consume Chinese food to experience the exotic and, in doing so, acquire cultural capital. Until the late 1980s, Chinese restaurants in Sydney Chinatown served mainly Cantonese fare. Other regional cuisines from China followed from the early 1990s, including those from Hunan, Sichuan, Beijing and Shanghai (Pang 2012: 1). Around this time, the Hong Kong Cantonese

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meal of yumcha became popular where tea and numerous kinds of snack-­ sized dishes are offered from 11 in the morning to 3 in the afternoon. The meal has become popular with both non-Chinese Australians and the Chinese diaspora (Tam 2002: 121–151). In the years before the handover of Hong Kong to the Republic of China, many Hong Kong Chinese settled in Sydney. Hong Kong Chinese capital financed shopping malls and other infrastructure in Chinatown. Yumcha provided a familiar situation where one could find a sense of meaning in an isolated, alienated and “foreign” environment. It provided the opportunity to renew of relationships among family and friends (Tam 2002: 137).

Reviewing the Food It is likely that Australia’s first restaurant “review” appeared on 26 September 1831 in The Sydney Herald, praising the Royal Hotel for the “excellent lunch given by the proprietor, to upwards of thirty persons”. It was only in the late twentieth century when the middle class aspired for fine dining that the restaurant critic appeared in Sydney. The first and most influential Sydney critic was Leo Schofield who reviewed for the Sunday Telegraph from 1971 to 1977, and for the Sydney Morning Herald in the 1980s. Schofield’s credentials included eating widely in France and the United States. He noted the poor standard of restaurant fare and saw his role as a pedagogical one, to educate diners and to encourage restaurateurs to provide quality food (Harper 2012). Others were Jill Dupleix, food editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, and her team of food writers, John Newton and Terry Durack, who critiqued restaurants and cafes and wrote on new food trends (Rolls 1998). Nationally, Diane Holuigue, of the Australian Weekend Magazine, and Cherry Ripe writing for the Weekend Australian “Review” informed readers of the state of dining. The Australian Good Food and Travel Guides (AGFG) has been awarding “chef hats” to chefs who prepare excellent meals since 1982. Like other food guide inspectors, AGFG reviewers dine anonymously. Results are from a combination of inspectors’ reviews and members of the dining public. In 1984, Schofield established The Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide with co-editors David Dale and Jenna Price, and remained editor until the ninth edition in 1993. It is noteworthy that the two books that raised awareness about fine dining in Australia, particularly on French food, were published in Sydney, by the Shepherd Press. William Wallace Irwin wrote The Garrulous Gourmet

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in 1947, and Ted Moloney, together with Deke Coleman, wrote Oh, for a French Wife in 1952. As in other cities where women also wrote about food, men dominated the scene and, according to Gay Bilson, food and wine magazines like Epicurean “addressed men of a certain age and means for whom a cellar full of wine dictated the menu and not the other way round” (Bilson 2004: 15–16). Bilson, one of Sydney’s foremost restaurateurs who trained other well-regarded chefs (including Tetsuya Wakuda), noted that in the early years his sources of inspiration came from American publications, Gourmet and the New Yorker magazines (Bilson 2004: 67). Henri Gault invented the phrase “nouvelle cuisine” in France when chefs started cooking meals that were light, using fresh ingredients and experimenting with new ways in preparing fruit and vegetables. Gault and Christian Millau started writing the monthly food guide Gault et Millau in 1969. It is no coincidence that Australian chefs began to produce lighter dishes using fresh Australian produce. French tradition in Australian cuisine was already evident since the post-1860s gold rush years. Gay Bilson thinks that restaurants such as the Bon Goût in the 1970s, offering “a kind of breezy, easy French cooking with none of the pretension of haute cuisine”, together with diners enthralled with the new style of cooking drove social change in Australian cities. In her view, regular diners, in celebration of gourmandism and conviviality, created a kind of “café society” in the sociable and intellectual European sense (Bilson 2004: 25). Indeed, Bon Goût became the most talked-about restaurant in Australia (Downes 2002: 86). There are food writers who view Australians’ progression from the “one meat and two/three veg” to the daily consumption of ethnic foods and the emergence of countless ethnic type restaurants due mainly to the effects of multiculturalism. It is worth challenging this myth that Australian’s modern and light cuisine is the result of migration. I contend that while migrant restaurateurs did contribute towards this to some extent, individual Australian chefs were the significant players in creating its fine dining culture and in moving away from the British diet in Sydney towards the end of the twentieth century.

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Rappaport, Erika. 2017. A Thirst for Empire: How Tea Shaped the Modern World. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Rawson, Lance, Mrs. 1890. Mrs. Lance Rawson’s Cookery Book and Household Hints. Rockhampton: William Hopkins. Risson, Toni. 2014. From Oysters to Olives at the Olympia Café: Greek Migrants and Australian Foodways. Gastronomica: The Journal of Critical Food Studies. Summer issue. Rolls, Eric. 1998. A Celebration of Food and Wine. St Lucia: University of Queensland Press. Santich, Barbara. 1995. What the Doctors Ordered: 150 Years of Dietary Advice in Australia. Melbourne: Hyland House. ———. 2011. Nineteenth-Century Experimentation and the Role of Indigenous Foods in Australian Food Culture. Australian Humanities Review. Issue 51: 65–78. ———. 2012. Bold Palates: Australia’s Gastronomic Heritage. Adelaide: Wakefield Press. Singley, Blake. 2012. “Hardly Anything Fit for Man to Eat”: Food and Colonialism in Australia. History Australia 9 (3): 38–40. Stone, Richard. 2005. Fragments of the Everyday: A Book of Australian Ephemera. Canberra: National Library of Australia. Sydney Herald. 27 May 1854. Sydney Morning Herald. 3 December 1913. ———. 18 June 2016. ———. http://www.smh.com.au/national/end-of-an-era-as-developers-move-intospanish-quarter-20090417-aa7k.html. Accessed 1 Dec 2017. Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide of 1989–1990. Symons, Michael. 1993. The Shared Table: Ideas for Australian Cuisine. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. ———. 2000. A history of Cooks and Cooking. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. ———. 2007. One Continuous Picnic: A gastronomic History of Australia. Carlton: Melbourne University Press. Tam, Siumi Maria. 2002. Heunggongyan Forever: Immigrant Life and Hong Kong Style Yumcha in Australia. In The Globalization of Chinese Food, ed. Y.H. Wu David and Sidney C.H. Cheung. Richmond: Curzon Press. The Commonsense Cookery Book. 1914. Compiled by the Public School Cookery Teachers’ Association of New South Wales. Sydney: Angus & Robertson. ———. 1937. Compiled by the Public School Cookery Teachers’ Association of New South Wales. Sydney: Angus & Robertson. ———. 1957. Compiled by The Public School Cookery Teachers’ Association of New South Wales. Sydney: Angus & Robertson. ———. 1990. (Revised by Molly Breaden). North Ryde: Collins/Angus & Robertson.

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The Sun “Chinese Likes Pie, “Cuppa”, (Sydney, NSW) 29 Sept 1946, page 8. Accessed 10 Mar 2018. Timbs, Gladys, and Stephen Rapley. NSW Council on the Ageing; Oral History Association of Australia, NSW Branch, NSW Bicentennial Oral History Project. National Library of Australia. Sound recording, 20 May 1987. https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/565641?lookfor=gladys%20timbs&offset=1& max=1. Accessed 3 May 2018. Travers, Robert. 1981. Australian Mandarin: The Life and Times of Quong Tart. Netley: Kangaroo Press. Wakuda, Tetsuya. 2000. Tetsuya. Pymble: Harper Collins. Wessell, Adele. 2013a. Women’s Work in the Transition to Modernity: The Worker Cook Book and Our Cookery Book. In TEXT Special Issue 24: Cookbooks: Writing, Reading and Publishing Culinary Literature in Australasia, ed. Donna Lee Brien and Adele Wessell. Queensland: Central Queensland University and Southern Cross Universtiy. ———. 2013b. Cookbooks for Making History: As Sources for Historians and as Records of the Past. M/C Journal 16 (3). http://www.journal.media-culture. org.au/index.php/mcjournal/article/view/717. Wessell, Adele, and Donna Lee Brien. 2013. Introduction. Cookbooks: Writing, Reading and Publishing Culinary Literature in Australasia. In Cookbooks: Writing, Reading and Publishing Culinary Literature in Australasia, ed. Adele Wessell and Donna Lee Brien. Text (Special Issue). Queensland: Central Queensland University and Southern Cross Universtiy. Wilkinson, John. 1999. Dairy Industry in NSW: Past and Present. Briefing Paper No 23/99. NSW Parliament Library Research Service. Wilson, Marie. 1991. The Chefs of Sydney: A Presentation of Original Recipes. Carmel: M. Wilson & B. Bates. Wilton, Janis. 2004. Golden Threads: The Chinese in Regional NSW 1850–1950. Sydney: New England Regional Museum/Powerhouse Publishing.

CHAPTER 3

Shanghai: From Treaty Port to Global City

The Lie of the Land Shanghae [sic] is by far the most important station for foreign trade on the coast of China … No other town with which I am acquainted possesses such advantages: it is the great gate – the entrance, in fact – to the Chinese empire … Junks come here from all parts of the coast, not only from the southern provinces, but also from Shantung and Peechelee: there are also a considerable number annually from Singapore and the Malay Islands. (Robert Fortune. 1847. Three years’ Wanderings in the Northern Provinces of China. London: J. Murray. Page 110)

Robert Fortune, a botanist and collector for the Horticultural Society of London, wrote the above on his travels in China in the mid-nineteenth century. Fortune reaffirmed what was already known that Shanghai was a prominent maritime centre and predated Western imperialism and her emergence as a modern port city. Indeed, Shanghai was already a major trading port in the eighteenth century. There were many others, however, who perpetuated the myth that Shanghai was a fishing village until the British came. The ditty below was often quoted. Shanghai, the Paris of the East! Shanghai, the New York of the West! Shanghai, the most cosmopolitan city in the world, the fishing village on a mudflat © The Author(s) 2019 C. Leong-Salobir, Urban Food Culture, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6_3

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which almost literally overnight became a great metropolis …Cosmopolitan Shanghai, city of amazing paradoxes and fantastic contrasts … A vast brilliantly-hued cycloramic, panoramic mural of the best and the worst of Orient and Occident. (All About Shanghai and Environs: A 1934 guidebook. 1934. Shanghai: The University Press)

Historical evidence shows that Shanghai was a fishing village, but known by another name, Hu Tu, prior to the seventh century. Another nickname bestowed on the city by Westerners includes “Pearl of the Orient”. During China’s reform era, Shanghai was also known as Longtou (dragon head). Lena Scheen suggests that “the idea that Shanghai has only been a real city – with all its positive connotations – during colonization and then globalization is arguably Orientalist in nature” (Scheen 2015: 16). Another explanation that Shanghai had only been an insignificant village was given substance by Shanghailanders (Britons residing in twentieth-­ century Shanghai and employed by the treaty port administration and private sector). They viewed the International Settlement as not part of China but as “a free-floating ‘republic’”, a throwback to Venice of the city-­state era. It was not only foreigners who characterized the emergence, decline and re-emergence of the global metropolis being due entirely to Western influence. The “fishing village myth” is a recurrent theme in the literary imaginings of Shanghai by many local Chinese writers as well (Scheen 2015: 16). Situated at the estuary of the Yangzi River of eastern China, Shanghai (meaning “up from the sea”) was a small market town by the eleventh century. In the fourteenth century, Shanghai’s deep water port was enhanced when it was widened and trade grew. Trade of cotton and other goods grew between the coast and the provinces on the Yangzi River. As the trade grew, the port began to build a wall around the town before the mid-sixteenth century. By the seventeenth century, Shanghai had become one of China’s major ports, largely benefitting from the lucrative coastal junk trade. As the port prospered, the population increased to 50,000 by 1700. The flourishing market town’s population increased to 200,000 in the early 1800s and was exporting goods to Southeast Asia. The county already had dense agricultural and market settlements (Rowe et al. 2016: 15). Its geographical location, halfway up China’s coast and by the mouth of the Yangtze River, meant that it had easy access to the rest of the country. This laid the ground for various Western powers to acquire Shanghai. It became a treaty port in 1842 after the First Opium War, opening up

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China to trade and subsequent concession settlements by the British, Americans and French. In the colonial era, Shanghai was in a unique position, encompassing separate jurisdictions: a self-governing autonomy comprising an American enclave in the International Settlement, a French Concession, a Chinese city and several other foreign enclaves. The British Consulate was set up in 1843. Five years later, the French Concession was opened around the city’s red light district. In 1863, the British and American settlements joined forces and formed the International Settlement. The Russians and Germans arrived later and a Japanese enclave was established in 1895. At this time, tea, silks and porcelain were exported from Shanghai. The textile industry also became important with its many cotton mills. The city soon became a major financial centre, with banking as an important sector. This chapter builds on the work of food scholars of Shanghai, M.  Swislocki (2001, 2009), James Farrer (2010a, b) and Hanchao Lu (2004). It discusses how the geography and terrain of the city influenced the types of ingredients and cooking methods used in Shanghai cooking. It examines the introduction of numerous cuisines from around the world and from within China to the city. The chapter looks at how housing, in particular, the shikumen houses (two- or three-storey high houses with a small front yard and heavy gates known as shikumen), gave rise to street food culture. It also investigates how European restaurants and food supplies catering to the Westerners contribute to the cosmopolitan foodways of twentieth-century Shanghai.

Shanghai Flavours The regional cooking traditions of China are dictated in the main by topographical features. The types of animal and vegetable foods reared and cultivated depend largely on the region’s terrain. Foods farmed in coastal areas and riverine landscapes are largely different from those in highlands and steppes. There are various ways of classifying the different kinds of cuisines within China. One popular way is based on eight culinary traditions of the eight provinces of Sichuan, Hunan, Guangdong, Shandong, Jiangsu, Anhui, Fujian and Zhejiang. The other model is based on the four compass points: northern cuisine (Beijing or Shandong), eastern cuisine (Shanghai, lower Yangzi), western cuisine (Southwestern, Sichuan or Sichuan-Hunan) and southern cuisine (Guangzhou). A further simplification of the four regions

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by Thomas O. Höllmann is based on the four distinct flavours: east (sour), south (sweet), west (spicy) and north (salty) (Höllmann 71) (Simoons 1991: 43–44; Höllmann 2010: 71). Its favourable geographical features of a temperate climate and loamy soils attracted foreigners and Chinese from other regions of China to Shanghai. Seen as the most fertile area of China, the Yangzi estuary with rich alluvial soils is known as the “land of fish and rice” (Dong 2001: 12). The lower Yangzi, unlike North China, with its milder climate, abundance of water and favourable terrain, has contributed to its intensive rice cultivation. At the same time, the types of animals reared, crops cultivated and presence of seafood in its waterways have contributed to the region’s reputation for its gourmet cooking. It has been said that the flavours of the region’s produce were so rich that particular food items were used to enhance each other. Examples given are of prawns being used as seasoning, crab roe as fat and pork as a sweetener (Lin and Lin 1969: 116). Of course, Chinese cooking in other regions practise this, but admirers of Shanghainese cooking were the first to lay claim to it. Using the compass point categorization, Shanghai cuisine falls under Eastern food traditions. The lower Yangzi River Valley comprises the five provinces of Kiangsu, Anhwei, Kingsi, Chekiang and Fukien. Its long coastline halfway up China’s coast by the East China Sea, with relative milder winters, enables farmers to grow a larger diversity of crops. Its waterways of the Yangtze and its tributaries, canals, swamps and lakes provide aquatic agriculture, fishing and fish farming (Simoons 1991: 48). As a consequence, Shanghai’s style of cooking is primarily based on freshwater seafood and braised meats. Shanghai gained its reputation for a sophisticated cuisine relatively recently. While other regional cuisines were well developed between the Ming and Qing dynasties, Shanghai then did not have restaurants but simple canteens that catered to fishermen plying in the Yangtze River Delta (Lin-Liu 2009: 220). Where nature has bestowed favourable topography, mild climate and plentiful water for rice cultivation and other crops, the region has also benefitted from and influenced by cookery from imperial kitchens. As well, high-level government officials and wealthy merchants from other regions and countries who flocked to Shanghai and its surrounding cities and towns contributed to culinary excellence. Shanghainese or eastern cuisine is renowned for its sophisticated cooking and is famous for red-­cooked dishes and delicacies such as Nanjing pressed duck (Roberts 2002: 23).

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An imperial chef creation was the bright moon red pine chicken (Sakamoto 1977: 105). Eight Precious Chicken has stuffing made of rice, lotus seeds, ginkgo nuts, melon seeds, chestnuts, mushrooms, barley and bamboo. Squash or melon is steamed with whole chickens or ducks stuffed within the poultry (Simoons 1991: 50). Hors d’oeuvres at feasts were highly decorated in floral patterns (Lin and Lin 1969: 115). Seafood dishes come from freshwater, and sea fish and the famous dazha crabs (or Shanghai hairy crabs) are harvested from the streams, canals and lakes of eastern China, in cities such as Hangzhou or Suzhou. Hangzhou is famous for Long Jin (Dragon Well) tea, and is used to smoke foods. It is said that Shanghainese eat more noodles than the Cantonese, but lesser than people from Beijing. Noodles are pan-fried rather than steamed. Shanghai cooks preserve many vegetables, smoke foods and like to cook with vinegar. Shaoxing wine, made in Shanghai and used all over China, is used to flavour dishes. Australian journalist Jane Hutcheon who grew up in Shanghai observes that although influenced by cuisines from both the north and the south of the country, Shanghainese food tends to be a little sweeter than northern food, and is made with copious quantities of Shaoxing wine. When a dish is not stewed or braised, it is usually “drunken” (Hutcheon 2003: 75). Presentation is important to Shanghai cooks, and dishes are often glazed with rich sauces (Lo 1985: 112–114). Public utilities and infrastructure helped propel Shanghai into the modern era. In 1866, gas lighting was introduced and, in 1882, electricity was generated. Rickshaws as a means of public transport started operating in 1874. By 1900, there were 4647 rickshaws in the International Settlement and, in the 1930s, 23,000 on Shanghai streets. Rickshaw owners initially were licensed to European business, but the hard labour was done by the thousands of Chinese pullers. Most of the rickshaw pullers in Shanghai at the time came from the rural areas and were former peasants (Lu 2004: 68–75). The rickshaws could move about easily in almost every corner of Shanghai’s winding and narrow streets and alleyways, just like the simpler wheelbarrow could (Zhou 2010). “Ricsha meal tickets” were issued by exchange shops and local banks from 1909, and were in circulation for about 20 years, ceasing circulation in October 1929. They were used in “sing-song girls’ houses” or house of courtesans for tipping rickshaw pullers and servants. There were usually about 700,000 tickets in circulation, in denominations varying from 20 to 100 coppers (“The Passing of ‘Ricsha Meal Tickets’; to Disappear on Oct. 15”. The Shanghai Morning Post. 28 September 1929; Henriot 1999).

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Prostitution was an established institution, with the “singsong” houses advertising both entertainers and prostitutes. Servant girls would welcome clients with tea and bowls of nuts and sweetmeats. Meals of cooked dishes and cups of warmed wine were served too (Pan et al. 1998: 32). A mere six years later, rickshaws made their appearance in Singapore, as they were seen as both an efficient and cheap means of transport. The first consignment of rickshaws came from Shanghai. As shown in the next chapter, the rickshaw trade gave rise to an enduring street food culture in Singapore. The rickshaw pullers came from different parts of China, particularly from the treaty ports. By the early twentieth century, Shanghai has developed the most diverse cuisine in China, with the growing middle class eager to try new dishes from other regions and countries. In 1908, electric trams serviced the streets, and the first cinema was built to serve its population of one million. By the mid-1930s, the population increased to about 3 million. There were increasing numbers of foreigners living in the city, including Russians who fled from the Revolution. The inflow of outsiders to Shanghai was not just from the well-to-do nor all new foods introduced were sophisticated restaurant dishes. Migrants from different regions were attracted to the burgeoning city for work, with the height of domestic emigration to Shanghai peaking in the 1950s when 85 per cent of its residents were from outside Shanghai (Gao 2013: 275). Often migrant families from different regions lived under one roof and shared meals. Shanghai families were complex, as the city was home to migrants from different regions in China. Housewives had to learn different cuisines in addition to the local dishes of Shanghai. An example that James Gao cites is of a father-in-law from Subei, motherin-law from Ningbo, wife from Canton and other family members from Sichuan (Gao 2013: 275). With such diverse regional make-up in these families which the housewife had to cater to, each person would prefer cuisines from their place of origin; their preferences could be spicy, sour, sweet, varying degrees of saltiness and with or without garlic. The housewife had to cater to different tastes. It is this exposure to the food practices of other regions and countries that has given Shanghai its fame for a sophisticated and varied cuisine. Some food writers even list Shanghai or eastern Chinese cooking as China’s leading regional cuisine, and, indeed, the one closest to being China’s national cuisine (Chang and Fuchs 1977: 179; Hush and Wong

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1976: 51). Chinese food scholars Hsiang Ju Lin and Tsuifeng Lin (1969) who describe the “exquisite delicacy” of Shanghainese cooking are also critical of the elite in the two coastal provinces of Chekiang and Kiangsu in this respect. They note that there, the “gastronomes were most numerous, in the cities and towns and resorts where wealth made people ‘knowing’. Shops and restaurants catered to the demands of gastronomy and snobbery” (Lin and Lin 1969: 113). Lin and Lin also compare the small towns at the delta of the Yangtze to the gastronomically important villages of Burgundy. As in Burgundy, the changing seasons were gastronomic events. They mention the region’s specialties, Chinkiang vinegar, Shaoxing wine, Yangchow noodles and pastries (Lin and Lin 1969: 114). Indeed, it is the frequent use of vinegar for eastern cuisine that is the hallmark of the “sour” flavour of many Shanghainese dishes. These include the famous West Lake vinegar fish (Xi Hu Cu Yu), su tung po pork, fresh ginger chicken and braised pai ts’ai hearts (Sakamoto 1977: 105). Vinegar or wine is used for cooking other seasonal fish, including shad, mullet and perch. These are often steamed with black vinegar and soya sauce. Fish here was cooked delicately and with elaborate preparation. Small lake fish were starved for a day to cleanse their systems, then split and slashed so that the head and two sides of the body were spread flat. Cooking time was only three minutes (Lin and Lin 1969: 114–115). In the 1930s, the average consumption of rice among Shanghainese and other Chinese in the region was about 32 bushels (1163 kg) for a family of four. H.T. Fei conducted a field study of the peasant life in the village of Kaihsienkung in Yangtze Valley, about eight miles west of Shanghai. More than three quarters of the households were engaged in agriculture, including rice cultivation. The surplus rice was sold in the market. Vegetables grown included cabbages, mushrooms, nuts, potatoes and turnips. They also grew fruit trees. Villages in and around the outskirts of Shanghai would have grown similar crops and sold surpluses to Shanghai markets (Fei 1939: 1, 126). For Shanghai-born author of numerous books on Shanghai and China, Lynn Pan, the cuisine of Shanghai is derived from the Yangzhou style of cooking. Yangzhou, an old city in Jiangsu, is the province north of Shanghai. Thomas O. Höllmann agrees, noting that the core areas of eastern regional cooking are the coastal provinces of Jiangsu and Zhejiang. He adds that there are also influences from the inland provinces of Anhui and Jiangxi (Höllmann 2010: 67). Pan writes that soya sauce and sugar are used liberally. She identifies those dishes that are typically Shanghainese include drunken chicken,

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lion’s head (pork meatballs with cabbage), smoked fish, mock goose, braised eel and shrimps fried with egg white (Pan et al. 1998: 153). Pa “Little buns” (xiao long bao) are another specialty of the region. “Little” is frequently used to describe food. It refers to tasting and sampling different kinds of small dishes, as in degustation. It can also refer to daintiness, particularly for small pastries, some as tiny as one bite. Shanghainese also find it amusing to buy small snacks from obscure street vendors. They would also send out young boys to fetch hot pastries for lunch, running back before they cooled (Lin, page 121). While the main staple of the Shanghainese is rice, noodles and dumplings made from wheat are also widely consumed (Pan et al. 1998: 149; Simoons 1991: 49). Generally, the Chinese’ high intake of starchy wheat and rice products stems from a belief that they prevent hunger and provide energy (Zhang et al. 2015). The preoccupation on avoiding hunger is likely to be related to an inherited memory of past experiences of food shortages and famine in China. In the 1960s, as a result of the failure of the Great Leap Forward Campaign, there were widespread shortages, with “every household with enough living space had a store cupboard in which we hoarded such daily necessities as flour, sugar and tins of meat” (Cheng 1986: 101). The trio condiments of soy, wine and sugar are used in the braising or “red-cooking” pork, chicken, duck, fish or eggplant. Aromatics traditionally used are ginger, spring onion, fennel or tangerine peel. The meat is slowly braised until the gravy is glazed reddish brown, hence “red-­cooking”. It is well known that Chairman Mao’s favourite dish was red-­braised pork (Lin-Liu 2009: 220). The Shanghai ‘vegetable rice’ is rice cooked with green vegetables. Handiwork in preparing dishes was admired. Chopping and slivering were skills learnt. Bean curd was pressed and sliced so thin “to fit the eye of a needle” (Lin and Lin 1969: 116). Shanghai cooks borrowed cooking methods from neighbouring cities. In time, the city overshadowed the cuisines of nearby cities. Rice wine from the nearby town of Shaoxing was introduced to stir-fries. The highly skilled knife techniques from Yangzhou were adopted to slice tofu into fine slivers. The now universally known xiao long bao (dumplings filled with pork and broth) came from a nearby town of Nanxiang. Restaurant chefs brought cuisines from other provinces like Canton, Sichuan and Hunan (Lin-Liu 2009: 221). Where Shanghai was generally seen as cosmopolitan, Shanghai residents themselves in the early twentieth century preferred to adhere to their own native-place cuisine. In Bryna Goodman’s work on the social practices and rituals of Chinese people in Shanghai, she states that “native-­place identity

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was vigorously defined through cuisine, an enormously significant area of cultural articulation in China” (Goodman 1995: 17). She notes that Chinese guides to Shanghai written in the late Qing era and Republican period were rich with descriptions of regional cuisines and characterizations of the types of people who ate each sort of food. Even how holiday and festival foods are consumed differ in native tastes and are a way of emphasizing regional identity. For example, zongzi, the steamed leaf-wrapped dumpling of rice and various fillings, consumed during the Duanwu holiday, is different across the regions and provinces. Zhejiang zongzi is smaller and contains red bean or meat stuffing, whereas the Guangdong variety has richer fillings of salted duck egg, yellow beans, sausage or chicken (Goodman 1995: 26). In Mark Swislocki’s work on culinary nostalgia and Shanghai, he notes that Shanghai has defined itself as a locus of regional food culture and consciousness, from the time of the city’s emergence as a place of note during the Ming dynasty through the twentieth century. Swislocki defines culinary nostalgia as “the recollection or purposive evocation of another time and place through food, provided city residents with a framework for understanding and identifying the importance of Shanghai as a place”. He adds that culinary nostalgia also helped city residents make sense of and define their relationship to the city, to other parts of China and to the world beyond (Swislocki 2009: 219). Swislocki points out that some elements of culinary nostalgia in Shanghai were so enduring that they became part of its urban culture and identity throughout its history. During the periods of Ming and Qing, peach growing became entrenched with Chinese horticulture and food writing, creating an image of Shanghai as a garden city. When the city became an important treaty port from the 1850s, new Chinese arrivals frequented regional restaurants that served the foods of their home regions. As Swislocki notes, they also “sympathized with city natives who mourned the fading of Shanghai’s garden culture, and the idealized s­ociety it represented, that accompanied the rapid growth and transformation of the city” (Swislocki 2009: 219).

Shelter and Food By the 1930s, Shanghai accounted for more than half of China’s total foreign commerce, far exceeding Tianjin’s, China’s second most important port. Until the last decade of the twentieth century, the majority of

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Shanghainese lived in alleyway houses, also known as shikumen. A legacy from earlier eras, shikumen were built from the mid-nineteenth century to cater to the tide of refugees and migrants to the city. Almost 500,000 refugees arrived at the International Settlement and the French Concession from the late 1860s. Initially built of timber, those from the 1870s were of brick, wood and concrete (Lu 2004: 143). Arranged along alleys, the two- or three-storey high houses featured a small front yard and heavy gates known as shikumen (or stone warehouse gates) (Yu et al. 2016: 66). Communal activities in lane life were replicated from the familiar village-like circumstances into urban areas, creating harmonious units of neighbourhoods. Shikumen are entered through a gateway “from the adjoining thoroughfare typically lined with shophouses” (Rowe et al. 2016: 65). Interspersed among the shikumen were one-storey workshops and small factories. By the 1930s, half of Shanghai homes were of shikumen style. Since 1949, the population of Shanghai had more than doubled, and the government built very few houses. It was Mao Tze-Tung’s policy to build up cities in the interior rather than the coastal regions. Several families had to inhabit each of these houses, sharing kitchen and bathroom and using the same hallway (Cheng 1986: 450). In 1980, shikumen accounted for 80 per cent of housing. By the 1990s, state-sanctioned urban renewal saw the demolition of most of the shikumen houses (Yu et al. 2016: 66). Between the 1850s and the 1950s, about 80 per cent of Shanghai’s population lived in street lanes. The dwellings were diverse—some were solid structures, while others were squalid. Likewise, the inhabitants came from all walks of life and from different parts of the country (You 1985: 130). The better built lane house or “stone-framed-door house” evolved from the old Beijing-style courtyard house, with two stories, with a sitting room and kitchen downstairs. Other simpler houses had no stone-framed door, courtyard or kitchen (You 1985: 130). Families who lived in these undoubtedly found street vendor food a necessity. In the 1900s, street food in Shanghai was sold by peddlers and stall keepers. The large numbers of small grocery stores and food shops were a great convenience (Jia You, p. 128). After decades of development, shikumen areas had turned relatively mature communities with a full range of stores, food markets and other stalls, supplying almost all the necessities for neighbouring inhabitants (Feng 2009: 42). Peddlers selling snacks roamed the alleyways from morning to night.

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The “four heavenly guardians” of breakfast: pancakes with red bean paste stuffing, fried dough sticks, glutinous rice balls and soya bean milk were sold in stalls that were usually located at the crossings or corners of alleys. These were also known as sesame cake stores. A survey of 1952 listed 1500 of these stalls in Shanghai (Feng 2009: 49). Students or workers ate pancakes on the run in the morning rush. Others sat down to have a bowl of soya bean milk with sugar or a savoury version could be had with soya sauce, pickled vegetables, dried shrimp and chopped spring onion. A less delectable and standard breakfast for the majority of Shanghai residents was reheated leftover rice with pickles or preserved bean curd (Lu 2004: 14; Feng 2009: 60). Tenants in the simpler houses shared a communal kitchen and cooked on coal stoves. Newcomers to a crowded shikumen building could not even share this facility and cooked in the passageway (Feng 2009: 118). In part, the lack of cooking facilities gave rice to the numerous “travelling kitchens” or “wheeled kitchens” plying in the alleyways. Generally, heartier evening meals were cooked in the kitchens. Snacks and lighter meals were bought from street vendors. From the mud and plaster stoves suspended on poles and carried on shoulders were hot kettles of tea, pots of rice, bread buns, chestnuts and sweet potatoes. Workers in the 1920s usually bought these food items home for the evening meal (Enders 1923: 20; Pan 1992: 135). During the 1960s, when the Red Guards patrolled the city, the Shanghai Municipal provided free meals for them. Food stalls at the railway station and wharves were set up. All the shops making steamed buns and the former white Russian bakeries, now state-owned, were mobilized to produce buns and bread for the Red Guards. At this time, the Red Guards rejected the Western-style bread made by the bakeries as “foreign food” and refused to eat it (Cheng 1986: 128–129).

Factory Workers As the textile industry expanded, cotton mills sprouted all over the city. The entrepreneurial Guo brothers from Sydney (discussed in Chap. 7) owned four cotton mills in Shanghai (Yen 1998). The business of buying and selling young girls in the 1930s was known as “plucking mulberry leaves”. Teenage girls were recruited from the countryside as contract workers in the city’s largest industry, the cotton mills (Honig 1986: 96). Many of them did not work directly at the mills, but worked as domestic help. Others recruited ended up as prostitutes, servants or child brides. E. Honig’s comprehensive

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study on labour relations in the cotton mills through surveys, newspapers and personal interviews that she conducted with former workers from Shanghai also illustrates the poor and inadequate meals the girls were given. Honig gives an example of a young girl who worked for a contractor (recruiter of young women), doing housework and other chores for his family. She had to get up at three in the morning to make rice gruel for the morning shift of contract workers. Other chores included washing six or seven toilets, the spittoon and the baby’s diapers. At six o’clock she would go to the market with the employer’s wife, walking behind her and carrying a basket. Leftover vegetables were bought and at home the girl would wash them. After the shift contract workers had gone to bed at nine, she had to eat whatever was left in a tub. These were the remains of the employer’s lunch and dinner that had included plentiful meat and fish. The girl served these meals as well as taking care of the workers’ food. Most nights she went to bed at 11 or at midnight, sleeping among other girls in the contract workers’ room. Her other duties also included massaging the employer’s wife when she played mahjong all day (Honig 1986: 102). The contract signed between the workers’ parents and the employer stipulated that the contractor assumed responsibility for providing the girls with food. The contract labour system took its popular name, bao fan, meaning “guaranteed rice”, but the only real meal the girls ate was lunch, which consisted of dry rice with vegetables. The vegetables were usually dried turnips, discarded vegetable leaves and stalks and salted cabbage. Meat or fish were supplied only on holidays. For breakfast and dinner, a thin congee made from Indian rice and different grains or leftover soya bean dregs were offered (Shanghai Municipal Annual Report 1938: 41–42). Inadequate food, crowded living conditions, physical abuse and illnesses such as tuberculosis, beriberi and skin diseases were common. At the end of the contract, girls stayed on under arrangement of dai fan or “taking rice”. They were not bonded to stay and were paid a salary of $7 or $8 and had to pay the contractor for room and board (Honig 1986: 108–109). About four decades later, factory workers fared better in accommodation and meals provided in the Shanghai Electrical Machinery Factory. Orville Schell spent time working at the factory in 1976. He noted that workers were housed in dormitories and bought meal tickets in the cafeteria. With the meal tickets they could buy a bowl of rice or a few buns. For lunch, the factory workers could order garlic shoots, cabbage soup and rice. Small whole salt fish or broad beans and a bowl of brown noodles were also on offer (Schell 1978: 136, 147–148, 169).

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Street Stores Apart from lacking toilet facilities in shikumen buildings, most households did not have hot water supplies. Stores known as laohuzao heated and sold water from “tiger stoves” (so-called as the stoves crouched on claw-like feet). The official name for these hot water stores was “boiled water store”, and they first appeared during the reign of Emperor Jiaqing of the Qing dynasty. In the 1960s, a thermos flask of hot water cost one fen (15 US cents currently) (Feng 2009: 63). Opened every hour of the day, these shops also had a tea room next to the tiger stove (Feng 2009: 263–264). Sometimes the tea rooms were also known as sesame cake stores. In 1912, there were 159 hot water stores in Shanghai and, by 1936, this had increased to 2000. Usually located at the entrance of alleys (Feng 2009: 71), the tiger stores and the tea rooms provided a space for elderly men to gather for company. Running from the crack of dawn to midnight, the dabing dian (sesame cake stores) sold Shanghai breakfast foods: sesame cakes, fried dough sticks, steamed bread, fried bread, glutinous rice cakes, noodle soup wonton soup and soya bean milk. Although some customers sat and ate at the store, most bought breakfast to take home. The busiest times at the sesame cake stores were from six to eight in the morning, and from three in the afternoon when people came to buy afternoon snacks (Lu 2004: 264). Entrances to laneways were crowded with stores selling a large variety of Shanghai snacks: glutinous rice cakes fried with pork ribs (a New Year dish), chicken porridge and fried meat dumplings. Some of these stalls were at the Dongxin Bridge, (present-day Zhejiang Road, South), the Xixin Bridge (present-day Guangxi Road, South), Yunan Road, Xizang (Tibet) Road and Carter Road (the present Shimen Road) (You 1985: 137). There were also the pitched cloth tents with benches under them all over the city, selling shallow-fried meat-stuffed dumplings, pancakes, deep-fried twisted dough sticks, onion oil cakes, steamed bread stuffed with minced meat or vegetables, glutinous rice balls, pork chop and New Year cakes (Wei Wei 1985: 111). Lu Xun also described a snack stall with a large pot and iron cage selling noodle soup with fried tofu, a popular Shanghai snack (Feng 2009: 42). The more prosperous could buy “varnished yellow ducks”, heads of calves and dry, half-cured steaks of goat or preserved duck eggs from meat shops (Enders 1923: 19). Aside from the cooked food stores, there were also shops selling staples and condiments. There were numerous rice stores everywhere. The poorer

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Chinese were known as “people with small rice buckets”, meaning that they had no food left overnight in their homes (Feng 2009: 57). There were more than 2300 rice stores in Shanghai in 1951. The thousands of pickles stores stocked special pickles from other provinces too. There were pickle storekeepers from Haiyan of Zhejiang Province and other well-­ known pickle stores were Wanlong and Wanshun. In the 1920s, when the Japanese seasoning, Ajinomoto, became popular, a Chinese technician analysed its ingredients and started manufacturing it in Zhang Yiyun’s pickle store. It became the Tianchu Sodium Glutamat Factory and competed directly with Ajinomoto (Feng 2009: 61–63). The strong aroma of the sauces fermenting in jars and vats greeted customers on entering a soya sauce shop. Owners of soya sauce shops during the Qing dynasty were from Haiyan in Zhejiang province. People native to Zhejiang ran the soya sauce shops. Interestingly, soya sauce shops stood next to pharmacies along Nanjing road. Soya sauce shops also stocked peanut butter, sesame paste, sweet flour paste, shrimp paste, crab paste, bean paste and pepper paste. Pickles too were sold there.

Colonial Consumption Among the Westerners who formed part of the settler community in the treaty port of Shanghai was a specific group, calling themselves Shanghailanders. They became the largest British community in China and had immense influence in the political and military affairs of the city until the late 1930s. As Robert Bickers points out, the Shanghailander identity was British and set the pattern for social life in the International Settlement. Other national communities in Shanghai remained communities of expatriate foreign nations (Bickers 1998: 161–211). The Shanghailanders, from the early part of twentieth-century Shanghai, cocooned themselves in their respective enclaves, known as concessions. They were waited upon by several domestic servants in their homes, some of whom were responsible for preparing and serving mainly European fare. When Shanghailanders did venture out for meals or drinks, the majority frequented European clubs, restaurants or cafes. The home and club where Europeans relaxed, ate and drank were one of the visible means by which race, class and gender were displayed. There were invitations from Shanghainese to Westerners to dine at Chinese restaurants from time to time. In her travelogue, Elizabeth Crump described the food offered at a local restaurant. She mentioned

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being “invited to a Chinese tiffin -- chopsticks and all. In a large Chinese hotel, we partook of shark-fin soup, sandwiches of the varnished duck in rolls of soft pastry, little knobs of spareribs candied in thick molasses, peas and shrimps with soya bean sauce, fried rice mixed with egg and meat, and Chinese rice wine” (Enders 1923: 20). The British who visited local agents were invited to banquets “with dishes of native delicacies such as birds’ nest soup, pigeons’ eggs, sharks’ fins, frogs’ legs and sea slug. Frequently the banquet would comprise sixteen dishes washed down with warm rice or kaoliang wine” (Wood 1998: 203). If the Westerner was inclined, he or she could have “elevenses at any hour of the morning, … boiled or fried noodles with ham or tiny shrimps or shreds of chicken”. For afternoon snacks there were “endless sorts of sweet or salty cakes stuffed with ground beans or minced pork or chopped greens” (Roberts 2002: 91, quoting Emily Hahn, the American writer, arrived in Shanghai in 1935). Roberts noted that “Coolie” food were plain dishes of bean sprouts and salt fish and ordinary cabbage. Children from the British families in the Asian colonies had a different relationship with the cook and other servants. Not quite colonizer and yet ranking above the servants, the colonial children complicated the wider relationship between the ruler and the ruled. Unaware of the dynamics of the colonial divide, these colonial children had a different perspective to colonial life. Parents tried to ensure that the children did not get too close to the domestic servants for fear of them “going native”. Many colonial children grew up and wrote memoirs of their childhoods in tropical lands. Their narratives were nostalgic tinged with present-day understanding of the colonial past. They almost always recount memories of time in the kitchen with the Chinese cook. Fay Angus, who grew up in Shanghai in the 1930s, said “it was acceptable for Western children in the care of their amahs to eat street food. She liked best the long strips of twisted dough deep-fried in peanut oil. Her mother wondered why she had no appetite for the formal European dinners served so elegantly at their house in the evening” (Roberts 2002: 85).

Shanghailanders at Play Clubs were leisure and recreation centres for Europeans to congregate all over the European colonies. Almost all the clubs had restaurants and bars that catered for club members. Just as the running of hill stations depended on the labour of the colonized people, so the maintenance and provision

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of food and drink depended on the local people. Clubs became popular in the eighteenth century in Britain when members signed up as a group to seek a particular pleasure. The colonial clubs were important to those men whose families were in Britain or to those who were bachelors, as the clubs served as places for socialization, dining venues and a sense of belonging to an essentially British institution (Leong-Salobir 2011: x). Other Europeans also saw the social club as “a small island of Englishness or Frenchness or Americanness away from home” (Cook 1985: 28–29). The Shanghai Club at 3, The Bund, a white neo-classical marble building, was the most exclusive club in old Shanghai, famed with its longest bar in the world at the time. Its dining room was located on one of the upper floors and, for many years, the Chinese cook there had prepared roast beef and Yorkshire pudding (Earnshaw 2012). It was open only to men belonging to the professions or those from an “office”. However, men from “trade” were excluded, as were Chinese. By the 1980s, the club had become the East Wind Restaurant (Cheng 1986: 649). One club that admitted not only Chinese members but women as well was the Cercle e Francais. Opened in 1926, it was seen as the liveliest venue in Shanghai at the time (Clifford 1991: 72). During colonial times, tiffin was served at the club and cocktails at the Cercle Sportif Francais on the Bund. Lynn Pan wrote that the British went for tiffin at the club and cocktails at the Cercle Sportif Francais on the Bund (Pan 1992: 45). Typically, Shanghailanders had afternoon drinks at the American Club at Nanking Road, leaving for home at about eight o’clock. They changed to evening wear and would sit down for a dinner party. After dinner, they would venture out to listen to American jazz at the Carlton or to the Astor ballroom or to the Creste or the Delmonte. Ladow’s Casanova advertised dancing to a good orchestra and “all food and liquors of the best quality”, and Canidrome Ballroom featured “ballroom in winter, lovely garden during summer” and “first-class cuisine” (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 42). They would breakfast on ham (Australian ham was often advertised in the English newspapers) and eggs at five in the morning (Clifford 1991: 74). A Shanghai guidebook from the 1930s similarly described formal tea and dinner dances with elaborate entertainment in the leading hotels, cabarets and ballrooms (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 75). It noted that: Good food can be found everywhere, at any hour; good liquor is the pride and boast of the first class resorts. Night life in Shanghai begins with the tea-cocktail hour, tea for propriety cocktails for pep; it ends at anytime from 2 am until breakfast. … a stop at Hongkew Market on the way to bed after

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a Shanghai night out is both unique and interesting. You may also purchase a live duck or lobster to take home for your ‘morning after’ breakfast. (About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 54)

Irene Corbally Kuhn was a foreign correspondent in Shanghai in the 1920s and wrote about social life among the various nationalities that made up the city’s foreign population. She noted that the dinner party was the most popular activity, followed by dancing at the French Club, the Carlton Cafe, the Cathay or Astor House hotels, or in one of the hundreds of small nightclubs. Kuhn wrote: Dinner, served at 9 o’clock, was, as a rule, a fairly informal meal at which one might encounter any of a number of cuisines, for each national group taught its Chinese cooks all manner of regional specialties. One's choice of menu as a hostess, however, was not unlimited; it was constrained by primitive refrigeration and the uncertain origin of much that appeared in the markets. Still, ships calling at Shanghai regularly brought lamb and butter from New Zealand and beef and citrus fruit from Australia. The Dollar Line ships from San Francisco and Honolulu were occasional sources of expensive, fresh, green vegetables, bought from the ship’s stores. (Kuhn 1986)

Members of the Shanghai Paper Hunt Club were an elite group who tried to replicate fox hunting in Shanghai. Lunches of suckling pig barbecued in a pit were served before the paper hunts (Cook 1985: 61). The club’s menu for the 1936 annual dinner listed hors d’oeuvres and Dutch pea soup, followed by fried sole with lemon, broiled quail on toast and contrefilet of beef served with Yorkshire pudding, roast potatoes and spinach. Apple pie, cheese, fruit and coffee concluded the meal (Cook 1985: 23). Roberts also mentioned that each course of the annual dinner was served with the appropriate wine, sherry with the soup and hock with the fish. He reported there were a white entrée and a brown entrée (Roberts 2002: 83).

Shanghailanders at Home Serviced apartments catered to the increasing number of foreigners who arrived in Shanghai. The Medhurst on 943 Bubbling Well Road was a 12-storey apartment hotel that served “excellent cuisine”. Single rooms were priced at $10–$12 a day, and double rooms at $16–$18 per day. The rates included meals. The Bubbling Well Home, on Bubbling Well Road, advertised itself as “home with meals” and “has all the facilities of a modern hotel combined with the atmosphere of a private residence”.

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The China United Apartment on 104 Bubbling Well Road had “two spacious dining rooms”. The newly opened Park Hotel in September 1934 on Bubbling Well Road advertised 205 furnished and unfurnished rooms and apartments and “a beautifully decorated dining room and grill” featuring “exquisite cuisine” (the advertisements appeared in All About Shanghai and Environs 1934). During the worldwide recession of the 1930s, an apartment with a bedroom, sitting room and bathroom in the Cathay Mansions in Shanghai could be rented for $400 a month (Shanghai dollars). Servants were provided and, by ringing a bell, a “boy” would come and take orders for meals. There was a restaurant on the top floor where meals were served or sent down to the tenants (Cook 1985: 28). Although Shanghai was administered as a treaty port, the British established cultures and norms that were semi-colonial. Keen to emulate the trappings of the Raj in India, the British mistress supervised the European household. Chinese cooks purchased, prepared and served their British employers. As in other British-held colonies and territories, the hierarchy and the category of servants in the household were clearly defined. In the early 1930s, monthly salaries were paid according to the category of domestic servants in the Shanghailander’s household. The European with a monthly wage of $300 usually had a cook, a helper, an amah, a table boy and a number of other servants (Clifford 1991: 75). On average, the houseboy’s salary was $35, the cook’s was $30, the coolie’s $18 and the amah was paid between $25 and $35 (Crow 1933: 17). Phyllis Blake recalls that the “number one boy” opened the door to guests, waited on table and supervised the other servants. The cook was solely responsible for food preparation and serving, but on instructions from “Missy” (the form of address for the European mistress of the house, the equivalent being memsahib in colonial South Asia). When faced with complicated menus or recipes and/or if not conversant in English, the number one boy would translate for cook to Missy (Cook 1985: 54). I have examined whether certain foods consumed by the colonizer were peculiar to each colony in my book, Food Culture in Colonial Asia: A taste of empire (2011). I argue that the colonial experience was a fluid enterprise, and foods eaten by colonizers in each colony made geographical leaps to other colonies. This expands on the notion held by historian Thomas Metcalf that “ways of thinking formed during the Indian colonial experience found expression, as the British struggled to come to terms with their new colonial subjects, in comparable, if different forms of knowledge elsewhere” (Metcalf 2007: 47).

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Shanghai for the Westerner was a place for “boozy tiffins”, cocktail parties, teas, receptions, late dinner and long nights of drinking and dancing (Clifford 1991: 75). For breakfast, medical doctor, James Henderson, wrote that the Briton in Shanghai ate fish, beef steaks or mutton chops with potatoes, omelette, rice and curry, eggs and bacon and jam with bread or toast. Beverages were coffee or tea and a glass of claret (Henderson 1863: 7). In his personal account of life over several decades in China, Paul King related that tiffin at noon was preceded by “the inevitable and noxious cold drink in cocktail shape”. Tiffin was a substantial meal, with the “spatch-cock” chicken as the feature. As there was no ice, any meat had to be quickly cooked and eaten, and could only be obtained from “the good-natured skippers” of visiting steamers (King 1924: 28). To start dinner, there was a rich soup with a glass of sherry, then one or two side dishes accompanied by champagne. This was followed by beef, mutton or poultry and bacon with champagne again or beer; then curry and rice and ham; game; then pudding, pastry, jelly, custard or blancmange with more champagne; then cheese and salad; bread and butter, with port wine; oranges, figs, raisins and walnuts were consumed with up to three glasses of claret or other wine; and finally coffee and cigars (Henderson 1863: 11). Although Henderson’s Shanghai Hygiene was written in 1863, outside the periodization for this book, his advice against overconsumption of food and drink was similar to those cautioned by some of the medical experts based in the colonies. Three decades later in Sydney, Dr Philip E. Musket from Sydney Hospital, was critical of settlers eating too much meat and not sufficient vegetables. He went as far as to suggest a national dish made entirely of vegetables (Muskett 1893: 125). Both Henderson and Muskett were of the view that British settlers should eat less meat in hot climates. Henderson wrote that “it is perfectly absurd to think that a man can enjoy good health through the hot season, if he eats of six eight, or ten different dishes during a meal, which is frequently done here” (Henderson 1863: 7). Muskett reproached the new Australians thus, “it is no exaggeration to say that the vast majority of our people believe implicitly in the necessity for meat at their three daily meals, and not only is this the case in the cooler parts of the year, but it is practiced universally during the high of summer” (Musket 1893: 116). Henderson had a distinguished career in medicine in Shanghai and advocated for healthy living, and his was one of the few voices raised against overconsumption of food and drink in the colonies.

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It is also useful to compare the substantial meals the colonials were consuming in Singapore in the same decade. It was not unusual for the British to consume up to ten different dishes during a meal, a practice followed across the British colonies (Leong-Salobir 2011). James Cameron described dinner as a substantial meal, usually between half-past six to seven: soup and fish usually preceded the ‘substantials’, of roast beef or mutton, turkey or capon. These were supplemented by side dishes of tongue, fowl, or cutlets, accompanied by a variety of vegetables. Then the substantials were followed by curry and rice. There were usually two or more different curries with accompanying side dishes of different side dishes of sambals. Beer or pale sherry was served during the main part of the meal. Dessert consisted of a colourful display of pineapple, plaintains, ducoos, mangoes, rambutans, pomelos and mangosteens. (Cameron 1965: 295–302)

With the exception of curries and the ubiquitous mulligatawny soup, however, home cooking in the European kitchen in treaty port Shanghai included a variety of European dishes. Where cookbook titles were published in the hundreds in and for colonial India and other Asian colonies, only a handful saw print for Shanghai and other Chinese treaty ports. This gives evidence that there was not really a peculiarly colonial cuisine in Shanghai as in India and Southeast Asia. The few that were published for Shanghai were similar in content: in addition to recipes, there were instructions on how to run a household and manage servants. Values and representations of empire needed to be upheld, even for semi-colonial Shanghai. Across the colonies, domestic servants were seen as dishonest through profiteering from shopping for food supplies for the household. The most common complaint about Chinese servants was of their dishonesty in “squeezing” extra money out of their masters by controlling the shopping and either claiming to have bought excessive quantities of food or inaccurately representing market prices. The position of cook “is also a lucrative post, for besides wages and a heavy squeeze on every article brought into the kitchen, the remains of each meal, whether half a chicken, half a leg of mutton, or both, are carried off for sale to native restaurants” (Wood 1998: 133). As in other British-held territories, a pidgin type of English was employed for conversing with domestic servants. Even where servants were conversant in English, it was not unknown for British colonists to use “mongrel” language. As Frances Wood points out, this imposed baby-talk

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became a “second language” for the servants (Wood 1998: 131). In the 250-page guide for Shanghai, Darwent devoted the introductory pages to “useful” sentences in pidgin. One of the commands offered is “Talkee cook three piece man dinner”. This was translated to mean “Tell the cook to prepare dinner for three to-day” (Darwent 1911: iv). Although the complaints about domestic servants in colonial Asia generally were about their dishonesty and standard of hygiene, the consensus was that the foods they prepared were flavoursome. The exception was the matter of toast for breakfast in the Shanghailander’s household. As a reader to The Evening Star on 5 December 1921b complained, “[M]ost of the dishes beloved of foreigners Chinese cooks (for whose genius we have the greatest admiration) can and do learn to make admirably. But toast is seemingly beyond them”. The sogginess of the toasted bread was seen as a major failing of the cook, but the advertisement below attributed it to the inferior local flour. Don’t blame the cook! If your morning toast is soggy or hard as a board, don’t blame the cook. He does his best but “hoe-fashion” toast cannot be made with “China-fashion” bread made from local flour. Use BAKE-RITE bread and you will enjoy the best toast that you have tasted since you came to the East. BAKE-RITE BREAD is made from imported flour and imported yeast, scientifically mixed by foreign bakers, baked by electricity and wrapped in clean waxed paper as soon as it leaves the oven. (The Evening Star on 5 December 1921b, Shanghai: The China Press)

Another advertisement in the same paper dated 2 December 1921 featured different kinds of bread sold by the Bakerite Bakery at The Chocolate Shop in Nanking Road. Baked by foreign bakers and using imported flour and yeast, they included milk bread, rye bread, raisin bread, fig and nut bread and whole wheat bread. There were also “rolls of all sorts and home fashion pies”. It would seem that fresh food supplies were adequate according a 1933 handbook: Foreigners had access to all the foods he was accustomed to in his homeland and in addition could sample the delicious native foods of China, including persimons, mangoes and lychee. Game in abundance included pheasant, duck, quail, rice birds, snipe, woodcock and venison. (Crow 1933: 17)

And yet, for some,

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Dinner was necessarily largely ‘metallic’. Tinned soup, tinned fish, tinned meat, tinned vegetables, and Christmas tinned plum pudding. A local poet in Singapore once wrote a melancholy little ditty entitled ‘Metallic Meals’. Tinned sausages were the great stand-by in those days, served with tinned green peas. (King 1924: 29)

Food Anxiety As with other Westerners who took up residence in Asia and Africa, there was much anxiety about food safety among Westerners who lived in Shanghai. W.H. Widdowson, an inspector with the Shanghai Municipal Police, wrote, “[P]erhaps the most pressing problem which the resident of Shanghai has to face is the question of eating and drinking” (Widdowson 1938: 596). Widdowson, writing on health hints for Shanghailanders, advised the new arrival, who had arrived from a country where public health regulations had reduced food and water contamination, to take extra care. He recommended that precautions, which may seem exasperating to the newcomer, could prevent dysentery “or some other equally dangerous complaint”. Equally, he wrote that those who had lived in Shanghai for extended periods should continue to be vigilant against infection by cholera and typhoid. A small booklet of 22 pages published by the Medical Missionary Association of China (no publication year) lists strict instructions on how to consume food and drink safely: No unboiled water should be drunk. All filters are unsafe except the Pasteur and Berkefeld. Even with these two kinds it may be well always to boil the water in case they are not kept in proper order. No unboiled milk should be drunk. Uncooked fruit or vegetables should only be eaten with great care as to source of supply, and state of ripeness. It is well only to eat freshly cooked food. That which is left over from day to day moulds and ferments, and becomes a fertile source of alimentary troubles. Take every precaution to prevent the access of flies to the food, e.g. by the use of wire gauze dish covers, or a mosquito screen doors and windows. Flies are an abundant source of disseminating disease. Alcohol beverages are best eschewed. Be wary of tasty native feasts. (Boone, H.W., P.B.  Cousland, and C.J. Davenport. n.d. Medical Missionary Association of China, page 15)

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Compounded with this anxiety about disease was the fear that domestic servants who were responsible for food preparation did not adhere to good standards of hygiene (Leong-Salobir 2011: 114–133). Widdowson cautioned that servants “require watching, and the cleanliness of their hands and their persons, and the thoroughness with which they do their work, will depend to a great extent upon the amount of supervision which you maintain over them” (Widdowson 1938: 597). It was not only the personal hygiene that was an issue. Fresh fruit and vegetables posed hidden dangers as human excrement was used as fertilizer (Widdowson 1938: 600). The Shanghai guidebook advised: If vegetables of local origin, such as lettuce should be thoroughly washed and the sterilized by dipping in boiling water. Fruit is a constant source of danger during the summer months. Such fruits as apples, oranges, grapefruit, bananas, watermelon and pears which possess undamaged thick skins are safe, provided care is taken to cleanse the external surface, before eating. Other and thinner skinned fruits, such as grapes, strawberries, raspberries and the lie, and apricots and peaches are safe only if eaten cooked. The popular method of dipping fruit in a solution of potassium permanganate is not recommended since it is far less reliable than boiling water. Shell fish should never be eaten raw, and are best avoided altogether. (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 116)

Widdowson suggested in detail on what to look for when dining out. One of the first requirements is to see that the shops with which you deal are clean, and conform to the regulations laid down by the Public Health Department. It is a good plan to form a personal acquaintance with them, and to note the degree of cleanliness maintained. Exposed foodstuffs should be under cover. The shop should be neat and tidy, and its staff reasonably familiar with soap and water. If these conditions do not obtain, it is obviously your duty to report the matter to the nearest Branch Health Office and to transfer your patronage elsewhere, even if it means slightly higher charges. (Widdowson 1938: 596)

There were recommendations as far back as 1899 that milk from local dairies should be sterilized at a designated centre before being sold to the public. This came about in light of the fears of tuberculosis being spread via meat and milk. The Shanghai Municipal Council issued licences to dairies and the dairies were regularly inspected for breaches of hygiene and

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for quality control. In 1901, of the 68 milk samples analysed, 2 were of excellent quality, 33 of good quality, 9 of moderate quality, 9 of poor quality and 15 were adulterated. In the same year, four dairy licences were withdrawn (three on account of “insanitary premises”). Four new licences were issued, to Mrs Flood of Farfield Dairy, Mrs Grandon of Yangtszepoo Farm, Yat Sing of Woosung Road and Yuen Shing of Markham Road. There were 24 dairies licensed in total (Shanghai Municipal Council Report, for the year ended 31 December 1901 and Budget for the year ending 31 December 1902, page 143). There were 771 cattle in dairies in 1903 and 951 in 1904 (Shanghai Municipal Council Report, for the year ended 31 December 1904 and Budget for the year ending 31 December 1905, page 131). In the following year, the number of cattle had increased to 1138. There was still debate on centralizing the sterilization of milk. By 1905, the recommendation was given further thought with the naming of such a station, the Municipal Sterilising Station, “to which the milk would be brought in bulk by the dairymen, tested, sterilized, bottled and sealed and handed back to the dairymen for distribution to their customers”. These measures were still in the planning stage. Meanwhile, the public was urged to use imported butter as the local variety was of poor quality and expensive. Three dairies in the Hongkew district were infected with “Cattle Plague” in 1905. Each month, large numbers of samples were examined for quality and hygiene standards. Dairies that adulterated milk were prosecuted at the Mixed Court, where fines or imprisonment were handed out (SMC 1905: 159). The municipal council rules stipulated that imported butter had to be “washed with filtered water, is very like fresh butter and a much safer article of food than the local product” (SMC 1902: 131). Retail food stores catering to Westerners were keen to advertise purity of their products and adherence to health regulations. All About Shanghai and Environs: A Standard Guide Book published the following advertisements for dairies in the city: Culty’s Milk. “Safe and Pure”, on 1567 Avenue Joffre. The Model Dairy Farm, 8 Tifeng Road. “Healthy Milk from Healthy Cows. These will make children healthy and strong. All our milk and milk products are Grade A and pasteurized”. Sung Sung Dairy. “Milk means health. Drink our Grade A Pasteurized milk”. Hongkew Dairy at 8 Moo-Ka-Za, Chen Yuan Road. “Fresh milk and dairy supplies”.

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Steys Dairy Farm, 92 Edinburgh Road. Grade A pasteurized milk. Lucerne Dairy, 381 Great Western Road. “Grade A Pasteurised Milk and Milk Products”. Standard Dairy Farm Co., 485 Great Western Road. “Of purity and quality, pasteurized milk and cream”. Shanghai Milk Supply Co. Lt. 145 Tunsin Road. Shanghai Milk Supply. “Grade A Milk, cream and dairy products”. Ivy Dairy, no address nor advertising line. (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934)

Butcheries catering to the Western customer were also advertised: Continental Butcher, Dong Hing Butchery, Godfrey Butchery, Grand Market, Nanyang Butchery, National Green Grocery & Co, New Hopkin’s Butchery, New State Market, Shanghai Butchery Co., Union Provision Co., Universal Butchery, Asia Butchery, Wah Yang Butchery and Welcome Butchery (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 212–213). The Shanghai Municipal Slaughterhouses slaughtered 17,317 oxen, 29,269 sheep, 3944 calves and 1896 pigs. All the meat was inspected and stamped with the words “Killed, Municipal Slaugterhouse”, with the date. Inferior quality but edible meat was stamped “Stallman”. No meat was allowed to be sold from any shop unless it bore the municipal stamp (Darwent 1911: 51). Beef, mutton and pork are further marked in two grades, first quality in purple and second quality in blue (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 116). Imported meat came in the form of ham. The Evening Star noted that the Del Monte Café, well known for cabaret and dancing, served ham and eggs “that Australian ham that we are using is the best ever came to Shanghai” (The Evening Star, 3 December 1921a: 3). In 1940, there were 59 bakeries and 63 confectionaries in Shanghai, and the Shanghai Municipal Council maintained strict regulations on their operation (SMC Annual Report 1940: 123). The concern about night soil as a fertilizer for vegetable growing was shared in the three cities under discussion in this book. Under the section on health hints in Shanghai Municipal Police: Guide and Regulations, 1938, Widdowson reported: Chinese methods of market gardening leave a lot to be desired from our point of view. The manner in which crops are fertilised (usually with the contents of the nightsoil buckets and cesspool which are to be seen all too frequently in the country) presents a very real danger of serious intestinal infection. Lettuce should be home grown or bought from reliable firms. If home grown, a careful

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eye on the activities of the gardener, especially with regard to manuring the plants, is essential. The manure he prefers to use may be human or animal, and is often infected with disease germs, or the eggs of various intestinal parasites. All vegetables which are eaten raw must first be washed thoroughly, and then dipped in boiling water. (Widdowson 1938: 600)

There was also concern for those households who did not own a refrigerator and instead had to rely on an ice chest. Widdowson advised that it must be kept scrupulously clean, and only machine-made ice should be used as “natural ice is often merely frozen sewage, and should never be allowed in the house”. He also recommended that uncovered meat should never be placed in the same basket as vegetables, but should be wrapped in clean paper and placed in the refrigerator or ice chest (Widdowson 1938: 599). Fruit was seen as a constant source of danger during the summer months. Such fruits as apples, oranges, grape fruit, bananas, watermelon and pears which possess undamaged thick skins are safe, provided care is taken to cleanse the external surface before eating. Other and thinner skinned fruits, such as grapes, strawberries, raspberries and the like, and apricots and peaches are safe only if eaten cooked. The popular method of dipping fruit in a solution of potassium permanganate is not recommended since it is far less reliable than boiling water. (Widdowson 1938: 600)

Fish was seen as particularly risky as it “decays very rapidly during the summer months. It must be fresh, and not kept too long in the refrigerator or ice chest. Shell fish should never be eaten raw, and are best avoided altogether” (Widdowson 1938: 599).

References All About Shanghai and Environs: A Standard Guide Book. 1934. Shanghai: The University Press. No author listed. Bickers, Robert. 1998. Shanghailanders: The Formation and Identity of the British Settler Community in Shanghai 1843–1937. Past & Present 159: 161–211. Boone, H.W., P.B. Cousland, and C.J. Davenport. n.d. Untitled Booklet. Medical Missionary Association of China. No publication year. Cameron, J.  1965. Our Tropical Possessions in Malayan India. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press. Chang, F.L., and G.M. Fuchs. 1977. Five Treasures of Chinese Cuisine. Honolulu: Oriental Pub. Co.

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Cheng, Nien. 1986. Life and Death in Shanghai. London: Grafton Books. Clifford, Nicholas R. 1991. Spoilt Children of Empire: Westerners in Shanghai and the Chinese Revolution of the 1920s. Hanover: University Press of New England. Cook, Christopher. 1985. The Lion and the Dragon: British Voices from the China Coast. London: Elm Tree Books. Crow, C. 1933. Handbook for China. Kelly & Walsh, Limited: Shanghai. Darwent, C.E. 1911. Shanghai: A Handbook for Travellers and Residents to the Chief Objects of Interest in and Around the Foreign Settlements and Native City. Shanghai: Kelly & Walsh. Dong, Stella. 2001. Shanghai: The Rise and Fall of a Decadent City. New York: Perennial. Earnshaw, Graham. 2012. Letters of a Shanghai Griffin. In Tales of Old Shanghai. Hong Kong: Earnshaw Books. Enders, Elizabeth Crump. 1923. Swinging Lanterns. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Evening Star, 3 December 1921a, Shanghai. ———, 5 December 1921b, Shanghai. Farrer, James. 2010a. Introduction: Food Studies and Global Studies in the Asia Pacific. In Globalization, Food and Social Identities in the Asia Pacific Region, ed. James Farrer. Tokyo: Sophia University Institute of Comparative Culture. ———. 2010b. Eating the West and Beating the Rest: Culinary Occidentalism and Urban Soft Power in Asia’s Global Food Cities. In Globalization, Food and Social Identities in the Asia Pacific Region, ed. James Farrer. Tokyo: Sophia University Institute of Comparative Culture. Fei, H.T. 1939. Peasant Life in China: A Field Study of Country Life in the Yangtze Valley. London: George Routledge and Sons. Feng, Shaoting. 2009. Shikumen: Experiencing Civil Residence and Alleys of Shanghai Style. Trans. Li bing shi. Shanghai: Shanghai People’s Publishing House. Fortune, Robert. 1847. Three Years’ Wanderings in the Northern Provinces of China. London: J. Murray. Gao, James Z. 2013. Eating, Cooking, and Shanghai’s ‘Less-than-Manly Men’: The Social Consequences of Food Rationing and Economic Reforms. Frontiers of History in China 8 (2): 259–293. Goodman, Bryna. 1995. Native Place, City, and Nation: Regional Networks and Identities in Shanghai, 1853–1937. University of California Press. Henderson, James. 1863. Shanghai Hygiene. Or Hints for the Preservation of Health in China. Shanghai: Presbyterian Mission Press. Henriot, Christian. 1999. Courtship, Sex and Money: The Economics of Courtesan Houses in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Shanghai. Women’s History Review 8 (3): 443–468. Höllmann, Thomas O. 2010. The Land of the Five Flavors: A Cultural History of Chinese Cuisine. New York: Columbia University Press.

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Honig, Emily. 1986. Sisters and Strangers: Women in the Cotton Mills, 1919–1949. Stanford: Stanford University Press. http://www.china.org.cn/travel/2012-07/18/content_25944840_2.htm. Accessed 16 Aug 2017. Hush, Joanna, and Peter Wong. 1976. Chinese Menu Cookbook. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. Hutcheon, Jane. 2003. From Rice to Riches: A Personal Journey Through a Changing China. Sydney: Macmillan. King, Paul. 1924. In the Chinese Customs Service: A Personal Record of Forty-Seven Years. London: T. Fisher Unwin Ltd. Kuhn, Irene Corbally. 1986. Shanghai: The Way It Was: A Glance Back at a Short, but Extraordinary Era. Los Angeles Times, October 19. Leong-Salobir, Cecilia. 2011. Food Culture in Colonial Asia: A Taste of Empire. Abingdon/New York: Routledge. Lin, Hsiang Ju, and Tsuifeng Lin. 1969. Chinese Gastronomy. London: Thomas Nelson and Sons. Lin-Liu, Jen. 2009. Serve the People: A Stir-Fried Journey Through China. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Lo, Eileen Yin-Fei. 1985. The Chinese Banquet Cookbook: Authentic Feasts from China’s Regions. New York: Crown Publishers. Lu, Hanchao. 2004. Beyond the Neon Lights: Everyday Shanghai in the Early Twentieth Century. Berkeley: University of California Press. Metcalf, Thomas. 2007. Imperial Connections: India in the Indian Ocean Arena, 1860–1920. Berkeley: University of California Press. Muskett, Philip E. 1893. The Art of Living in Australia. London: Eyre and Spottiswoode. Pan, Lynn. 1992. Tracing It Home: Journeys Around a Chinese Family. London: Secker & Warburg. Pan, Lynn, et  al. 1998. Odyssey Illustrated Guide to Shanghai. Hong Kong: Odyssey Books. Roberts, J.A.G. 2002. China to Chinatown: Chinese Food in the West. London: Reaktion Books Ltd. Rowe, Peter G., Ann Forsyth, and Har Ye Kan. 2016. China’s Urban Communities: Concepts, Contexts, and Well-Being. Basel: Birkhauser. Sakamoto, Nobuko. 1977. The People’s Republic of China Cookbook. New  York: Random House. Scheen, Lena. 2015. Shanghai Literary Imaginings: A City in Transformation. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. Schell, Orville. 1978. China: In the People’s Republic. London: Gollancz. Shanghai Municipal Annual Report. 1938. Shanghai Municipal Annual Report. 1940.

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Shanghai Municipal Council Report, for the year ended 31 December 1901 and Budget for the year ending 31 December 1902. Shanghai Municipal Council Report, for the year ended 31 December 1904 and Budget for the year ending 31 December 1905. Simoons, Frederick J. 1991. Food in China: A Cultural and Historical Inquiry. Boca Raton: CRC Press. Swislocki, Mark S. 2001. Feast and Famine in Republican Shanghai: Urban Food Culture, Nutrition, and the State. PhD Dissertation, Stanford University. Swislocki, M. 2009. Culinary Nostalgia: Regional Food Culture and the Urban Experience in Shanghai. Stanford: Stanford University Press. The Shanghai Morning Post. 28 September 1929. Wei, Wei. 1985. Street Vendors in Old Shanghai. In Anecdotes of Old Shanghai. Trans. Yuan Bing. Shanghai: Shanghai Cultural Publishing House. Widdowson, W.H.I. 1938. Shanghai Municipal Police: Guide and Regulations 1938. Shanghai: Shanghai Municipal Jail Department. Wood, Frances. 1998. No Dogs and Not Many Chinese: Treaty Port Life in China, 1843–1943. London: John Murray. Yen, Ching-hwang. 1998. Wing On and the Kwok Brothers: A Case Study of Pre-­ war Chinese Entrepreneurs. In Asian Department Stores, ed. Kerrie L. MacPherson. Curzon: Press. You, Jia. 1985. General Aspects of Street-lanes in Shanghai. In Anecdotes of Old Shanghai. Trans. Min Dayong. Shanghai: Shanghai Cultural Publishing House. Yu, Hai, et  al. 2016. Commercial Development from Below: The Resilience of Local Shops in Shanghai. In Global Cities, Local Streets: Everyday Diversity from New York to Shanghai, ed. Sharon Zukin et al. New York: Routledge. Zhang, N., et  al. 2015. Intergenerational Differences in Beliefs About Healthy Eating Among Carers of Left-Behind Children in Rural China: A Qualitative Study. Appetite 95 (1 December): 484–491. Zhou, Fang. 2010. The Wheels that Transformed the City: The Historical Development of Public Transportation Systems in Shanghai, 1843–1937. Unpublished PhD Dissertation. Georgia Institute of Technology.

CHAPTER 4

Singapore: Tasting the City

5400 live sheep 330 tons potatoes 500 cases of eggs 34 tons bacon 2500 cases of fruit Singapore’s daily newspaper, The Straits Times, reported in December 1946 that two ships, Charon and Asphalion, of the Blue Funnel Liners, carrying the aforementioned food supplies would arrive in Singapore from Australia, on 13 December 1946 (The Straits Times, 10 December 1946, page 7). It is unclear to what extent the food supplies from Australia trickled down to local Singaporeans. It was the only time in Singapore’s recent history that the general population faced severe food shortages. It is more than likely these Australian produce were destined for the homes of expatriates, the refurbished eating outlets or, indeed, were in transit to other ports in the region. In 1946, Singapore was home to about a million, a population comprising migrants from China, India, the Middle East and Europe. The British who held the reins of power then, as a Crown Colony, were in diminishing numbers as World War II dealt a severe blow to the colony.

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Arrival of the British Contrary to popular belief that Singapore was a sleepy fishing village until the arrival of the British in 1819, the island had been a thriving cosmopolitan trading port in the fourteenth century. The colonial port city of Singapore was established with the arrival of the British in the 1820s. Stamford Raffles, seen as the founder of modern Singapore, declared the island port a free port and the continuance of a flourishing island state. With a good supply of drinking water, a natural harbour and situated on the main sea route to China, Singapore was ideally suited for British expansion in the Far East. As its new settlement, the port city quickly became the base for trade of produce from the Java Sea. Its strategic location at the tip of the Malay Peninsula and at the junction of the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean ensured its importance as the hub of the different trade networks in the region. With its entrepôt trade status, it attracted immigrants from China, India and other parts of Asia. The expansion of European colonial rule in Southeast Asia was aided by the opening of the Suez Canal and the increase in merchant steamship traffic. It is estimated that Singapore’s trade expanded eightfold between 1873 and 1913. The primary products that moved from its port were rubber, tin, copra and sugar. Singapore was also the centre for tin smelting, rubber processing and pineapple canning. Labour from different parts of Asia flocked to the port city.

Colonizers and Immigrants and the Emergence of Singaporean Food The arrival of the British as a colonizer with its imperial expansion agenda formulated policies on the colony’s labour workforce, encouraging vastly different peoples from around the world to settle on the tiny island. The immigration of such a diverse group of people, in turn, helped develop the food practices of Singapore. While there was strategic selection of the different migrant groups from around the world, the food patterns that formed from a collection of people from such diverse origins initially grew haphazardly. Each racial or ethnic group brought its own distinct cuisine from their homeland to be replicated in Singapore. Across the causeway in Malaysia, the same processes were taking place. The history of Singapore is closely intertwined with the history of Malaysia. Present-day Malaysia and Singapore are the successor states to the former British colonies and

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protectorates. The two nations were governed together by the British colonial government, and later became a newly independent federation in 1963. Two years later, Singapore separated from Malaysia and became a new island nation. For all intents and purposes, the two societies of the two nations were and are socially and culturally similar. Over the decades, some of the many cooking cultures that found home in Singapore fused and intermingled, giving rise to uniquely hybridized dishes. Either out of necessity or expediency, patterns formed, with ethnic or racial groups clinging together, forming pockets of food outlets, most notably in street food. Each racial or ethnic group brought their own distinct cuisine from their homeland to be replicated in Singapore. Where ingredients or cooking methods were unavailable or impractical, local ingredients methods were used instead. In time, some of these cooking cultures fused and intermingled, giving rise to uniquely hybridized dishes. Singapore has retained most of the colonial-type dishes that the British consumed throughout the twentieth century, a few in home cooking, but mostly in food courts, cafes and restaurants. Unlike other postcolonial states, Singapore has looked back at its colonial benignly. Indeed, colonial links to the past are celebrated with refurbishment of colonial buildings and institutions. Seen as the “founder” modern Singapore, Stamford Raffles is still associated with notions of quality and tradition by Singaporeans. As Jan Morris puts it, “no possession of the old Empire was more dashingly acquired, romantically conceived, or successfully developed” (Morris 1985: 303).

Singaporean Cuisine? It can be argued whether a uniquely Singaporean cuisine exists given that many of the “iconic” dishes that Singaporeans deem their own are consumed in several Asian countries. Dishes from the Chinese, Malay, Indian, Eurasian and other communities can all be found in nearby Malaysia, bearing the same names. There may be subtle differences in the intensity of spice flavours, but these differences can also be found from among eating outlets within each neighbourhood. Chicken rice, chilli crabs, rendang (dry beef curry) and satay (grilled skewered meat morsels served with peanut sauce) are some of the contested dishes. Where other nations claim ownership of these dishes informally, Singaporean authorities have actively encouraged the recording and codifying of dishes. These measures were mainly by the Singaporean Tourism Board, the National Heritage Board

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and even private corporations. Singaporean diplomat Tommy Koh, writing as National Heritage Board chairman in the foreword for a food guidebook, There’s No Carrot in Carrot Cake, states “you will not find fish head curry or mee goreng in India. You will not find Chinese rojak or char kway teow or chilli crab or black pepper crab in China. Malay dishes, such as nasi goreng, tauhu goreng and tauhu telur, are probably the results of the fusion of different culinary traditions. Our hawker food is, therefore, an example of the success of Singapore’s multi-culturalism” (Tay et al. 2010: 12). Joan Catherine Henderson suggests that defining a national cuisine is complicated in multiracial societies and questions the ownership of specific dishes. She notes this as problematic, given the “diverse cultural elements and constant evolution”. She does concede though that certain dishes are endowed with iconic status by citizens and food heritage is deemed worthy of celebration and safeguarding (Henderson 2014: 904). In practical terms, the multicultural make-up of Malaysia and Singapore is similar, the Chinese, Indians and Malays forming the majority groups, with a host of other minority groups. In social and cultural terms, the similarities extend to food practices too. Most of the dishes consumed in the two countries are familiar and recognizable to the people of both nations. Differences could be as subtle as the variation of sweetness or spiciness for any particular dish for the two countries. At the same time, consumers do comment about the differences in the flavours of dishes among the different states in Malaysia. Additionally, there are iconic dishes in Indonesia that are also popular in Malay, such as satay and rendang. For both Malaysia and Singapore, there seems to exist an unwritten rule of a mutual respect and appreciation of each other’s cuisine, among the three major groups of Chinese, Malay and Indian. Chua and Rajah observe that the “Chinese, Malay and Indian food co-exist harmoniously, while retaining ‘distinct’, separated culinary and thus ‘racial’ or ethnic identities”. They further note that in “both official and popular conceptions and representations, food is a register for ethnicity in Singapore” (Chua and Rajah 1996: 2). There is growing scholarship on food appropriation, adaptation and hybridized cuisines. In recent years, attention has focused on “the hummus wars”, the fight for ownership of the chickpea dish that is eaten all over the Middle East. Nir Avieli investigates how notions of the “national” and the “local”, and of authenticity and hybridity, get constructed (Avieli 2016: 39). Melissa Caldwell has discussed the cultural processes that define food as local. Her study is on Russian consumers who are “blurring

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the boundaries between the global and the local, the new and the original, through a set of domesticating tactics grounded in flexible ideologies of trust, comfort and intimacy” (Caldwell 2004: 7). Rojak, broadly translated to denote a dish made up of different kinds of vegetables, tofu, egg and a spicy peanut sauce, has been adopted by the different ethnic groups in Singapore. Rojak is not uniquely Singaporean, as it exists under different guises in Malaysia and Indonesia, and indeed in other countries too but under different names. It is useful to posit this dish that has been appropriated by the different groups against the background of a large variety of dishes and meals for an understanding of multiculinary Singapore. Tracing the origin of a dish is often mired by the layers of flavours and meanings added to it by different groups through the years. The omission of an ingredient, the addition of something else and a tweak of the cooking method can bestow ownership to a particular ethnic group. Other food scholars have used rojak effectively as a food metaphor. Nicole Tarulevicz states that rojak can be used to describe the ethnic mix of the nation, the rojak being a chopped salad usually made with a mix of cucumber, pineapple, onions and yam bean with a sweet-sour dressing. She notes, “in Singapore people talk about multiracialism as being like rojak – all the pieces are in the same bowl but separate” (Tarulevicz 2013: 33). She further notes that it “highlights the way various foods have become potent national symbols that simultaneously speak to diversity and unity and in the process help define the boundaries of what is considered a national food” (Tarulevicz 2013: 6). In their study on food, space and identity of food consumption in Malaysia and Singapore, Jean Duruz and Gaik Cheng Khoo discuss rojak’s mixed provenance and multiple forms and how it is embedded in the “local”, with its history of border crossings (Duruz and Khoo 2015: 1). They suggest rojak constitutes a set of images for reflecting on the politics of commensality, intercultural exchanges, and identity hybridity and belonging. They use the motif of rojak “to look beyond the immediacy of street eating and beyond its geographies of exchange and cultures of remembering to the political tensions of ‘different’ people living together, and to the search for home and identity in a world on the move” (Duruz and Khoo 2015: 2–3). Rojak has been likened to the government’s state-­ sanctioned policies of multiculturalism, but at the same time less generous groups (in Malaysia) have used the term in a derogatory manner. Some Malay groups keen to preserve Malay hegemony and a purer Malay ­culture attribute “rojak culture” to the non-Malay groups (Duruz and Khoo

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2015: 3). Another negative connotation of rojak comes in the metaphor of “chaos”. When a business or an organization has no clear objectives and is chaotic, the entity is known as rojak. Rojak will be discussed in its different forms and meanings appropriated by the different racial groups in the chapter on restaurants, cafes and street food.

Malay Food At the time of Stamford’s arrival, the island was populated mainly by Malays, originally a seafaring people from coastal Borneo, Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula. The Malays converted to the Islamic faith in the fourteenth century, and Malay culture and cuisine are derived from Thai, Javanese and Sumatran elements. Malay cuisine in Singapore, like other ethnic cuisines, is, in the main, similar to that of Malaysia’s. Arrivals from Java, Madura and other Indonesian islands as well as Malays from Malaysia added nuances to Malay culture. These Malay-speaking and Muslim peoples from different geographic origins added to Malay cuisine in Singapore. Although Malay food is not as prominent in Singapore as Chinese cuisine, it is part of the mainstream diet. Malay classics include korma (of Indian origin), rendang, chicken curry and the various sambals. Nasi lemak, a coconut-rich rice dish served with accompaniments like crisp fried ikan bilis (anchovies) peanuts, prawns, shredded omelette and chill sambal, is what many Singaporeans eat for breakfast. Some of the kuih (cakes) associated with the Nonyas were Malay to start with, and along with Chinese chui kuih (steamed rice cake with preserved vegetables) and Indian roti prata, are consumed for breakfast and at teatime. In Singapore, the highlight of Malay cuisine is satay, thought by some to have been derived from the Arab kebab but with a character of its own. Fragrance is important to Malay cooking, hence the predominant use of rhizomes and bulbs like galangal, ginger and turmeric as well as lemongrass, coriander, screw pine leaf and curry leaf. These aromatics add flavour and fragrance to the different kinds of curries and other dishes. Spices from the Spice Islands, such as cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and mace, are the foundation of many Malay spice mixes. Rich coconut milk and the fragrant screw pine leaf have their unique place too (Oon 1992: 9). Fried shallots and garlic add depth, while spiciness is from both fresh and dried chillies. Dried shrimp paste provides the all-important umami taste, while coconut milk and palm sugar add sweetness. Tamarind and lime juice add tartness and fragrance. Malay classic dishes include different kinds of cur-

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ries like rendang and korma, using beef, mutton, chicken, fish and prawns. Rempah, a spicy paste of rhizomes, herbs and spices, is the base for many Malay dishes. Satay, small morsels of meat threaded on bamboo skewers and barbecued over coals and served with a peanut sauce, is a variant of kebab, possibly originating from Middle-Eastern traders. Malay food became popular in the 1960s, notably in the Geylang Serai area. Satay made its mark at the Satay Club (near the Alhambra Theatre) where there were 30 stalls, all operated only by Malays or Muslim Indians (Vincent Gabriel. Accession No. 2909/17). Satay took up to 25 minutes to prepare, first grilling the flesh over red hot embers, basting with oil to ensure it stayed moist. Food consultant Vincent Gabriel points out that the customer ordered the satay first, and, while waiting for it, drinks came and “if you are really hungry, you started to eat the mee rebus, or the mee goring, and then the satay would come”. Satays grilled at the Satay Club included, beef, mutton (and mutton lung), chicken, chicken skin and chicken offal (lung, gizzard and heart). Mutton satay was ten cents a stick (skewer), and chicken and beef were five cents each. Satay was served with ketupat (rice wrapped in woven fresh palm leaves), sliced onion and cucumber. The customer would only pay for the number of sticks of satay consumed. Any leftovers would be returned and reheated for the next customer. As the stall keepers were Muslims, no pork nor beer was sold. Sarabat or ginger tea with milk was served. The beverage gave its name to the Indian sarabat stalls. This is discussed in detail in the chapter on restaurants, cafes and street food. Satay celup or steamboat satay is the dish where customers would dip their raw skewers of meat into a steaming pot of satay soup/gravy. Each stick cost five cents and could be slivers of pork, beef, fish, cockle meat, beef and mutton liver and fish balls (fish pounded into a paste and shaped into balls). When Chinese food sellers appropriated satay or satay celup, pork was included in the dish. Another dish where payment was collected only when consumed was nasi padang. It came with a whole range of small dishes to accompany the rice, including chicken, fish, tofu and vegetables. Another favourite Malay dish was nasi lemak, a rich rice dish cooked in coconut milk.

Chinese Food In our Tangshan, no progress Thus I thought of migrating There was no rice at home

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I hate that we were poor, without rich relations My wife heard this with tears deep within Instructing me to return early Your parents love you thus Yet now we are flung apart Whether there are earnings or none, return early Do not let your family wait. (Excerpt from, “The Rhyme of the Migrants”. Translated from Tan Chye Yee’s rendition. Oral History Centre, National Archives of Singapore)

Millions of Chinese men left China in the nineteenth century, driven by famine, floods and political unrest; some made their fortune and returned, others never did. Singapore was one of the destinations, part of Nanyang, the southern seas. These immigrants were known as Sinkheh, or “new guests” (in Hokkien), a name given to them by the earlier generations of Chinese. There were earlier Chinese arrivals to Singapore, of course. Chinese traders to Southeast Asia from the sixteenth century started the hybridization of Chinese foods in many areas. Tan Chee-Beng has written extensively on what he calls “diasporic Chinese food” to refer to Chinese food traditions outside mainland China. The initial landing of 50,000 Chinese to Singapore had increased to 200,000 in 1900, many of whom had transited through the Malay States or the Dutch East Indies (Turnbull 1977: 95–97). The Hokkiens were the largest Chinese dialect group, with strong influences in banking, industry and sugar production. Originally from Fujian province, the Hokkiens are well known for robust pork braised dishes, usually eaten with steamed buns. An example of this is tau yew bak (pork braised in soya sauce). Other pork dishes are braised trotter and braised belly pork with garlic and soya sauce. Popiah is a popular Hokkien snack, spring rolls made of soft wheat skins. Tan Chee-Beng (Tan 2011: 26) has detailed the many guises of popiah reproduced in Southeast Asia, with its origin from Quanzhou, Fujian. Hokkien mee, also known as Hokkien prawn mee, is a wheat-noodle dish. Some sources state that the Malay Mee Rebus or Soto Mee or the Indian Mee Goreng all have origins from Hokkien mee (Wibisono et al. 1995: 14). Oyster omelette has been attributed to both Hokkien (Fujian) and Teochew origins. In terms of numbers, the Teochews followed a close second, having strongholds in rubber production, pineapple canning, sawmilling, rice-­ milling and fish distribution.

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Most of the regional cooking traditions as well as those from the different dialect groups in China are represented in Singapore. Teochew cooking is lighter and uses much seafood. Fish flesh, pounded and rounded into small balls, is used in many dishes, including ethnic dishes, like Indian rojak, Malay sambal. Teochews make Chinese noodle soup with fish balls. In twentieth-century Singapore, there were fine dining Chinese restaurants from the northern and eastern China, particularly from Beijing and Shanghai. At the same time, dishes from the northern and eastern regions were found in casual eating outlets and home cooking. Universally though, Cantonese cuisine is more often than not synonymous with Chinese cuisine outside China. In Singapore too, where the Cantonese-speaking group from the south is relatively small in comparison to other dialect groups, Cantonese cuisine was, and is still, prominent. Most of the Cantonese restaurants take after Hong Kong traditions. Cantonese-style roasts such as suckling pig, roast pork and roast duck are easily obtainable for takeaway meals as well as from restaurants. The dim sum breakfast or lunch, where small dishes are served with tea first, made their appearance in Singapore in the 1980s. They became so popular that other non-­ Cantonese dialect restaurants, Hokkien and Teochew, started serving the meal (Vincent Gabriel. Accession No. 2909/17). An ingredient that is used across all Chinese regional and dialect groups is soya sauce. From the early years, soya sauce was manufactured in Singapore. One of the most enduring factories is the Kwong Who Hin Sauce Factory that was first started by Woo Hoh in 1943. Arriving in 1940 from Guangzhou, Woo first set up the soya sauce business near Kallang Gasworks, and, in later years, relocated to Tai Seng and then to Defu Industrial Park in 1985. Woo’s family has continued to produce their soya sauce in the traditional process of fermentation in the sun, a process that can take up to two years (Ng Sor Luan, “Soya sauce steeped in tradition”, The Straits Times, Singapore, 12 June 2017).

Indian Food Although South Asian traders had made their way to Southeast Asia from the second century, it was during the British colonial period that large numbers settled in Singapore. From 1819, the British had recruited Indians to work in rubber plantations, as well as soldiers and convicts in both Malaya and Singapore. Most of these early Indian arrivals were from southern India, the Tamils from Tamil Nadu and Malayalees from Kerala

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in the southwest. These early arrivals were instrumental in introducing ingredients and dishes from South Asia (Sanmugam 1997: 1). These enterprising early stall keepers and restaurateurs selling Indian food introduced Singaporeans to spicy and hot dishes from their homeland. As is with other foods that change as they travel, Indian food in Singapore took on ingredients and methods of cooking, and new dishes were evolved. Fish head curry, for instance, has become the signature Indian dish in Singapore. As always, there is debate on who actually started cooking and selling this dish. One anecdote is that an Indian migrant, M.J. Gomez from Kerala, first prepared it in his restaurant in Mt Sophia in 1952. Gomez cooked the large heads of red snapper and grouper in a spicy curry with eggplant, okra, onion and garlic and aromatics such as ginger, turmeric, chillies and curry leaves (Straits Times Annual, 1974: 86). Gabriel, however, argues that it was the Chinese owner of Soon Heng restaurant on Race Course Road who first experimented with cooking fish head curry. At the time, Gabriel states that “fish head was something you fed the pigs or dogs, not really for human consumption” and not many people were game to try the dish (Vincent Gabriel. Accession No. 2909/17). Whatever the origins of this dish, it is now closely associated with Indian restaurant or stall fare. Still, there are Chinese versions of this in both restaurants and food courts. The opening of Muthu’s Curry, a coffee shop along Klang Road in 1969, helped popularize the dish. A few years later, in 1974, another Indian restaurant, the Banana Leaf Apolo, opened, offering fish head curry (http://www.thebananaleafapolo.com/ page/about-us. Accessed 4 June 2018). Nasi briyani, a rice dish similar to the Persian or Middle-Eastern pilaf, was a popular dish served in Islamic Restaurant from the 1920s. The restaurant was started by M. Abdul Rahman in 1921 on North Bridge Road. Abdul Rahman was already serving his famous biryani as head chef to the prominent Arab Alsagoff family in Singapore prior to starting Islamic Restaurant (Ilangovan 2013: 28). Among the diverse groups settling in Singapore from the 1900s were the Arabs, Jews and Armenians, bringing their cuisines and cultures to the island (Wibisono et al. 1995: 8). Sweet and savoury snacks for the Indian and Muslim communities were always available from food vendors in the street. There was also the ­Indian-­Muslim Bakery & Confectionary at 124 Onan Road that had been supplying cakes, sweets and bread since 1942.

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Eurasian and Peranakan Food Alongside the three major cuisines of the Chinese, Indian and Malay are the Eurasian and Peranakan food traditions; the former of European and Asian heritage and the latter of Chinese and Malay origins. What constitutes a legitimate cuisine for a particular community? According to Sydney Mintz (1996), the criterion of a cuisine involves frequent consumption of the dishes, knowledge about preparation and taste of the foods and articulation and debate about the dishes. Chua and Rajah (1996: 8) state that Peranakan cuisine has, since the mid-1970s, emerged from household kitchens and entered into cookbooks (Lee 1974; Oon 1978; Tan 1981) and restaurants. They note that inscribing of Peranakan domestic cooking as recipes in cookbooks and as a feature in restaurant and coffee-house menus, as well as hawker fare, has resulted in the formalization of a cuisine. It codifies the cuisine into a public and recognizable form to consumers and renders it reproducible by all, Peranakan or otherwise (Chua and Rajah 1996: 8).

Eurasian Food Mixed marriages or cohabitation between Europeans and local women gave rise to a group of Eurasians with their own culture and identity. The Europeans included Portuguese, Dutch and British. Some of the Europeans in their exploratory voyages and colonial exploits around the world settled in Malaya and Singapore and formed relationships with local women. Policies from their respective metropoles on how European men lived their domestic lives had important influences on colonial and hybridized cuisines. The Portuguese had a strategic interest in creating communities who would be loyal to Lisbon by recruiting local labour and encouraging intermarriage (Boileau 2010: 138). Moreover, Portuguese women were not encouraged to go to the colonies. In the early years of British colonization, the Colonial Office in London frowned on British men forming liaisons with local women, but it was only in 1909 that a sexual directive, known as the Crewe Circular, discouraged the taking of concubines (Leong-Salobir 2011: 70; Hyam 1986). The Eurasians in Singapore were part of the cohort of the well-to-do, the Europeans, Jews, Armenians, Parsis and affluent Chinese. As the most prosperous hub in the Asian region, Europeans and Eurasians flocked to Singapore. In particular, Eurasians from the other Straits Settlement and

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the Western Sumatran settlement of Bencoolen arrived on the island. Other arrivals of mixed European and Asian heritage included the Burghers from Sri Lanka and the Anglo-Burmese from Burma. The Eurasian hybrid cuisine, developed from elements of the Straits Chinese diet, also flags its European heritage by including roasts, steaks and chops. These were often seasoned with soya sauce and consumed with sambal belacan (shrimp paste) and chilli sauce. There are also Indian influences in the Eurasian cuisine with dishes such as vindaloo, pork curry and devil curry. Author of numerous cookbooks on Singapore, Wendy Hutton, likes to “think of Eurasian food as the food of love, the result of intermarriage between East and West” (Hutton 2007: 11). Eurasian recipes stem from the heritage of the combined customs and culture of this unique community. Hutton notes that Eurasians, as a marginal community, have always had to adapt, and their willingness to new ideas and different ways of doing things extended to their cuisine. She notes that almost all Eurasians were Christians, and various religious or caste restrictions on eating certain foods did not affect them. “Thus liberated, anything was possible and over the centuries, a unique cuisine fusing the food of different cultures and continents has evolved” (Hutton 2007: 10). Eurasian (of Portuguese descent) cookbook writer Mary Gomes’ Eurasian cookbook lists some of the essentials in a Eurasian kitchen: chilli paste, rempah (herbs and spices paste), curry powder, minced garlic, soda biscuits (in lieu of breadcrumbs), coconut milk and tamarind (Gomes 2001: 10–14). The dish that most Eurasians refer as their own is curry debal (devil chicken curry), a fiery dish seasoned with soya sauce, liberal amounts of chilli powder and ginger. Other ingredients can include luncheon meat or roast pork or frankfurters (Gomes 2001: 68). Usually cooked as a festive dish, particularly for Christmas, it is served with rice or French loaf. The Eurasian chicken pie, usually served after midnight mass at Christmas, looks European to all appearances. With butter as shortening in the pastry, the filling consists of chicken, minced pork, chicken frankfurters, potatoes, carrots and peas. However, a quarter teaspoon of dark soya sauce is sneaked in. Is that to signify its Eurasianness? There are subgroups among the Eurasians. An anthropological study of a subgroup in the 1970s was of a community of 30 Eurasian families domiciled in a squatter settlement about 11 km from the city. Known as Portuguese Eurasians, they were originally from Melaka. They lived in abject poverty, were poorly educated and spoke little English (Blake 1973).

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Peranakan Food The Peranakan community is generally understood to be the mixed cultures of two racial groups in Malaysia and Singapore, with distinct foodways, clothing and rituals. “Peranakan”, a term originating from Indonesian or Malay, has multiple meanings: “locally born” or “the offspring of intermarriage between a local and a foreigner” (Ng and Karim 2016: 93). The Peranakans’ forefathers were Chinese traders who moved to Southeast Asia in the seventeenth century and married local Malay women. While maintaining a Chinese identity, they developed their own creole language of Hokkien-Malay and adopted many aspects of Malay culture (Rudolph 1998). Like the Eurasians in the two countries, there are several subgroups within the Peranakans. The Peranakan Chinese in Singapore and Malaysia, from its seventeenth-century origins in Malacca, has undergone extensive integration and creolization (Duruz and Khoo, page 126). Through intermarriage between Chinese men and local women, the resultant Peranakan culture and identity was the adoption of Malay language, fashion and a hybridized cuisine. Duruz and Khoo (2015: 126) note that “Peranakan” applies not only to Chinese Peranakans but also to groups like Indian Peranakans and Portuguese Peranakans, “on the principle of the ‘mixed’ marriages in which ‘foreign’ males marry ‘local’ females”. Peranakan cooking is occasionally called Nonya, after the word for woman, and is notable for its complexity, elaborate preparations and reliance on spices. There are broadly three categories of Nonya food; the first being traditional Chinese (Hokkien)-based, second, Malay-based and, third, which Ng and Karim (2016: 94 & 97) call the “innovated foods”. Some of these dishes, cooked mainly by women, include udang goreng asam (fried tamarind prawns), pongteh (stewed chicken or pork with fermented soya bean) and kueh koci (glutinous rice cake with coconut filling). A well-known Peranakan dish is laksa with combinations of Chinese, Malay, South Indian and Eurasian flavours (Henderson 2014: 907). Foods of My Ancestors (Rengayah-Knight 2007) details recipes of the small Peranakan Indians or Chitty Melaka (or Straits Indians) as they are also known. Evolving at the same time as the Peranakan Chinese during the Malacca Sultanate from the fifteenth century, the Chitty Melaka are descendants of the Tamil merchants of South India (marrying the local Malays). While the Peranakan Chinese and Chitty Melaka cuisines are similar in many ways, a point of difference is that the latter contains no

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pork or beef in accordance with Hindu dietary requirements. There are also differences between Indian and Straits Indians cooking. There is liberal use of dried prawns and prawn paste to flavour Chitty Melaka food. The hybrid foods of the Peranakan Chinese (the largest Peranakan group) is known as Peranakan or Nonya. Although the Peranakans have embraced most aspects of local culture, their cuisine remains largely Chinese. The cuisine emerged when the early Chinese immigrants used Southeast Asian spices and herbs with Chinese ingredients and cooking methods. The use of pungent and aromatic roots, herbs and spices is from Malay cooking traditions, while the other ingredients are of Chinese origin. Although many Nonya dishes have Malay names, they include pork, which Malays, as Muslims, do not consume. Peranakan cooking uses pork, chicken, pork, fish and prawns, cabbage, long beans, eggplant and gourds. Sourness is added to foods with green mango, belimbing and pineapple (Tan 2011: 9). Known for laborious preparation of ingredients for Nonya cooking, some dishes also include two cooking methods, as in babi assam garam (tamarind pork) or ayam sioh (coriander chicken). The use of buah keluak (black nuts, Pangium edule), actually seeds of the Pangium edule tree, native to Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, is unique to Peranakan cookery. The Peranakan merchants held important positions from the early years of colonial rule, including in shipping, tin mining, rubber planting and coconut and rice trade. Indeed, some of the many wealthy Peranakan families in colonial Singapore were known as the King’s Chinese. The period in which they enjoyed great social prestige and economic power were from the 1750s to 1850s. They continued to liaise between the last colonizing power, the British, and the local people. They were Malay- and English-educated and well-versed in local cultures and were in an ideal position to negotiate between the British and local communities. They emulated the lifestyle of the British, including recreational pursuits such as horse riding, dancing and playing cricket. However, the one tradition that they held fast to was the Peranakan cuisine. From food preparation to the serving of it and even eating it were very much gendered activities. Most discussion of Peranakan or Nonya culture alludes to the laborious and painstaking efforts required for their cooking traditions. Girls were encouraged to learn Peranakan kitchen skills from a young age. Similar to the Victorian ideals of the thrifty and good wife, a young Peranakan woman was trained to become the good woman by being an accomplished cook while her future husband would be busy working outside the home to provide for the family. It did not

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matter that the affluent Peranakan women would routinely depend on her cooks for day-to-day food preparation even though they themselves were well versed in Nonya cooking. From a very young age, they were compelled by the matriarch to help in the kitchen, grinding spices, preparing sambal belacan (chilli with shrimp paste) and chopping vegetables before being given the freedom to cook on their own (Gwee 1985: 95). Most well-off families in twentieth-century Singapore had domestic servants, including a cook. Some families insisted on the freshest ingredients for every meal, and the cook went to buy fresh produce from the markets twice a day. Gwee Thian Hock’s memoir of his family is dated from the 1920s in Singapore (Gwee 1985: 26). The menfolk would eat dinner first, separately from the women, including wives. Women would eat at the next sitting. However, from the 1950s, the standing of the Peranakans declined, first with the Japanese Occupation (the Japanese saw them as too closely aligned with the British), and later with independence. This was revived in the mid-1980s with the publication of Nonya cookbooks and opening of Nonya restaurants. In turn, it became known internationally with the Peranakan diaspora (Gwee 1985: 94): It is believed that Nonya cakes and snacks were first sold as a street food during the Japanese Occupation when Nonya women made and sold them to help sustain their families. Mary Lim, aged nineteen, made and sold popiah, kueh lapis (steamed layered cake), kueh koci (rice flour cakes with coconut filling) and kaya (coconut egg custard) near Tanglin Road. Lim substituted rice flour with tapioca flour for kueh koci.

Then, of course, there were also Thai, Dutch, Portuguese and English influences (Ng and Karim 2016: 53). For more than a hundred years after the 1850s, however, Peranakan culture became less prominent. It was not until the 1980s that interest in Peranakan culture revived. The publication of several Peranakan and Nonya cookbooks attest to this. This aspect is further discussed in the chapter on cookbooks.

All That in Between Further, there are crossovers of cuisines from the different cultures in Singapore. Chua and Rajah pronounce that “Chinese, Malay and Indian appropriate in a promiscuous and voracious manner from each other,

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creating a far greater culinary variety through hybridization, than each in its exclusive representation” (Chua and Rajah 1996: 2). It is not only in Malaysia and Singapore that culinary crossovers take place. In the Philippines, Chinese dishes have become indigenized to the point where locals do not even recognize them as foreign dishes (Ang-See 2011: 124–140). While Chua and Rajah give the examples of Peranakan food and Eurasian food as the epitome of this, they also go further. They discuss the hybridity in Malay cuisine and the Islamization of Chinese food as well as the hybridization of Indian food (Chua and Rajah 1996: 11–14). Most of the Chinese-Malay hybrid dishes are more prominent in street food. Examples are mee rebus, a yellow wheat-noodle dish, blanched in boiling water and served in a gravy of fermented soya bean paste, fried bean curd, bean sprouts, boiled egg, coriander and chillies. Mee soto, now much accepted as a Malay dish, has Javanese origins and consists of a yellow noodle soup dish with chicken slices, bean sprouts and chillies. The soup is based on chicken stock cooked with ginger, curry leaves, belacan (fermented shrimp paste), turmeric, coriander seed, cumin, fennel, pepper and nutmeg. As can be seen, both these “Malay” dishes use Chinese type of ingredients. Further, noodles are not of Malay provenance. A phenomenon which took hold from the 1970s was the Islamization of Chinese food. This is where halal Chinese food is cooked without pork, lard or alcohol, and where the chicken and cattle have been slaughtered according to Islamic rites. Chua and Rajah note that “it would be a mistake to view halal Chinese food as a deracinated version of ‘pure’ Chinese cuisine” with the addition of “alien” or “foreign” elements. Instead, they see the omission of pork and lard as yet another aspect of hybridization where the crossing of culturally constructed boundaries involve absences (Chua and Rajah 1996: 13). These kinds of hybridized foods are found in both restaurants and hawker stalls. Examples of dishes which have been Islamized are Chinese noodle dishes, Hainanese chicken rice and yong tau foo (stuffed bean curd). Yong tau foo, originally a Hakka dish, takes many forms, with various ingredients. The soft or fried bean curds have their centres hollowed out to be stuffed with minced pork, fish, prawn or a mixture of these. They are cooked in a sauce or soup. The Malay or Muslim version has no pork. Where pork or pork stock is used for Chinese dishes, the Islamized versions are replaced with halal chicken. Halal Chinese restaurants first made their appearance in the early 1980s, along the East Coast area and in Geylang Serai (Chua and Rajah 1996: 13). The develop-

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ment of Islamized food has been attributed to several reasons. One is that Chinese who have converted to Islam (e.g. through marriage) may want to continue to eat Chinese food but which is halal. Another reason could be food vendors or restaurant cooks wanting to be innovative to cater to more diverse customers. Yet another factor could be the relative ease in which Chinese could be Islamized, with the omission of pork and alcohol and to use halal ingredients (Chua and Rajah 1996). Crossovers also happen in Chinese restaurants. Sambal belacan, a fermented shrimp paste, is so accepted that it appears as a standard condiment in Teochew restaurants (Wibisono et al. 1995: 17). Chillies, in chilli sauces, pickles and pastes, not often found as condiments at restaurant tables in mainland China or Hong Kong, are ubiquitous in Singapore. Chillies are important in Malay and Indian cuisines. The Malay barbequed skewered meat has been reincarnated on Chinese dining tables, as satay celop, Nonya pork satay and satay bee hoon. Then there are other dishes that are so hybridized it is not clear which community has borrowed from which community. Sup kambing, mutton soup, straddles between Malay and Indian cuisines. It could have morphed from Chinese beef bone and tendon soup that is highly flavoured with aromatics. In sup kambing, chunks of mutton are cooked slowly in a peppery soup. Mee goreng in Singapore refers to the yellow wheat noodles fried with chillies, potato cubes, bean sprouts, tomato sauce and a range of spices. It is conjectured that it was adapted from char kway teow or Chinese fried rice noodles. Mee goreng was said to have been a favourite with the Tamil-Muslim Chulia community. Another dish that has crossovers from other ethnic groups is Indian rojak. The Tamil-Muslims from Thakkali in Tamil Nadu, on tasting mee siam gravy in Singapore, modified it by using mashed sweet potato as a thickener, resulting in a spicy sweet gravy. The gravy is used as a dipping for deep-fried tofu, potatoes, tempeh, hard-boiled eggs and different kinds of fritters (Ilangovan 2013: 27–28). Meal combinations such as “economy rice or Chinese mixed rice” have also spilt into the Malay/Muslim stalls. Economy rice is usually a combination of non-spicy leafy green local vegetables cooked with garlic, and with choices of braised soya sauce chicken, steamed fish, steamed egg, braised soya sauce fatty pork slices, sweet and sour pork, lemon chicken or steamed tofu. Pricing is based on combinations of two meat and one vegetable or one meat and two vegetables and so on. The Malay stall versions are spicier and use only halal ingredients (Tay et al. 2010: 79).

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The Colonial Palate In my book on the colonial food culture in Asia (Leong-Salobir 2011), I discussed how the food practices and cuisine of the majority of the British in India, Malaysia and Singapore emerged from a dependence on their Asian servants. There were some in the colonial community who frowned on this. An “E.M.M.” wrote to The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser extolling the virtues of a good homemaker and praised those women who took “an intelligent interest in the supplies and preparation of food and all which affects the comfort of their homes”. The writer pointed out that “home-making hearts are happiest” (The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser. 23 April 1933, page 1). In Singapore, as with the other colonies of India and Malaysia, a unique cuisine developed that was distinct and different from the food practices of Britain and Asia but at the same time incorporated dietary components of British culinary traditions and embraced indigenous ingredients and practices from the colonies (Leong-Salobir 2011: 1). This hybrid colonial cuisine was replete with peculiarities and idiosyncrasies that evolved over decades and was influenced by factors such as the availability of local food, cooking facilities, input by domestic servants and traditions from Britain and Asia (Leong-Salobir 2011: 13). Many of the hybrid dishes originated from colonial India and were transported by the revolving community of colonials from India and other parts of the British Empire. These dishes included the numerous kinds of curries, mulligatawny, kedgeree, chicken chop and pish pash. As with the ways in which foods travel, they took on local flavours, meanings, presentation and representation. Tiffin in twentieth-century India referred to a light lunch (whereas tiffin meals in the 1800s included eight or nine curry dishes). In Singapore and British Borneo, there were the tiffin, a light lunch as in India, as well as the Sunday tiffin that became a colonial institution. The two most familiar colonial desserts in Singapore were caramel custard and sago pudding. As a Western dish originating from medieval times, caramel custard employed the ingredients of eggs, milk and sugar. Probably due to the ready availability of these ingredients, caramel custard was the standby for most meals in colonial households. Sago pudding is also known as gula malacca, or gula melaka, the Malay name referring to the palm sugar used as the sauce for the pudding. The sago is made to a jelly consistency, upon which a palm sugar syrup and coconut milk are poured. These two desserts were usually served at the Sunday curry tiffin. Sunday

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curry tiffins were also served in the European-style hotels in Singapore, at the Hotel de L’Europe, Adelphi Hotel and Hotel de la Paix. The Raffles Hotel, opened in 1887, came “to epitomise the type of life led by the expatriate British of the colonial era” and “has enjoyed a reputation found on its ‘Britishness’”, according to Singapore writer Ilsa Sharp (Sharp 1981: 11). Its Sunday curry tiffin, lasting well into the postcolonial years, comprised different kinds of curries of fish, eggs, beef, chicken and vegetables accompanied by mango pickle, fried anchovies, prawn crackers, fresh tomato and cucumber, fresh coconut flakes, fried onion and numerous other sambals (spicy pastes). Other colonial meals served at the Raffles were the traditional afternoon tea (finger sandwiches, curry puffs, cream cakes and tea) (Sharp 1981: 120). Indeed, Sunday in Singapore for the colonial was “a time for relaxation, long cool drinks to combat the heat; cricket golf, tennis, yachting, swimming, bridge. … There were dinners and dances at luxury hotels, or conversation at club or home over whisky and cocktail and iced beers. It was the customary life of the white man in the tropics”, wrote K.  Attiwill (Attiwill 1959: 17). The influences of colonization and globalization also allowed for different kinds of Western restaurants to thrive. Lim Kee Chan (Lim. Accession No. 002068) stated that it was nice to go to the Western restaurants in the 1970s. They were unlike those Western food in coffee shops in the fifties for a dollar for a steak. The steak was not sirloin or strip loin or fillet. Just an ordinary piece of meat, and they beat it up and marinate it and fry it and they call it beef steak. If you go to Restaurant Italy you get the best steak available.

Lim remembered some of the Western restaurants in the 1970s were in Katong (the Katong Rest House), Lapaloma, a restaurant in the Ambassador Hotel, and another at the Ocean Park Hotel (Lim. Accession No. 002068).

The War Years and Food Shortages Singapore had always depended on importing most of its food supplies. When World War II broke out, rice imports from Burma ceased and the Japanese began hoarding the staple for its military campaigns. Initial efforts by the Japanese to encourage Singaporeans to grow their own food

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were largely unsuccessful. In 1944, the Japanese hardened their policy and forced government employees to grow tapioca and other vegetables in their front gardens (Turnbull 1977: 204). The “Grow More Food” campaign was launched by the Japanese Military Administration, encouraging the local people to be self-sufficient. Every available area of land was turned into vegetable plots, including football fields and school playgrounds (Wong 2009: 21), and those with agricultural backgrounds were recruited. Families were also encouraged to grow their own food. School attendance was poor during the Occupation, as students had to help look for food from official outlets or on the black market. The Grow More Food campaign stipulated gardening was compulsory for school children. At the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus in Singapore, the school children grew and ate long beans, tapioca, sweet potatoes, maize, spinach, tomatoes, cucumbers and yams (Hudd 2016: 62). In a bid to further alleviate food shortages and to stabilize prices, the Japanese authorities put in place several measures to control food supplies and distribution. In the first year, the Japanese Military Administration organized local companies for wholesale and retail trade called kumiai, for a wide range of goods, including vegetables, fish and clothing. Kaishas were powerful firms that controlled shipping, palm oil and rice distribution. Rice was distributed by the Mitsubishi Shoji Kabushiki Kaisha (MSKK), and sugar and salt were controlled by the Mitsui Bussan Kabushiki Kaisha (MBKK) (Wong 2009: 19). Lists of necessities under controlled prices were published in newspapers and posted in public places (Wong 2009: 19). Essential items such as rice, flour, bread, eggs, fish, meat, vegetable, sugar and cooking oil were rationed. Each family had to register for each card for each food item (Chu. Accession No. 000462). The economic and social world of Singaporeans changed dramatically during the Japanese regime. Food imports dwindled and ceased altogether eventually. While the majority suffered from food shortages and other deprivations, there were those who profiteered in various areas. A new class of businessmen, racketeers and gamblers emerged, posing as middlemen to the previously underclass of hawkers and rickshaw pullers. White collar workers, including teachers and clerks, now became poor, as they found it difficult to subsist on fixed wages (Turnbull 1977: 200). When the bombs started to fall, Felix Chia’s family and other families rushed to purchase tinned food, chicken curry, corned beef, sardines and condensed milk, by the cases. Overnight they became hawkers and sold these at the Orchard Road market. Provision shops along Orchard Road

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were still open, and people could be seen loading up their wooden pushcarts with food stuff. Ayam brand sardines were the most popular item (Felix Chia. Accession no. 001553). Staples like rice sugar and salt were rationed, and monthly ration cards (written in Japanese) were issued to heads of households. As the war progressed and food supplies dwindled, families often went hungry, including Chia’s family of 12. Sweet potato was a treat, but the ubiquitous tapioca was seen as not nutritious. Tapioca and beri beri were words frequently articulated together in many anecdotes of wartime food shortages in Malaysia and Singapore. Chia found work with the Japanese authorities. This can be seen as remarkable as Chia belonged to the Baba or Peranakan community, a community viewed with suspicion by the Japanese. Eurasians were another community maligned by the Japanese. They had to wear armbands to show they were not Europeans (Chia, Oral History, Accession no. 001553). Peranakans were English-educated and favoured by British in jobs in the colonial administration and private sector. Chia was appointed as food clerk with the company Mitsubishi Shoji Kabushiki Kaisha. The day he was appointed “was the biggest joy of my life” (Felix Chia. Accession No. 001553). Chia’s duty, together with a Malay “peon”, was to distribute food to the Japanese personnel employed by Mitsubishi. Chia was given a list of the house numbers of each employee and a list of food items for each household. The kinds and quality of food for each household depend on the hierarchy in the company. The head of the company would get the best food items. The food items distributed included eggs, pork, chicken, fish and vegetables. Cooks from the Japanese homes would come with baskets with numbers corresponding to the house numbers of the employees. The biggest perk in the job for Chia was the food supplies he had access to. He said, “I always put aside something for myself, eggs, fresh pork, vegetables or fish” (Felix Chia. Accession No. 001553). Soh Teow Seng, aged 20, found work initially for a Japanese shipping company, earning about $180 a month, and was also given a weekly ration of three kilograms of rice. Others who were not so fortunate survived mainly on tapioca. Soh recalled numerous cases of beri beri, due to poor nutrition (Soh Teow Seng. Accession No. 000454). After the Japanese surrender, Soh worked as food control inspector under the British Military Administration (BMA) in 1946. His duties included reporting of black marketeering of basic food staples from shopkeepers. He was also responsible for raiding restaurants that overcharged meals. He was successful in helping to prosecute a restaurant in Raffles Hotel in which the owner was fined $600 for unfair pricing.

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As the war progressed, food shortages and shelter made life harder. There were families who slept on the five-foot way along North Bridge Road. Some provision and coffee shops remained open, and proprietors often offered drinks, biscuits and other food to those in need. Jean Yip’s grandparents, from Guangzhou, owned several eating stalls at Bugis Street and later Malabar Street, which remained open during the war years. Where customers could not afford to pay for their meals, they helped out in the stalls. Their Yip Kee stall on Bugis Street sold Cantonese-style chicken porridge and chicken rice, preparing 60 chickens a day for the dish during the Japanese Occupation (Jean Yip. Accession No. 2951). At the Changi Military Camp, a Japanese-run internment camp, food or the thought of food was in everyone’s mind. Ronnie Horner arrived in Singapore in 1940 in the midst of war and was first sent to labour on the Burmese railway, then back to Changi in Singapore. His diary contains details of food consumption during internment. Diphtheria, malaria, cholera and dysentery were rife at the camp. There were also cases of beri beri and the men knew this was due to lack of Vitamin B. A “cattle food nut cake”, made of groundnut meal that had been supplied as garden fertilizer, was the only means of getting this vitamin. Horner remembered that although he managed to get it down, it nearly made him sick. He also noted that these were usually given to cattle in England (Horner 2001: 20). Meat rations were continually reduced. In May 1942, three and a quarter ounces, including bone and fat, were to last three days, with four ounces of tinned onions. The tinned milk supply, which was used to make rice porridge and puddings, had stopped. Horner reported on 6 May 1942, the arrival of a fresh local green vegetable, kangkung, papaya, cucumber and pineapple. These were welcome not only as variety to the meagre food rations but which the men hoped contained Vitamin B (Horner 2001: 22). There were occasional “treats”. On the Emperor of Japan’s birthday on 29 April 1942, the internees were given a holiday and tinned pineapple. On the colonel’s birthday on 30 April 1942, they celebrated with supplies that they had been saving for several weeks as well as “odd surreptitious purchases from Malays and Chinese”. The diary entry noted that the men had “celery soup, salmon and rice fish cakes with tomato sauce, raisin duff made from all-wheat flour, cheese on toast and papaya and cream” (Horner 2001: 21). Another meal to be remembered was when Lieutenant General M.B. Beckwith-Smith came to dinner, which Horner reported on 9 May 1942.

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The menu featured tomato soup, braised beef, peas and potatoes, doughnut and cream and sardines on toast. Horner explained that the doughnuts were made of wheat and rice flour and the toast was made from bread from the “Field Bakery”. The bakery which the Men who worked at the bakery had a portion of their weekly issue of flour deducted and were given three slices of bread a fortnight (Horner 2001: 25). By early June 1942, however, serious talk of food shortages in Singapore reached the camp. No meat was being imported (Horner 2001: 28). The Japanese had started sending live cattle instead of providing frozen meat. Still, the men were able to purchase fresh fruits from the canteen. On 14 June 1942, Horner recalled the joy of tasting a tin of pilchards with rice for breakfast that he shared with his dining companions. He noted “the fact remains that after weeks of plain rice and watery stock, that fish tasted superb” (Horner 2001: 28). Horner remembered that he and Denis Pearl shared “everything we have and have long discussions on food, pipes, tobacco and have fully decided on our ‘reunion’ dinner when we’re home again” (Horner 2001: 21). When a gala dinner was held, as reported on 5 July 1942, ten ducks were killed and were served with sweet potatoes, bread and garlic stuffing and kangkong. There were also doughnuts and cream and fresh pineapple (Horner 2001: 31). Rice porridge with fish was one way of stretching the ingredients. Rice was ground using a stone and was done twice a week (Bangs. Accession No. 000103). Bangs also recalled trying to pick a green “spinachy” vegetable from a nearby village. The Chinese farmer on hearing that the British were harvesting the greens for food cried as he fed these to his pigs. Fish heads that were discarded by the British cooks were rescued by the Eurasians (Bangs. Accession No. 000103). Singapore-born Barbara Clunies-Ross (Clunies-Ross. Accession No. 002742) was 13 years old in 1941 and living in Upper Serangoon Road with her family when shelling started. She and her mother moved from place to place until they were relocated to Bahau (a camp set up for the Catholic community in 1943  in the Malaysian state of Negri Sembilan, about 280 km from Singapore, see also Sandra Hudd’s book), and later Sime Road Camp. At Sime Road, there were imaginative ways of cooking the ubiquitous tapioca. It was cut up in small cubes, and then boiled and fried with onions and chilli to resemble fried rice. Spinach and kangkung were the vegetables most often consumed with the occasional treat of chicken. The men were designated as cooks and dispatched prepared meals, usually vegetable stew, in large barrels to the women’s camp. There

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was no rice. For breakfast, porridge was made from ragi, a grain also known as finger millet, African millet or red millet (Clunies-Ross, Accession No. 002742). There were also the rare Red Cross parcels that arrived for the internees; the items included tinned pineapple, sugar, jam, corned beef and other tinned meats. While there were numerous accounts of how cruelly the Japanese treated the internees, there were also random acts of kindness from Japanese soldiers. Horner reported that one day in 1943, Lance Corporal Osawa gave them a “presento” of two small pieces of pork crackling. He wrote that crackling was received by 14 men with “real delight, quaffing it down with plain boiled rice” (Horner 2001: 91). The Christmas Day (1942) menus were carefully written down (Horner 2001: 28): Breakfast: malted porridge with milk and sugar, fish croquettes and chips Tiffin: meat pies, scalloped sweet potatoes and fried pumpkin, guava and banana flan Tea: tea with milk and sugar, hot mince pies (made with white flour and mincemeat) Dinner: clear consomme, herring creole with cream sauce, roast chicken with roast new potatoes and greens, Christmas pudding and aspic savoury cups (with homemade wine) Towards the war’s end, most of the internees had lost substantial body weight, while those of slimmer build had “rice pods” or distended ­stomachs. Horner reported that Ken Charnock had lost 19 kilos, Charles Wilkinson 15 kilos and himself 13 kilos (Horner 2001: 91). In March 1942, health nurse Gladys Tompkins was interned in Changi for two and a half years. There were 405 women and children in the women’s camp, and 595 in the men’s camp. Decades after the war, at the age of 81, Tompkins recounted her Changi prison years in Three Wasted Years where she set out in detail her food experiences there. She wrote of arriving at the camp after walking eight and a half miles with “nothing to eat”. On the next day, she and others were given a biscuit and tea in the morning, rice and soup at two o’clock in the afternoon and a biscuit for the evening meal. The following day, the internees were issued with a cup of tea at nine in the morning, and lunch was soup that contained “spots of meat”. On the third day, a cup of tea was given for breakfast, a small

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amount of rice for lunch and two cubes of pineapple for dinner (Tompkins 1977: 32–33). Efforts were made to grow vegetables, and the internees’ urine was carefully collected from the whole camp as fertilizer (Tompkins 1977: 39). Food was a dominant thought. Tompkins wrote that they were given very poor type of rice, probably sweepings, as it was very filthy and dirty and contained great fat maggots. We soon learned to pick out the maggots and carry on eating (Tompkins 1977: 40). Cooking was done in kerosene tins over an open fire. The internees considered lunch the best meal of the day—rice with a tablespoon of mashed up sardine or herring which they called “Changi shark”. At one stage, the men ground rice into flour, which they made into buns. When the Japanese refused to supply salt to the camp, the British men extracted it from the sea. Fruit consisted of coconuts and papaya, and a large part of the day was always taken up in queuing for rice (Tompkins 1977: 42). When rice was available on the first days of internment, there was resistance by some Europeans to eating it. The other problem was that the British cooks did not know how to cook, resorting to making rice pudding with water as there was no milk (Bangs. Accession No. 000103). It was the Eurasians in the camp who taught the British men to cook the staple. Francis Thomas wrote of the shortage and poor quality of food in the camp. He too stated that some of the Europeans refused to eat rice. Thomas would beg for their rations “on the principle of stocking up for worse days to come. Some carried their refusal so far they had to be hospitalised; but I doubt if any stubbornly starved themselves to death” (Thomas 1972: 52). After the war, between June 1946 and August 1948, the colonial government established the “People’s Restaurants” with the aim of providing one nutritious meal a day for Singaporeans at affordable prices. The first People’s Restaurant opened on 29 June 1946 and, in the first two hours, between 2000 and 3000 meals were sold. The first meal comprised rice, pork and vegetable for rice and fish curry for Muslims (Ho 2013: 3). By the end of 1946 there were 20 People’s Restaurants all over the city. Different menus catered to Chinese, Malay and Indian diners. Each meal was priced at 35 cents and was served at lunch time. Apart from providing cheap and nutritious meals, the People’s Restaurants also served to counter the black market and high food prices (Wong 2009: 83). For those who could not afford even the 35-cent meal, the Family Restaurants (first opened in December 1946) sold meals at 8 cents each (Ho 2013: 3).

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The tumultuous years of independence and separation from the Federation of Malaysia were followed by eight years of economic boom. Full employment and the rising standard of living paved the way for new ways of eating. Singapore’s first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew stated that it was only after 1971 when many jobs were created that the government was able to to enforce the law and reclaim the streets. We licensed the cooked food hawkers and moved them from the roads and pavements to properly constructed nearby hawker centers, with piped water, sewers, and garbage disposal. By the early 1980s we had resettled all hawkers. Some were such excellent cooks that they became great tourist attractions. (Lee 2000: 174)

Initially the government’s regulating of hawker centres was met with resistance as food vendors were used to trading rent-free on the street with good pedestrian traffic. Between the 1970s and 1980s, about five thousand street vendors selling cooked food and fresh food were housed in purpose-built centres (Lee 2000: 179). Fast food chains started making their appearance. The first was A&W offering “Coney Dogs” and root beer, opening on 17 September 1968 along Robinson Road. KFC opened in 1977, and McDonalds in 1979. Ramshackle street food stalls and itinerant hawkers gave way to more regulated eateries in the 1960s and 1970s. These dining outlets are discussed in the chapter on restaurants, cafes and street food.

References Ang-See, Carmelea. 2011. Acculturation, Localization and Chinese Foodways in the Philippines. In Chinese Food and Foodways in Southeast Asia and Beyond, ed. Chee-Beng Tan. Singapore: NUS Press. Attiwill, K. 1959. The Singapore Story. London: Frederick Muller Limited. Avieli, Nir. 2016. The Hummus Wars: Local food, Guinness Records and Palestinian-Israeli Gastropolitics. In Cooking Cultures: Convergent Histories of Food and Feeling, ed. Ishita Banerjee-Dube. New York: Cambridge University Press. Bangs, Datu Haji Mohamed Yusuf. 1981. Access No. 000103. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Sept 10. Blake, Myrna L. 1973. Kampong Eurasians in Singapore. Singapore: Department of Sociology, University of Singapore.

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Boileau, Janet P. 2010. A Culinary History of the Portuguese Eurasians: The Origins of Luso-Asian Cuisine in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. PhD Thesis, University of Adelaide. Caldwell, Melissa. 2004. Domesticating the French Fry: McDonald’s and Consumerism in Moscow. Journal of Consumer Culture 4 (1): 5–26. Chia, Felix. 1994. Accession No. 001553. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Sept 1. Chu Shuen Choo. 1984. Accession No. 000462. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Aug 15. Chua, Beng Huat, and Ananda Rajah. 1996. Hybridity, Ethnicity and Food in Singapore, Working Paper, No. 133. Singapore: Department of Sociology, National University of Singapore. Clunies-Ross, Barbara. 2003. Accession No. 002742. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Mar 5. Duruz, Jean, and Gaik Cheng Khoo. 2015. Eating Together: Food, Space and Identity in Malaysia and Singapore. Petaling Jaya: Rowman and Littlefield. E.M.M. 1993. Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser, 23 April 1933. Gabriel, Vincent. 2005. Accession No. 002909. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Jan 20. Gomes, Mary. 2001. The Eurasian Cookbook. Singapore: Horizon Books. Gwee, Thian Hock. 1985. A Nonya Mosaic: My Mother’s Childhood. Singapore: Times Book International. Henderson, Joan Catherine. 2014. Food and Culture: In Search of a Singapore Cuisine. British Food Journal 116 (6): 904–917. Ho, Chi Tim. 2013. Communal Feeding in Post-War Singapore. BiblioAsia 9 (3). Horner, R.M. 2001. Singapore Diary: The Hidden Journal of Captain R.M. Horner. Stroud: Spellmount. Hudd, Sandra. 2016. The Site of the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus in Singapore: Entwined Histories of a Colonial Convent and a Nation, 1854–2015. New York: Lexington Books. http://www.thebananaleafapolo.com/page/about-us. Accessed 4 June 2018. Hutton, Wendy. 2007. The Food of Love: Four Centuries of East-West cuisine. Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Cuisine. Hyam, Ronald. 1986. Concubinage and the Colonial Service: The Crewe Circular (1909). Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History XIV: 170–186. Ilangovan, Malarvele. 2013. Spicy Nation: From India to Singapore. BiblioAsia 9 (3): 24–29. Lee, Chin Koon. 1974. Mrs Lee’s Cookbook: Nonya Recipes and Other Favourite Recipes. Singapore: Eurasia Press. Lee, Kuan Yew. 2000. From Third World to First. The Singapore Story: 1965–2000. New York: HarperCollins Publishers.

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Leong-Salobir, Cecilia. 2011. Food Culture in Colonial Asia: A Taste of Empire. Abingdon/Oxon/New York: Routledge. Lim, Kee Chan. 1999. Accession No. 002068. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Apr 6. Mintz, Sydney W. 1996. Tasting Foods, Tasting Freedom: Excursions into Eating, Culture, and the Past. Boston: Beacon Press. Morris, Jan. 1985. Among the Cities. London: Penguin Books. Ng, Chien Y., and Shahrim Ab. Karim. 2016. Historical and Contemporary Perspectives of the Nyonya Food Culture in Malaysia. Journal of Ethnic Foods 3: 93–106. Ng, Sor Lam. Straits Times. Singapore, 12 June 2017. Oon, Violet. 1978. Her World Peranakan Cooking. Singapore: Times Periodicals. ———. 1992. Violet Oon Cooks: A Collection of Recipes from The FOOD Paper. Singapore: Ultra Violet Pte Ltd. Rengayah-Knight, Veni. 2007. Foods of My Ancestors. Singapore: Glenn J. Knight, Singapore. Rudolph, J.  1998. Reconstructing Identities: A Social History of the Babas in Singapore. Aldershot: Ashgate. Sanmugam, Devagi. 1997. Banana Leaf Temptations. Singapore: VJ Times International Pte Ltd. Sharp, Ilsa. 1981. There Is Only One Raffles: The Story of a Grand Hotel. Singapore: Souvenir Press Ltd. Soh Teow Seng. 1983. Accession No. 000454. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Jul 7. Straits Times. 10 December 1946. Straits Times Annual. 1974. Singapore: Straits Times. Tan, Terry. 1981. Terry Tan’s Straits Chinese Cookbook. Singapore: Times Books International. Tan, Chee-beng. 2011. Cultural Reproduction, Local Invention and Globalization of Southeast Asian Chinese Food. In Chinese Food and Foodways in Southeast Asia and Beyond, ed. Chee-Beng Tan. Singapore: NUS Press, National University of Singapore. Tarulevicz, Nicole. 2013. Eating Her Curries and Kway: A Cultural History of Food in Singapore. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Tay, Leslie, et al. 2010. There’s No Carrot in Carrot Cake: The Ultimate Guide for Visitors and Expats. Singapore: Epigram Books. Thomas, Francis. 1972. Memoirs of a Migrant. Singapore: University Education Press. Tompkins, Gladys. 1977. Three Wasted Years. Hamilton: Felicity Tompkins. Turnbull, C.M. 1977. A History of Singapore: 1819–1975. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press.

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Wibisono, Djoko, et al. 1995. The Food of Singapore: Authentic Recipes from the Manhattan of the East. Singapore: Periplus Editions. Wong, Hong Suen. 2009. Wartime Kitchen: Food and Eating in Singapore 1942–1950. Singapore: National Museum of Singapore. Yip, Jean, and Dawn Yip. 2005. Accession No. 2951. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Jul 1.

CHAPTER 5

Colonial Legacies: Curries and Other Hybridities

Mulligatawney Soup Chicken or turkey left from a former dinner, bones and scraps from roast veal, lamb or mutton, altogether about 3 lbs., 4 quarts water, 4 stalks celery, 4 tablespoons butter, 4 of flour, 1 of curry, 2 onions, 2 slices carrot, ½ small cup barley, salt and pepper. Put on the bones of the poultry and meat with the water. Have the vegetables cut very fine, and cook gently 20 minutes in the butter; then skim them into the soup pot, being careful to press out all the butter. Into the butter remaining in the pan put the flour, and when that is brown, add the curry powder and stir all into the soup. Cook gently 4 hours; then season with salt and pepper, and strain. Return to the pot and add bits of chicken or turkey, as the case may be, and the barley, which has been simmering 2½ hours in clear water to cover. Simmer 30 minutes and serve. (R. Calder-Marshall and P.L. Bryant. 1916. The Anglo-Chinese Cook Book. Shanghai: The Commercial Press, page 11)

Twentieth-century British imperial structures put in place in her colonies and territories impacted on local and European communities far beyond governance and trade. This chapter discusses the ways in which some culinary relics remained long after British rule. It interrogates whether the kinds of administrations and governments with their particular class of Britons had any bearing on the types of foods the British consumed in each territory. Then it engages with memoirs and other personal records together with cookbooks to demonstrate if any of the colonial dishes

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survived through the postcolonial years of the twentieth century. It also looks at the ways in which some of these dishes have been further hybridized with local cuisines. As with other analyses of colonial discourses, there was no single predominant factor that precipitated a particular development. Colonial foodways were mired in the complexities of colonial rule. The prestige of imperialists had to be maintained; Asian servants were racially denigrated for their filthy and dishonest habits and yet colonizers consumed the foods prepared by the servants. There were uncertainties as to what local foods were deemed fit for European consumption by both the colonizer and the colonized. Unlike other mechanisms of imperialism, there were no deliberate guidelines on designing colonial food patterns. I contend that it was through food, via the development of a peculiarly hybridized colonial cuisine that contributed to the total sum of the colonial project. In other words, the Anglo-Indian cuisine and its spread to other colonies would count as part of the “cultural traffic that were integral to empires and colonialism” (Ballantyne 2014: 13). Tony Ballantyne refers to this cultural traffic in his work on the “new imperial history”. As we shall see, each of the three cities differed significantly in the ways they embraced or rejected the colonial hybrid dishes that emerged from India. The dishes discussed here are derived from the unique Anglo-Indian cuisine of the British who governed and settled in India. This colonial food was distinct and different from the food practices of Britain and Asia but was a hybrid of British food tradition and Asian ingredients and cooking methods. Some of these dishes are the countless kinds of curries, mulligatawny, kedgeree and country captain. Curry became the most important dish on the British colonial table, and, through its various incarnations, it has become a global dish. In trying to understand why curry took such a hold on the culinary history of British, I engage with Thomas Metcalf’s argument that the ties of empire not only took a trajectory to London but spread outwards to South Africa, Central and East Africa, the Arabian and Gulf coasts, the islands of the Indian Ocean, the Malayan peninsula and beyond (Metcalf 2007). I build on Metcalf’s argument by saying that food consumption was another means in which the British, through her Indian colonial connections, helped spread ideas on colonial cuisine, and specifically on curry. After nearly a century of British rule, little vestige of colonial culinary influence impacted on the cuisine of Shanghai. Did Shanghai’s status as part of the “informal empire” influence its British residents in keeping

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Chinese food at arms’ length? There is not a single Anglo-Chinese recipe in the deceptively titled Anglo-Chinese Cook Book (1916). They consumed mostly British meals at home, at their clubs and at Western restaurants. Unlike the Britons who, together with Indian servants, developed an Anglo-Indian cuisine in India, the British in Shanghai “borrowed” Anglo-­ Indian recipes for their cookbooks published in Shanghai. The Anglo-­ Indian dishes featured are curries, mulligatawny and kedgeree that Britons had developed during East India Company days together with Indian servants (Kenney-Herbert 1878). However, Shanghailanders and other Britons did emulate other cultural practices from the Raj in India, such as in vocabulary and domestic service (Bickers 1999). Colonials in the Crown Colony of Singapore, on the other hand, enjoyed curries, mulligatawny, kedgeree, country captain, pish pash and sago pudding on a daily basis. The colonial hybrid cuisine evolved over time and was a combination of culinary practices derived from European and Asian foodways. The hybrid dishes did not entirely replace British food practices as roast beef, saddles of mutton, European-style desserts and other dishes were often consumed in tandem (Leong-Salobir 2011: 29–35). Curries are still cooked by the Chinese, Eurasian and Indian communities both at home and in hawker centres and restaurants. Britons in the three cities were familiar with the hybridized colonial dishes (curries, kedgeree, mulligatawny and pish pash) even if they did not consume them on a frequent basis. These dishes developed from the British colonization of India, and as with other instruments of colonialism, made geographical leaps to other colonies. The British in colonial Singapore and Malaysia adopted the Anglo-Indian cuisine wholeheartedly, with a few variations in ingredients and flavours and served together with European dishes.

Colonial Life in Shanghai As a treaty port, Shanghai hosted diverse foreign settlements, but I will investigate the food culture of only the British here. Settlers of Britain’s informal empire found modes of discrimination in class and race, using food as a mark of differentiation between Westerner and Chinese. Colonial society in Shanghai was often portrayed as made up of well-heeled Britons and Westerners. The reality was that from the time Shanghai became a treaty port, the city attracted a motley mix of foreigners (Bickers 2004: 59). The missionary community was confined to the designated area. Then there were employees of the municipal council, the police force, u ­ tility

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companies, dockyards, steamship lines and the custom service. In the mix were teachers, nurses, clerks and prostitutes (Bickers 2004: 59). No matter how lowly their status, Westerners were entitled to having domestic servants by virtue of being white. As in other parts of British colonial Asia, the colonial world viewed the local people as inferior, and employed them only as servants and other subordinates. In my previous work, I discussed the role and representation of domestic servants in the colonial household in India, Malaysia and Singapore between 1858 and 1963. The colonial hybrid cuisine was developed largely through the dependence of British colonists on indigenous domestic servants for food preparation (Leong-Salobir 2011: 60–86). Robert Bickers, in his account of an Englishman, Maurice Tinkler, a policeman in the Shanghai Municipal Police in 1919, discusses the complex layers of colonialism. Tinkler belonged to a group of Britons who held lowly positions and were treated as servants by the upper reaches of colonial hierarchy but employed servants themselves (Bickers 2004: 12). The Shanghai Municipal Police force, like other British organizations, “served a British dominated administration which stood outside empire, but was intimately entwined with it, drawing from the same personnel and systems pool, sand sharing a common ideology” (Bickers 2004: 12). Shanghainese servants served tiffin, seen as a feast, for police recruits at the police depot (Bickers 2004: 72). Tiffin as a meal in the colonies has origins from Anglo-India. The unwritten modelling of colonial structures and values permeated into spaces of homes, clubs and other recreational centres and institutions. In describing the daily life of the Western businessman in Shanghai, journalist Harry Franck wrote, “When his business day is over he is trolleyed or chauffeured home, or out to the country club, plays a round of golf, a set of tennis, or rides an hour on horseback … He dines at home, club, or foreign hotel as nearly in the homeland style as carefully instructed Chinese cooks and ‘boys’ one can accomplish, and settles down to the home newspapers and magazines” (Franck 1925: 4). In Shanghai, Westerners viewed Chinese as “unreliable, corrupt, inefficient, inaccurate … Chinese labour was felt to need foreign supervision: Chinese supervisors were seen as corrupt or corruptible, and so lower-class men were recruited from Britain. … And Shanghai’s foreign elite refused to be served at the department stores by Chinese staff ” (Bickers 2004: 59). And yet Chinese domestic servants, including cooks, were intimately involved in the preparation of food. The types of food cooked remained essentially European, and there is no indication that Chinese dishes were prepared.

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Unlike colonial India where an extensive Anglo-Indian hybridized cuisine developed, no British-Chinese fusion dish emerged. In India, a distinct colonial cuisine emerged as a result of negotiation and collaboration between the British and local people (domestic cooks). The colonial cuisine consisted of countless types of curries, mulligatawny, kedgeree, chicken chop, pish pash and the inimitable meal of tiffin (Leong-Salobir 2011). Historian J.A.G.  Roberts shares this view, “[T]here is little evidence that an AngloIndian cuisine, such as was commonly served in British households in India, was replicated by an Anglo-Chinese cuisine in China” (Roberts 2002: 67). To understand why Britons felt little interest in Chinese food, it is useful to go back to the early years of treaty settlement when the British put pen to paper on their impressions of Chinese food. Most impressions were negative, and some opinions expressed were of derision and disgust. For example, writing in 1836, John Francis Davis (1836), described a private formal dinner All the dishes without exception swam in soup. On one side figured pigeons’ eggs, cooked in gravy, together with ducks and fowls cut very small, and immersed in a dark coloured sauce; on the other, little balls made of sharks’ fins, eggs prepared by heat, of which both the small and taste seemed to us equally repulsive, immense grubs, a peculiar kind of sea-fish, crabs, and pounded shrimps.

Not all impressions were negative. W.H. Medhurst, the British Consul in Shanghai, from 1871 to 1877, tried to correct impressions of the eating habits of the Chinese. He wrote that it was untrue that the Chinese diet consisted of “dogs, cats, rats and other garbage” (Medhurst 1873: 103–104). He qualified this by saying, “I will not assert that dogs and cats are never eaten; for there are poor, more particularly in the south, who do not object to dine off a plumb rodent when they can procure nothing better”. He went on to praise “a soup common to first-class dinners in China, composed of shark’s-fin, bird’s-nest, and sea slug, with pigeons’ or plovers’ eggs floating entire on its surface, which I consider equal, if not superior, to any of our richest soups, excepting perhaps turtle” (Medhurst 1873: 104–105). A writer with The Evening Star, Virginia Adam encouraged Western women in China to use local produce, pointing out that families who lived outside the cities spent far less on food when they bought locally (rather than purchasing imported goods).

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In the interior cities of China where it is difficult to secure foreign foods, many families live almost altogether on local market products and their living expenses are very much less than those of families of the same size living in Shanghai. In the outport the cook goes to the market every morning and returns with a chicken, pheasant, white cabbage, eggs, onions, a Chinese ham, fish, oranges, bamboo sprouts, water chestnuts, beans or shrimps, etc, according to the season. He buys also rice, dried peas, barley, soy bean meal and bean flour. Careful housewives have worked out meat substitutes and have made a study of the food value contained in Chinese foods. (Virginia Adams, “Chinese Foods are Tasty When Properly Prepared,” The Evening Star, The China Press Inc, 9 December 1921, page 7)

Mostly, early culinary encounters between Westerners and the Chinese were doubtful and suspicious, from both sides. There are reasons too why the Chinese were not enamoured of Western foods. The Chinese thought Western food culture unappetizing and primitive, as they saw consumption of large amounts of beef and mutton as distasteful. The Chinese also perceived that Westerners ate mostly raw vegetables, and labelled Western cuisine broadly as “barbarian dishes” (yizhuan) (Swislocki 2001: 191). Likewise, the British in Shanghai found Chinese cuisine disgusting. The English in Shanghai tried to replicate “the tastes of their home with Chinese or imported ingredients” (Bickers 1999: 102). At best, where interest or attraction to Shanghainese food was evident, it was tied to its “status as a novelty, as something exotic” (Swislocki 2001: 192). There was even far less evidence that colonial dishes were cooked in Chinese homes. With the tradition of a peasant and agrarian food culture, its residents are less likely to adopt the hybridized cuisine of a foreign elite. Further, Shanghailanders were also ensconced within the confines of the International Settlement and had little influence on the culinary practices of Shanghainese. In his ethnographic work on Shanghai foodways, James Farrer, sociologist and expert on urban life, observes that he was “surprised that Chinese chefs in even prestigious western restaurants often ate very little non- Chinese food in their spare time, and none of them actually grew up eating western foods” (Farrer 2010a, b: 3). Although the Chinese were not enthusiastic about Western foods, they were impressed with the Western power. As Farrer points out, “culinary Occidentalism developed in China as in Japan, as a way of appropriating Western power through the consumption of Western foods” (Farrer 2010a, b: 6). Mark Swislocki notes too that the association of Shanghai with Western food culture cemented Shanghai’s status as the vanguard of China’s engagement with foreign culture (Swislocki 2009: 125).

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Towards the end of the nineteenth century, eating Western food became trendy and Western type restaurants were opened to cater for patrons of brothels, theatres and bookshops along Fuzhou Road (Swislocki 2009: 24). These were known as fancaiguan or “foreign restaurants”. Western food was enjoyed by the small minority of elites who could afford the higher priced restaurant meals and who aspired for appreciation of foreign culture. It was seen as a way for them to flaunt their wealth and sophistication. The Western restaurants or cafes that became trendy in Shanghai in the 1930s featured European-type meals and not colonial-type dishes. The most wellknown French restaurant was the Chez Rovere that opened in 1935. Its signature dishes were baked escargot and mustard-marinated steak. The Palace Grill Room offered a cuisine which was “reputed to be the best in the Far East and a choice of wines for the most exacting”. The restaurant was housed in the Palace Hotel, one of the six hotels owned by the Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels, a landmark in the International Settlement. Another restaurant in the hotel was the Palace Tea Lounge, referred to as “charmingly appointed eighteenth century style room the Elite of Shanghai delight to congregate” (The Diamond Jubilee of the International Settlement of Shanghai. 1938: 132). Indications are that the colonial hybrid dishes that the British consumed in their enclave and clubs all but disappeared when they left treaty port Shanghai. With the exception of curry that popped up now and then in “Western”-type restaurants, there was nary a mention of mulligatawny soup nor kedgeree in public eating places. However, Swislocki reports of the rise of a type of type of restaurant from 1925 known as company Western food where lunch meals were reasonable and were appealing to office workers. Curried chicken rice was on the menu for two jiao (Swislocki 2001: 211). A menu of 13 November 1949 from the Sky Terrace Hall restaurant at the Park Hotel serving Western meals listed “curried chicken and rice” alongside “hamburger steak” and “pork chop Napolitaine” in the entrée section. By all accounts, many Britons and Westerners would have left Shanghai by the end of the 1940s, and presumably it was the elite Shanghainese who patronized Sky Terrace. Shanghai residents themselves have used food as a means to define their city as a focal point for Chinese identity and sense of place since its modern history. There was rapid migration from both domestic and foreign sources from its time as a British treaty port. Chinese migrants began recreating their regional cuisines in the city restaurants. The culinary landscape of Shanghai was continually changing and renewing through the years.

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The food culture of global cities is built from colonial legacies, and these play upon postcolonial imaginaries. Although the diversities of urban foodways are continually increasing, culinary occidentalism and culinary nationalism still strongly influence the meanings of consuming foreign foods in Asia’s global cities (Farrer 2010a, b: 18). Farrer explains: As high cuisine goes global, there is no escaping that global cuisine is still postcolonial cuisine for much of the world, i.e., the foods of former colonial masters or subjects. We must thus take into account both postcolonial foodscapes— local geographies of food shaped by a history of colonization and being colonized (sometimes both)—and culinary Occidentalism—the cultural politics of westernized foodways, either as a means of appropriating western cultural authority, or as a means of rejecting it. Both culinary postcoloniality and culinary Occidentalism are evident in the development of a globalized food scene in Asian global cities in ways that would not be observed in New York or London, for example. (Farrer 2010a, b: 5)

In the main though, Shanghailanders tended to consume British-type meals. Was this because Shanghainese servants were reluctant to cook non-Chinese food or was it the preference of the British not to consume Chinese meals? Although Shanghai was administered as a treaty port, the British established cultures and norms that were semi-colonial (Swislocki 2009). Keen to emulate the trappings of the Raj in India, the British mistress supervised the European household. Chinese cooks purchased, prepared and served their British employers. There were only a handful of colonial cookbooks published for the Shanghai residents (Westerners). The Anglo-Chinese Cook Book published in 1916 in Shanghai contained mainly European-type dishes but like other colonial cookbooks it featured mulligatawny soup, notes on the serving of curry and recipes for Cleland curry (a mutton curry), curried ox tail, Indian curry and vegetable curry. Another cookbook was written by Lady Maze and Mrs V.G. Bowden in 1940, entitled Bon Appetit: Secrets from Shanghai Kitchens. This cookbook also featured curry dishes. An Australian and Singaporean connection to the cookbook is the co-author, Mrs V.B. Bowden. Her husband, Sydney-born Vivian Gordon Bowden, became Australia’s first Trade Commissioner in Shanghai in 1935. In 1941, Bowden was appointed Australia’s representative in Singapore (http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/bowden-vivian-gordon-9552; and Ivor Bowden interviewed by Paul Macgregor for the Australia-China oral history project, Bib ID 459311, National Library of Australia).

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Singapore and Its Culinary Colonial Ties Singapore retained several of the colonial-type dishes throughout the twentieth century, both in home cooking and in cafes and restaurants. The fundamentally hybrid character of the colonial cuisine was influenced variously by the food practices of the Britons as well as the food traditions of the local people, particularly the domestic servants. In nineteenth-century Singapore, Europeans ate a mixture of British meals and Anglo-Indian curries in the European-style hotels (Knipp 2003: 214). Curry has survived, indeed thrived, in postcolonial communities in Asia. A permanent feature on the colonial table, it evolved to be the single most important dish that defined the culinary history of British imperialism and has emerged as one of the most recognizable dishes globally. Curries may not be, arguably, viewed as a colonial dish as they are so entrenched and universally consumed among Singaporeans. However, they have been cooked and consumed from colonial times, and now they are prepared in numerous ways in home cooking. Eurasians in Singapore are more likely to prepare the other colonial dishes like mulligatawny, kedgeree, chicken chop, chicken curry captain and so on. Restaurants that continue to serve colonial dishes from British times are discussed below. Colbar, short for Colonial Bar, started as a canteen and unofficial mess for British army troops at Portsdown Road in 1953. Located at Jalan Hang Jebat, it continued to serve British- and colonial-type dishes long after the British troops left. In 2003 when additional construction works for the Ayer Rajah Expressway meant the demise of Colbar, rather than demolish the canteen, government organizations and the community stepped in to save it. The building, including the clay roof tiles, timber screens and solid swing doors, was carefully taken down and reconstructed at Whitchurch Road. The menu today continues to feature local Asian meals as well as the well-known British dishes such as pork chop with chips and mushroom, curry chicken, fish and chips, eggs with sausage and chips. What warrants an architecturally non-descript building, selling mediocre British-type meals and homestyle Asian dishes, salvation from demolition? There are multifaceted answers to this. The way in which the city-state was governed as a colony and the manner in which it negotiated and planned towards independence meant Singaporeans were and are relatively comfortable with their colonial past (Marschall 2008: 347–63). After 144 years of British rule, self-government and its merger as part of the Federation of Malaysia in 1963 (and its subsequent separation from the federation in 1965), Singapore’s decolonization process was markedly

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different from other former colonies. The name of Briton Stamford Raffles, seen as the founding father of modern Singapore, is still associated with notions of quality and tradition. Many colonial structures in Singapore have not only been retained but refurbished to pristine condition. The universally known Raffles Hotel and Raffles Girls School are two examples. At one stage its national airline, Singapore Airlines, named its business class as Raffles class (Hudd 2015: 127–128). While Colbar is no grand architectural icon, Singaporeans’ predisposition for colonial structures and practices meant it was an eatery worth saving. It is a badge of honour for Singaporeans to be known as voracious consumers of different kinds of food. Colbar represents for them a link to their past, of the colonial hybrid dishes that were part of their food history. Where other food stalls and world renowned fine dining restaurants can be found all over the city-state, Colbar’s average-quality meals were Western and Singaporean at the same time. In the same vein, decades after the British left Singapore, one could have a taste of the “cuisine of the British Empire” at The Tiffin Room or the Elizabethan Grill from the Raffles Hotel. Writing in 1981, Ilsa Sharp notes the variety of meals on offer at the Elizabethan Grill (its pre-war name was Batik Grill): Anglo-Indian, French classics and European fare, including mulligatawny soup, prime rib of beef, pâté de foie gras, lobster bisque, steak au poivre, sole meunière and crêpes suzette (Sharp 1981: 121). Tiffin Room served afternoon tea, in English style, offering delicate finger sandwiches, curry puffs, cream cakes and tea. Tiffin, that is, curry lunch, consisted of fish, eggs, beef, chicken, vegetables, mango and other pickles, fired anchovies, prawn crackers and sambals (Sharp 1981: 120). It was not only European-type hotel restaurants that served the colonial hybrid dishes. In cafes and food courts throughout the second part of the twentieth century and into the present, there were mulligatawny soups, curries, chicken chops and “roti John” and chicken curry captain. Roti John, a spicy minced meat stew served with sliced French bread (Keema Roti), was very popular among the British Armed Forces stationed in Changi. The combination then evolved into Roti John—bread spread with a layer of minced meat and eggs, then fried. Wendy Hutton explains that the name came about because in colonial days, every Englishman was nick-named “John” by Singaporeans (Hutton 1989: 173). Yet another explanation was given by a Singaporean cookery writer, describing Chicken Curry Captain “as a very mild dish created for Western tastes, supposedly by a Chinese cook who told his captain that the evening meal was going to be ‘Curry, Captain’” (Hutton 1989: 157).

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Not only did curry become a signature dish on the colonial menu (both at home and in clubs and Western restaurants) in Singapore, it also developed into the centrepiece of a uniquely colonial meal of its own, known as the “Sunday tiffin”. The curry tiffin was a relaxed lunch eaten at home with family members and friends, usually on the verandah. The curry tiffin in Singapore and Malaysia is similar to the Dutch colonial rijsttafel (or “rice table”) from the Indies, where numerous dishes are laid out buffet-­style, with the rice dish as the main dish. By all accounts, the curry tiffin comprised numerous dishes—several main dishes such as chicken, beef, mutton, prawn, fish or vegetable curry were accompanied by even more side dishes. These, loosely called sambals, could number as many as 20. Included among these were prawn crackers (krupuk), chopped egg, spirals of omelette, peanuts, cucumber in coconut milk, sliced onion, dried prawns, dried fish, “100-year old” eggs (preserved duck eggs—a Chinese speciality, again showing how the British took to local foodways), green peppers, bananas, tomato, pineapple, papaya, mango, desiccated coconut, raisin and mango chutney. The curry tiffin also always included plenty of rice (LeongSalobir 2011: 58). Julian Davison remembers the Sunday curry tiffin in 1950s Singapore as “a grand feast” with many guests. Davison recalls feasting on chicken in coconut cream with potatoes, beef rendang, Assam fish, a spicy fish Mornay, curried hard-boiled eggs, ladies’ fingers, beansprouts with salted fish, coconut vegetable stew and long beans. Besides the relishes, there would be little bowls of sliced bananas, chopped tomatoes, sliced cucumber, freshly grated coconut, peanuts, sultanas and anchovies fried in chilli and lime, various sambals and a selection of Anglo-Indian chutneys and pickles (questionnaire response by Julian Davison, 15 February 2008). George L. Peet, a journalist in Singapore from 1923 to 1942, described the Sunday curry tiffin thus With the curry – mutton, chicken, fish, prawns, or hardboiled ducks’ eggs– came a dozen different side-dishes and savouries, some of them calculated to make the curry even hotter that it was already. As well as one or two dishes of curried vegetables, there would be an assortment of little dishes containing mango chutney from India, ikan bilis (tiny dried fish), red chilli sauce, a salty relish called “Bombay duck”, shredded coconut, fried peanuts, chopped-up tomato and white onion, sliced banana, cucumber, and other bits and pieces… . The curry was always followed in the old Straits tradition by a local sweet called Gula Melaka. (Peet 1985: 51)

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Sago pudding was also known as Singapore pudding, Malacca pudding, Straits Settlements pudding, palm pudding or gula melaka (Leong-Salobir 2011: 19–20).

Curry Travels Curry powder, the spicy mixture that transformed leftover meals or added new dimensions to meat or poultry, was a distinct colonial invention. It was one of the ways in which the British appropriated from the colonies, adding value to products and marketing them universally. They gathered the types of spices required for a curry, configured the proportions according to their ideals and ideals of a curry and called it their own. Irrespective of the rationale for the manufacture of curry powder, it is indisputable that this commodity effectively defined the curry eaten first solely by the colonizers. In the decades to come, “curry” found favour with postcolonial communities and with other communities that were untouched by British colonization. Working class Britons in the metropole began adding a spoonful of curry powder to English stew recipes and so “curried everything from beef to periwinkles, sheep’s trotters and brain. Thus, this typically British invention repackaged fresh aromatic ingredients and turned them into a handy, industrially manufactured flavouring” (Collingham 2017: 205). As the British established other colonies and settlements, they also brought their colonial hybrid dishes with them. Curries and other dishes went further modification, with ingredients added or taken out, and different cooking methods were employed. Curry, more than any other dish, illustrates the way in which ideas, goods and services travelled the nodal networks of empire, undergoing changes at each point. By the 1900s, curry was well and truly entrenched universally as a “global” dish, its links with empire almost forgotten. Every British and colonial cookbook featured at least several curry recipes. One of the few cookbooks written for the European community in Shanghai, The AngloChinese Cook Book (1916), gave meticulous and definitive notes on how to serve curry. This is discussed further in the chapter on cookbooks. Debate on the origins of curry has thrown up several likely scenarios. It had Tamil beginnings; it developed from the spiced cookery of medieval Europe and that Richard II’s palace cooks were producing spicy dishes similar to curry; and, more recent archaeological evidence unearthed recently points to villagers using the three key curry ingredients—ginger,

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garlic and turmeric—in the Indus region in India (Lawler 2013). Even defining what constitutes curry—both in etymological and culinary terms—is problematic. Perhaps the Anglo-Indian dictionary of 1886, Hobson Jobson, best sums it up vaguely but more or less accurately as a dish of meat, fish, fruit or vegetables cooked with a quantity of bruised spices. Important contemporary works on curry include Curried Cultures, a collection edited by K. Ray and Tulasi Srinivas (2012), Lizzie Collingham’s (2005) biography on curry as it spread from Delhi to Birmingham, and David Burton’s The Raj at Table (1993) and Curries and Couscous (2004) described the culinary history of British India. Curry has become a central part of a discourse of spice and exoticism and a form of Orientalism that pervades all aspects of Western societies, according to John Thieme and Ira Raja (2007). Arjun Appadurai (1988) refers to curry as the master trope of what many (outside India) perceive to be their idea of Indian cuisine. Scholars like Susan Zlotnick (1996), Uma Narayan (1997) and Nupur Chaudhuri (1992) advocate the view that curry and curry powder were a fabrication of Indian food and were deliberate inventions of an Indian product as “ideological function”. Zlotnick analyses how the Victorian British naturalized and nationalized curry. It is Zlotnick’s view that the good Victorian woman’s moral agency and figurative power was to d ­ omesticate the foreign through cookbooks and curry recipes. She states that nineteenth-century cookery books are self-conscious cultural documents in which the Other presents itself as nourishment and not a source of threat and contamination. According to Zlotnick, Victorian women neutralized the threat of the Other by naturalizing the products of foreign lands.

Curious Curry Matters in Sydney Of the three cities, colonial-type dishes existed far more extensively and for a longer period in Sydney. This is somewhat of an anomaly as the early settlers did not consume exclusively the peculiarly unique menu of colonial dishes that existed in Singapore or other British colonies. Almost every cookery book that was published up to the end of the twentieth century had numerous recipes for curries and mulligatawny soup, the two most recognized colonial dishes. Perhaps those early Australians, of British stock and now “occupying” a new land, found their loyalties and identity somewhat conflicted. This tension of whether to adhere to British values and cultures (including adopting Anglo-Indian meals) or to forge a new Australian identity would have spilt on to culinary choices made.

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Compromise and creativity went into curry making in the Antipodean cities. According to Collingham, Australian cooks used the British technique of thickening the sauce by mixing the curry powder with flour. She states, “Australians made their own contribution to the development of curry, by adding wattlebird and kangaroo tail to the long list of meats which received the British curry treatment” (Collingham 2005: 146–147). Evidence of the frequent consumption of the British colonial hybrid cuisine by the wealthy early settlers can be found in Advice to a young lady in the colonies (1979) by a Mrs E. The “young lady” was (Anna) Maria Macarthur, wife of Hannibal Macarthur. Hannibal Macarthur was a prosperous pastoralist in Sydney. Mrs E’s recipes, menus and notes were written to help Maria Macarthur to set up home at the Vineyard, near Parramatta, Sydney, from 1814 to 1849. The “advice” illustrates that curries, mulligatawny soup and other colonial-type dishes were served both as family fare and for formal dinner parties. Indications are that these instructions were followed at the Vineyard where the Macarthurs were part of “the most exclusive section of society in New South Wales” (Mrs E. 1979: 5) and entertained extensively. Various kinds of curries appeared on dinner menus frequently, including family dinners, dinners with friends and, surprisingly, formal dinners. Curry and rice was frequently served as one of the main meals. Nicole Humble maintains that curry in Britain remained the dish of the prosperous classes until the mid-twentieth century. This was most likely the case as well for early settlers in Australia. It was only from the late nineteenth century that curry was widely consumed, and, as Frieda Moran puts it, “curry cut across class differences. If working-class men on the very margins of colonies ate a variety of condiments, it seems likely that these foods were not only available and consumed by elites, but by the urban working-class too” (Moran 2017: 17). A likely reason why curries were prepared less frequently in the early years of settlement was that only a small number of affluent households employed cooks. Food preparation fell to the duties of the woman of the Australian household who cooked mainly British-type meals. The servant’s input in curry preparation is reinforced by Humble’s assertion that in colonial India, “Indian cooks tended to be left to their own devices and produced a series of curries” (Humble 2005: 19). The curry consumed in Sydney in the twentieth century was a curious concoction of meat or poultry, with apple, raisins, chutney and curry powder all cooked in a stew-like mixture. It is likely that the abundance of meat and seafood meant that curry did not feature as prominently as in the Asian colonies. There, supplies of beef, lamb and pork were limited and were of poor quality, and leftover meats were curried to stretch meals.

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Curry was already mentioned in the first Australian cookbook, The English and Australian Cookery Book by Edward Abbott, published in 1864 in Britain (Edward Abbott 1864), listing several curry recipes. Prior to the publication of this cookbook, housewives and servants made use of British cookbooks. Abbott also emphasized the merits of using the best ingredients for curry powder. He claimed that most of the curry powders in the shops were “invariably adulterated” (Abbott 1864: 209–210). He referred to “a book in our collection, The Cook by Read” which advised that “no cayenne is to be used in curry powder”. Abbott wrote that “we fancy a Bengalee or Malay would laugh at such a foolish recommendation”. Instead, he supplied “our proportions” for curry powder, to be pounded: Mustard seed, one ounce and a half Coriander, four ounces Turmeric four and a quarter ounces Black pepper, two and a half ounces Cayenne, one ounce and a quarter Ginger, half an ounce Cinnamon, cloves and mace, quarter of an ounce each. (Abbott 1864: 210)

In reality, curry was consumed less frequently in twentieth-century Sydney than by the British in other colonies. Still, curry, Australian style, remained persistent in cookbooks; it ranged from plagiarized versions from British and Anglo-Indian cookbooks to innovative ways of “currying” all kinds of foods that are native to Australia. Cookbook authors also used these publications to define what curry meant to them. In its more than a hundred years’ history, The Commonsense Cookery Book has sold over a million copies. It was originally published in 1914 to aid the teaching of home economics in the New South Wales schools, but it has become an important cookbook in Sydney homes. The copies published for each edition average about 200,000. By 1964, the publishers, Angus and Robertson, stated that more than half a million copies had been sold. Its 2008 edition saw more than a million copies had been purchased. The early editions featured numerous curry recipes and detailed notes on how to cook and serve them. Its first edition had only one curry recipe, curry and rice (The Commonsense Cookery Book 1914: 56). In the 1931 edition, there were three curry recipes: curried eggs, curry and rice (with separate recipe for “boiled rice for curry”), and dry curry. There was an addition of one curry recipe, curried chops, in the 1946 edition. The 1974 edition saw an increased number of recipes, including curried chops, curried eggs,

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curried steak, curry and rice, dry curry, egg and lentil curry and curry sauce. Perhaps with more Australians travelling to Asia in the 1970s, and with more Asians settling in Australia, curry was seen becoming popular in home cooking. By the 1990 edition of The Commonsense Cookery Book, there was no main meal curry recipe. There were two side dish curry recipes: curried rice salad and curried eggs. Curry continues to befuddle and intrigue in cookbooks in Australia. Curries served in cafes and restaurants in the late twentieth century would bear little resemblance to some of the curry recipes in cookbooks. For instance, as late as 2013, in that year’s edition of The Commonsense Cookery Book, it explained, “curry sauce is a variation of basic white sauce with two teaspoons of curry powder added” (Commonsense Cookery 2013: 18–19). It suggested that for curried chops or steak to use “neck chops or round steaks, cooked with onion, tomatoes, garlic, ginger and a tablespoon of curry powder, served with rice and lemon” (Commonsense Cookery 2013: 54). In her labour-saving slow cooker or “crockpot” cookery book, Margaret Fulton (1976) supplied recipes for curries and soups with miniscule amounts of curry powder. For the curried lentil soup, using 500 grams of dried lentils, one tablespoon of curry powder was listed (Fulton 1976: 33). The “Crock-pot curry”, using one and a half kilo of beef, serving six people, called for one tablespoon of curry powder, half a cup of flour, a cup of raisins and two apples (Fulton 1976: 75). A fish curry recipe for four to six servings included ingredients of a kilo of fish, two teaspoons of curry powder and half a teaspoon of turmeric (Fulton 1976: 25). Women’s pages in newspapers frequently carry recipes and tips for food preparation. On a full page devoted to curry, The Sydney Mail introduced the dish defensively. Curry is an appetizing winter dish, often, alas regarded merely as a means of using up cold meat. By taking the necessary trouble, however, you may make curries to be proud of – yet it is perhaps not advisable to serve a curry to those who have lived in the East. They have an irritating way of remembering “curry tiffins”, and no matter how good your dish may be they refuse to recognize it as an even a second cousin to the intriguing mixtures of India and Malaya. (The Sydney Mail. Wednesday, 15 May 1935, page 22)

Perhaps as servants were in short supply and cooking was done by the Australian housewife rather than Asian servants, curry was cooked more “creatively”. As Colin Bannerman’s historical study on Australian foodways from 1888 to 1914 put it,

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curry was a popular way of using up cold meat. It was often the last in the succession of made-dishes produced from the roast or boiled joint, so that what went into the curry may have been thought good for little else. There was always the suspicion that when it became necessary to disguise the tell-­ tale signs that meat was beginning to ‘go off’, the cook would turn to curry. But even when the meat was sweet the results were often wretched. (Bannerman 1996: 173)

Bannerman cites one such recipe, Curry of Cold Meat, from the Schauer Cookery Book: Take 1 oz. butter, 1 onion, fry them together; an apple chopped, 1 tablespoon curry powder, 1 dessertspoonful of plain flour; stir well and add slowly ½ a pint water or stock; boil 3 minutes; cool slightly; put in cold meat, cut small; add pepper and salt; heat meat through; serve on hot dish surrounded by wall of rice. (Bannerman 1996: 173)

Bannerman continues, Chicken, fish, prawns, eggs and vegetables were treated no more sympathetically than the ageing roast. There seemed to be few items of food safe from curry: oysters, liver, pigeon, calf’s head, tripe, asparagus, mushrooms and banana all received the same treatment. It is hard to imagine how a sauce of onion, apple, common curry powder and stock was thought to … The recipe was Hannah Maclurcan’s and her curried bananas were just as bad: green bananas, desiccated coconut, milk, curry powder, Worcestershire sauce, anchovy sauce and cayenne, all thickened with an egg. (Bannerman 1996: 174)

He quotes a recipe on Curried Oysters from Mrs Maclurcan’s Cookery Book, berating it as “the damnation of oysters”: 2 or 3 doz. Oysters; 1 large onion, 9 cloves; 1 piece ginger; 1 apple; tablespoonful of chutney and curry powder; tablespoonful cocoanut [sic]; lemon; butter. Mode. – Slice the onion very thin, put into the saucepan with the butter; when cooked add the ginger, cloves, apple and small piece of rind of lemon all chopped very fine; when these are cooked add the curry powder; now add the liquor off the oysters; if that is not enough add a little milk and the cocoanut; just before serving put in the oysters. Some people like a little garlic, which is an improvement, a very small piece about the size of a pea chopped up is sufficient. (Bannerman 1996: 174)

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Apple was nearly always mandatory; spices—apart from commercially prepared curry powder—were optional. It has been suggested that the trick of substituting apples for mangoes came from the British (Collingham 2005: 146). As well, Australian curries, embellished with raisins and other dried fruit, could have derived from Persian cookery, popular during Mughal rule. Combinations of meat and dried fruit such as sultanas and dried apricots were common in Persian dishes. It is also tempting to conjecture that there could be influence from the burgeoning dried fruit industry. It is clear that Australian home cooks and cookbook writers from the early days of settlement continually recreate their idea of curry and at one point flirted with the notion of using curry as part of its national cuisine. There was debate in the media in the 1950s that Australia had no set of savoury dishes that could be listed as features of a national cuisine. This was not for want of trying. As early as 1874, decades before Australia became a single nation, Marcus Clarke had proposed curry “as the base of our regenerated Australian food system” (Barbara Santich 2012: 15). Sydney doctor, Philip Muskett (1893), a few years later, also proposed “a vegetable curry or some well-concocted salad” as a national dish. This never eventuated, but curry was familiar and recognizable like a distant relative. It never became a dish that was cooked and consumed on a daily basis as in the colonial homes in India, Malaysia and Singapore. It is worth pondering Moran’s comparison of tea and curry, both with colonial associations in the Australian context. She points out that while “both tea and curry are both absorbed into Australian culinary culture, tea is named as Australian, while curry is not”. She notes that curry is not culturally absorbed in the same way as tea is. It is gustatorily absorbed, but has not been incorporated “invisibly” into Australian culture (Moran 2017: 27).

Mulligatawny Soup Tales Mulligatawny soup was one of the earliest dishes that formed part of the colonial hybrid cuisine. European herbs such as thyme and marjoram were added to Indian recipes when curries became entrenched in Victorian food culture in England. British cooks further anglicized Anglo-Indian dishes like mulligatawny soup and kedgeree. Apples, bay leaves, ham and turnips were added to mulligatawny. Kedgeree was modified by the addition of smoked haddock to the rice, and lentils were abandoned (Collingham 2005: 145).

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Mulligatawny points to a history of cultural exchange and a demonstration of how food linkages are entrenched with ideas of identity, class and race. It is yet another dish that the British in India hybridized—by adopting a local dish and adding other ingredients to it to make it a colonial dish. Mulligatawny soup is credited to the British settlers of Madras in Tamil Nadu and is a corruption of the Tamil words, “milagu-tannir”, meaning pepper water, a soup-like dish (Leong-Salobir 2011: 16–17). It has been suggested that it was during the years of the East India Company that British men in the 1700s (Yule and Burnell 1996: 595) modified the Indian pepper soup, adding chicken, beef, chicken or fish and fried onions and spices (Banerji 2007: 101). Like other colonial dishes, it evolved over the years and was transported to colonial Malaysia and Singapore. Ellice Handy’s recipe in Singapore’s first comprehensive cookery book, My Favourite Recipes (1960), is decidedly even more different than its original version. A chicken stock is prepared first, from fried garlic and onions and chicken bones. Coconut milk and tamarind juice are added to the strained stock. It is further enriched with cooked shredded chicken (Handy 1960: 212). As Modhumita Roy (2010: 67) points out, mulligatawny soup is a versatile and adaptable dish that can be upgraded with expensive meats and condiments or made simply with leftover meals. Roy states that mulligatawny has “an ability to move up or down the scale of snobbery—from the simple broth to a sophisticated, even extravagant, item of haute cuisine”. Roy’s premise of mulligatawny is “as an internecine skirmish within and among Anglo-Indians to define themselves. …It is … a story of class struggle at the level of the dinner table and it is a story, inevitably about gender” (Roy 2010: 67). The story of mulligatawny is quite different in twentieth-century Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore, however. Despite claims that Australian society was largely egalitarian, there is no dispute that class distinctions were transferred from the English system, based on wealth, property and land ownership. Australia was self-sufficient in meat, fruits, vegetables, wheat and sugar, and exported much of these at the end of the nineteenth century. By the 1900s, the majority of people in colonial Australia were predominantly middle class and for whom cookery books were written. The majority of these cookery books almost always feature mulligatawny soup, from its simplest Indian peppery soup to hearty ones replete with a variety of meats. Most list two versions of the soup. A small section of upper class existed—it was presumably these elites who dined at The

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Australia Hotel in Sydney where dinner menus were in French. A peruse of the hotels menus did not yield a single mention of mulligatawny soup. The Goulburn Cookery Book, published in Sydney in its second edition in 1905, lists a heartier one requiring one “fowl”, bacon or ham, a teaspoon of curry powder, a teaspoon of curry paste, among other condiments. The soup is strained, and diced breast meat is added. Author Jean Forster Rutledge recommends serving it with rice and suggests that other meats like veal and mutton can be substituted with chicken. The second soup includes an apple, an onion, a carrot, a teaspoon of curry powder, a tablespoon of flour and butter. Again the soup is strained before serving, with boiled rice (Rutledge 1905: 6). The mulligatawny soup recipe from The Coronation Cookery Book (1978) has more ingredients than usual in its fourteenth edition. The ingredients include a litre of stock, 30 grams of butter, two teaspoons of curry powder, a tablespoon of flour, a turnip, half a teaspoon of curry paste, 30 grams of ham, an onion, an apple, a carrot and lemon juice. Mulligatawny also comes under the “purees” section of The Schauer Australian Cookery Book (1975: 82) where ingredients cooked in the soup (onion, banana, apple, curry powder, chutney, pepper, sugar and salt) are rubbed through a sieve. Lemon juice and cooked rice are mixed with the pulp and liquid, pressed into egg cups, turned out and served in the centre of soup plates. The dish is named as “curry puree” (mulligatawny). The regular version of mulligatawny soup recipe is also given, using onion, apple, chutney and seasonings (Schauer 1975: 86). Mulligatawny soup recipes in Australia were present in cookery books up to the 1980s. The Golden Wattle Cookery Book, in its 27th 1984 edition, featured it among other soups, including brown vegetable soup, kangaroo tail soup (recommends to follow the same recipe as for ox tail soup) and oyster soup. By the late 1980s, the soup started fading away. There were seven curry recipes, no mulligatawny soup, in the 1988 The Australian Heritage Cookbook. Something happened from the 1990s—perhaps it was the increasing number of Asian restaurants with spicy laksas on the menu that lured diners away from mulligatawny.

Adaptation and Appropriation Barbara Santich, in her Preface to In the Land of the Magic Pudding: A Gastronomic Miscellany, wrote,

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Assuming that Australians inherited and unthinkingly applied British traditions they allow no credit for originality, ingenuity and independent thinking. We may have perpetuated the baked (or roast dinner), but we added pumpkin and sweet potato to the vegies around the joint of meat. We continued to bake scones, but we also deep-fried them to make puftaloons, and served them with golden syrup. We took a standard lemon curd recipe and substituted passionfruit, to produce passionfruit curd. While we might have inherited, we also adapted. (Santich 2000: xiii)

Pufftaloons 2 cups flour 2 teaspoonfuls baking powder 1 cup milk 1 dessertspoon butter Sift dry ingredients, rub in butter, make a dough with milk, roll out lightly and very thinly, cut into rounds. Have ready plenty of boiling fat in pan, fry golden brown; drain on paper. Serve very hot with golden syrup or jam (Coronation Cookery Book 1978: 185). Adaptations can turn out some culinary oddities. Curried bananas is such a dish which did not seem to survive in subsequent editions of Coronation Cookery. Curried Bananas Ingredients: 6 green bananas, ½ cup desiccated coconut, ½ pint milk, 1 egg, 2 tablespoons curry powder, 1 teaspoon sweet chutney, 1 teaspoon sugar, a little cayenne and salt. Put the coconut in a basin, pour milk over it, let stand for 1 hour, then put in saucepan with other ingredients. Peel and slice bananas and add to the curry. Simmer for 10 to 15 minutes and, just before serving, beat up the egg and stir in. Serve hot with boiled rice. (Coronation Cookery 1978: 68) On the same page is a recipe for “Singapore fruit curry”—the only ingredient that is possibly Singaporean is “juices from canned pineapples”. The other fruits called for are apricot, peaches, pears and cherries. Other ingredients are tomato sauce, curry powder and chutney. It is curious why the descriptor “Singapore” was used. One is tempted to surmise the con-

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notation of “Singapore” in the Australian imagination can be seen as something exotic or “oriental”, ideas of Australian familiarity with its near neighbour. Singapore was the first port of call for baby boomers in their backpacking travel days en route from Australia to Europe in the 1970s. Universally, tourism in the twentieth century has been attributed to effecting the large-scale changes of taste (Fernandez-Armesto 2002: 138).

References Abbott, Edward. 1864. The English and Australian Cookery Book: Cookery for the Many as Well as for the Upper Ten Thousand. London: Sampson Low, Son, and Marston. Adams, Virginia. 1921. Chinese Foods Are Tasty When Properly Prepared. The Evening Star, The China Press Inc, 9 December. Appadurai, Arjun. 1988. How to Make a National Cuisine: Cookbooks in Contemporary India. Comparative Studies in Society and History 30: 3–24. Ballantyne, Tony. 2014. Mobility, Empire, Colonisation. History Australia 11 (2): 7–37. Banerji, C. 2007. Eating India: An Odyssey into the Food and Culture of the Land of Spices. New Delhi: Penguin Books. Bannerman, Colin. 1996. A Friend in the Kitchen: Old Australian Cookery Books. Kenthurst: Kangaroo Press Pty Ltd. Bickers, Robert. 1999. Britain in China. New York: Manchester University Press. ———. 2004. Empire Made Me: An Englishman Adrift in Shanghai. London: Penguin Books. Burton, D. 1993. The Raj at Table. A Culinary History of the British in India. London: Faber & Faber. Burton, David. 2004. Curries and Couscous: Contrasting Colonial Legacies in French and British Cooking. In Gastronomic Encounters, ed. A. Lynn Martin and Barbara Santich, 49–61. Brompton: East Street Publications. Calder-Marshall, R., and P.L.  Bryant. 1916. The Anglo-Chinese Cook Book. Shanghai: The Commercial Press. Chaudhuri, N. 1992. Shawls, Jewelry, Curry, and Rice in Victorian Britain. In Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance, ed. Nupur Chaudhuri and Margaret Strobel. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Collingham, L. 2005. Curry: A Biography. London: Chatto & Windus. Collingham, Lizzie. 2017. The Hungry Empire: How Britain’s Quest for Food Shaped the Modern World. London: Bodley Head. Davis, John Francis. 1836. The Chinese: A General Description of the Empire of China and Its Inhabitants. London: Charles Knight. Davison, Julian. 2008. Questionnaire Response to Author, February 15.

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E., Mrs. 1979. Advice to a Young Lady in the Colonies: (being a Letter Sent from Mrs E. of England to Maria Macarthur in the Colony of N. S. Wales in 1812) Collingwood: Greenhouse Publications. Farrer, James. 2010a. Introduction: Food Studies and Global Studies in the Asia Pacific. In Globalization, Food and Social Identities in the Asia Pacific Region, ed. James Farrer. Tokyo: Sophia University Institute of Comparative Culture. ———. 2010b. Eating the West and Beating the Rest: Culinary Occidentalism and Urban Soft Power in Asia’s Global Food Cities. In Globalization, Food and Social Identities in the Asia Pacific Region, ed. James Farrer. Tokyo: Sophia University Institute of Comparative Culture. Fernandez-Armesto, Felipe. 2002. Near a Thousand Tables: A History of Food. New York: The Free Press. Franck, Harry. 1925. Roving Through Southern China. New York/London: The Century Co. Fulton, Margaret. 1976. The Margaret Fulton Crock-Pot Cookbook. Sydney: Paul Hamlyn. Handy, Ellice. 1960. My Favourite Recipes. Singapore: Malayan Publishing House. http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/austn-food-anddrink. Accessed 15 Nov 2017. Hudd, Sandra. 2015. From Orphanage to Entertainment Venue: Colonial and Post-­ Colonial Singapore Reflected in the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus. PhD Thesis. University of Tasmania. Humble, Nicola. 2005. Culinary Pleasures: Cook Books and the Transformation of British Food. London: Faber and Faber. Hutton, Wendy. 1989. Singapore Food, a Treasury of More Than 200 Time-Tested Recipes. Singapore: Time Books International. Kenney-Herbert, A.R. 1878. Culinary Jottings for Madras: A Treatise in Thirty Chapters on Reformed Cookery for Anglo-Indian Exiles. Madras: Higginbotham. Knipp, Peter A. 2003. The Raffles Hotel Cookbook, 2003. Singapore: Raffles Hotel. Lawler, Andrew. 2013. The Mystery of Curry. Slate (magazine), January 29. Leong-Salobir, Cecilia. 2011. Food Culture in Colonial Asia: A Taste of Empire. Abingdon/Oxon/New York: Routledge. Marschall, Sabine. 2008. The Heritage of Post-Colonial Societies. In The Ashgate Research Companion to Heritage and Identity, ed. Brian Graham and Peter Howard, 347–363. Aldershot: Ashgate. Maze, Lady Laura G., and V.G. Bowden. 1940. Bon Appetit: Secrets from Shanghai Kitchens. Shanghai: Publisher not listed. Medhurst, W.H. 1873. The Foreigner in Far Cathay. New  York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. Metcalf, Thomas. 2007. Imperial Connections: India in the Indian Ocean Arena, 1860–1920. Berkeley: University of California Press.

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Moran, F. A. 2017. Ordinary and Exotic: A Cultural History of Curry in Australia. Honours Thesis, University of Tasmania. Muskett, Philip E. 1893. The Art of Living in Australia. London: Eyre and Spottiswoode. Narayan, Uma. 1997. Dislocating Cultures: Identities, Traditions, and Third-­ World Feminism. New York: Routledge. Peet, George L. 1985. Rickshaw Reporter. Singapore: Eastern Universities Press Sdn Bhd. Ray, Krishnendu, and Tulasi Srinivas, eds. 2012. Curried Cultures: Globalization, Food, and South Asia. Berkeley: University of California Press. Roberts, J.A.G. 2002. China to Chinatown: Chinese Food in the West. London: Reaktion Books Ltd. Roy, Modhumita. 2010. Some Like It Hot: Class, Gender and Empire in the Making of Mulligatawny Soup. Economic & Political Weekly XLV (32): 66–75. Rutledge, Mrs Forster (Jean). 1905. The Goulburn Cookery Book. Sydney: W.C. Penfold. Santich, Barbara, ed. 2000. In the Land of the Magic Pudding: A Gastronomic Miscellany. Kent Town: Wakefield Press. ———. 2012. Bold Palates: Australia’s Gastronomic Heritage. Adelaide: Wakefield Press. Schauer, Amy. 1975. The Schauer Australian Cookery Book. Brisbane: W.R. Smith & Paterson Pty. Ltd. Sharp, Ilsa. 1981. There Is Only One Raffles: The Story of a Grand Hotel. Singapore: Souvenir Press Ltd. Swislocki, Mark S. 2001. Feast and Famine in Republican Shanghai: Urban Food Culture, Nutrition, and the State. PhD Dissertation, Stanford University. Swislocki, M. 2009. Culinary Nostalgia: Regional Food Culture and the Urban Experience in Shanghai. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Sydney Mail. 15 May 1935. The Commonsense Cookery Book. 1914. Compiled by the Public School Cookery Teachers’ Association of New South Wales. Sydney: Angus & Robertson. ———. 2013. Home Economics Institute of Australia (NSW Div). HarperCollins Publishers. The Coronation Cookery Book. 1978. Country Women’s Association of New South Wales, Australia. 14th ed. Sydney: CWA NSW. The Diamond Jubilee of the International Settlement of Shanghai. 1938. Shanghai: Post Mercury Company Fed. Inc. U.S.A. The Golden Wattle Cookery Book. 1984. Belmont: E.S. Wigg & Son Pty. Ltd. Thieme, J., and I. Raja. 2007. The Table Is Laid: The Oxford Anthology of South Asian Food Writing. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Yule, H., and A.C. Burnell. 1996. Hobson-Jobson: The Anglo-Indian Dictionary: A Spice-Box of Etymological Curiosities and Colourful Expressions. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions Ltd. (first published in 1886). Zlotnick, Susan. 1996. Domesticating Imperialism: Curry and Cookbooks in Victorian England. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 16 (2–3): 51–68.

CHAPTER 6

Restaurants, Cafes and Street Food

Fried Chilli Crab 3 whole uncooked crabs 4 fresh red chillies 3 cloves garlic small knob fresh root ginger 1 egg 2 teaspoons cornflour 1 tablespoon tomato sauce ½ teaspoon monosodium glutamate 1 teaspoon sugar 1 teaspoon vinegar 1 tablespoon peanut oil 4 oz. (100 ml) chicken stock Salt to taste Clean the crabs, discarding any grey or pulpy matter, and cut the crab including shell into small pieces. Heat oil in pan and fry 1 chopped clove of garlic with the crab for a couple of minutes. Add chicken stock, cover pan and simmer until crab is cooked (about 15 minutes). Pound the chillies, 2 cloves of garlic and ginger until fine. Add this, together with tomato sauce, monosodium glutamate, sugar, salt, cornflour, vinegar and beaten egg to the crab. Stir until sauce thickens, then serve garnished with lettuce. (Kenneth Mitchell. 1973. The Flavours of Singapore. Singapore: Four Corners Publishing Co)

© The Author(s) 2019 C. Leong-Salobir, Urban Food Culture, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6_6

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This recipe for fried chilli crab is from Cathay Restaurant, located in the Cathay Building, Dhoby Ghaut, Singapore, from the 1960s (Mitchell 1973: 36). The restaurant served mainly Cantonese meals at the time. The Singaporean tourism authority claims that the “world famous dish” started from a pushcart in 1956 by a husband and wife team, selling crabs cooked in tomato and chilli sauces along Kallang River. As the dish became popular, the couple opened a restaurant called Palm Beach (http://www.visitsingapore.com/en_au/dining-drinks-singapore/local-dishes/chilli-crab/. Accessed 14 September 2018). A chef from the Dragon Phoenix Restaurant modified the dish, using sambal (spicy prawn paste cooked with aromatics), tomato paste and eggs to create a rich thick gravy. This chapter highlights the emergence of the Chinese restaurant in the three cities, analysing its symbolic representation of Chinese culture, its place in Shanghai (sense of national identity), Sydney (sense of exoticism) and Singapore (sense of familiarity) between 1900 and 2000. I will discuss other types of dining-out venues, including European fine dining, cafes and street food. Food consumption in the public space such as restaurants, cafes, street stalls and others is a microcosm of the social fabric of a city. Restaurants represent the ethos of cities, regions, ethnic groups and even nations (Beriss and Sutton 2007).The vibrancy and dynamism of Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore can be attributed to the immigrants who arrived there from the 1850s. The different types of restaurants that emerged were a direct result of the waves of migration, as immigrants often found the restaurant business to be their only viable source of revenue (Smart 2003). Restaurants can be seen as homogenizing cultures globally when a fine dining restaurant is no more different to any other in any global city. McDonaldization has indeed rendered all stores under the McDonald’s brand identical in every city. Sydney’s first MacDonald’s opened in 1971; in Shanghai it was in 1994 and in Singapore, 1979. On the other hand, restaurants have also played an important role in reclaiming the local—in growing, supplying and cooking only local produce, adhering to local customs and foodways. Sydney’s multicultural population is reflected in its smorgasbord of restaurants. Similarly, Singapore’s gourmet dining venues, food markets, food halls and hawker centres are at the forefront of the city’s image. Although Shanghai residents had experimented with Western food from the nineteenth century, regional foods and native-place taste preferences continued into the twentieth century (Swislocki 2009: 25).

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While the concept of eating out had its genesis from the Roman Empire and Ancient China, it was not until the late eighteenth century that restaurants providing quality food and service became established as permanent venues for dining out. There are numerous antecedents of the restaurant as we know it today. There were the cook shops in medieval European cities that prepared food for the lower social classes, seventeenth-century coffee houses in London and eating places in bazaars, travellers’ inns and village kitchens in Europe and Asia (Finkelstein 2014: 7). In Europe, up to the fifth century, there were no inns or other forms of overnight accommodation for travellers (Andrieu 1956: 1). The first restaurant was opened in Paris in 1765. The myth that the end of the French Revolution was responsible for the rise of the restaurant has long since been debunked. It was held that the highly skilled unemployed cooks working for aristocratic families turned to cooking for the public. In fact, there were public eating places, from the twelfth century, where hot food was sold to the poor who had no kitchens (Finkelstein 2014: 8). Appearing first as “restorative” places in Paris in the 1760s, it was only in the late 1790s that “restaurant” became less associated with health tonics and more as a fashionable eatery (Spang 2000: 173). “Restaurant” was used interchangeably with inns, tables d’hôte and cook shops. By the nineteenth century, the terminology had finally firmed up to mean a public eating place with separate tables, individualized table settings and printed menus offering a wide range of dishes. Sociologist Krishnendu Ray’s major work on ethnic restaurants in New York City interrogates entrepreneurship at the street level, that is, the daily contact between immigrants and natives that produces the everyday sensorial cultures of cities. The Ethnic Restaurateur is based on interviews with immigrant restaurateurs, chefs and others as well as engaging with historical sources from newspapers, menus, recipes and guidebooks relating to twentieth-century New York City—engaging with “the immigrant restaurateur because s/he is the long-ignored hinge in the transaction in taste” (Ray 2016: 34). Historian Nicole Tarulevicz’ latest work on hawkers in Singapore reminds us of the central role played by hawkers or street food sellers in feeding the nation and the attendant benefits that flow from it. The latest response by the Singaporean government on the approaching slow death of hawking due to the ageing hawker population was to reinvent the hawker entrepreneur, or hawkerpreneur (Tarulevicz 2018). Various forms of intervention, control, persecution and regulation were adopted by both

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the colonial and present-day authorities. Hawkers or street food vendors were crucial in feeding twentieth-century Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore. The kinds of itinerant food vendors ranged from vendors selling food on foot from baskets, on tricycles, from portable charcoal stoves and on stools at street corners. Photographs and illustrations of Chinese men with two baskets of vegetables or cooked food balanced on a pole across his shoulders could be on a street in any of the three cities in the 1900s.

Dining Out in Shanghai As with migrants transplanted to other regions or indeed to new lands, arrivals to Shanghai from other provinces tried to replicate foods from their native place. From the 1850s, the population of Shanghai grew rapidly, from waves of domestic migration, notably from Guangdong, Zhejiang and Jiangsu, and internationally from Britain, France, the United States, Russia and Japan. By the twentieth century, Shanghai’s restaurants were the most diverse in China. The prosperous and glamorous image of Shanghai in the 1930s was served by the city’s large range of cosmopolitan restaurants. The 1933 Handbook for China described Shanghai’s dining-­ out venues, both the European restaurants and the different regional ones from all over China. Since Shanghai is one of the most cosmopolitan of cities, there are no restaurants serving food that can be said to be characteristic of Shanghai. …for Cantonese food, he (visitor) goes to Hang Fa Lau, at 526 Foochow Road. Da Ya Loo, at 231 Foochow Road, has an enviable reputation for its Peking food, while only a block north, Toa Loo Chuen, at 243 Hankow Road, and Siao Yu Tien, at 148 Hankow Road, tempt ones appetite with savory dishes of Szechuan and Fukien fare. The average dinner at any of these restaurants consists of four cold dishes, corresponding to hors d’ouvre, four preliminary hot dishes, ten main courses, four kinds of dessert, two of which are sweet, noodles, four dishes of meat or vegetables to accompany rice, and some kind of sweet gruel, generally made from almonds. There is one Cantonese restaurant on Nanking Road which serves a dinner costing $600. This provides food for the usual table of six persons and must be ordered days in advance. Apart the fact that the courses appear with a regular frequency that is ­apparently endless, each dish of this veritable banquet is an epicurean delight in itself. (Crow 1933: 147–148)

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As the city prospered in early twentieth century, many notable buildings were constructed in Shanghai. The Shanghai Pudong Development Bank was built in 1921, the Customs House was built in 1925 and the Peace Hotel was opened in 1929. Trading previously as the Cathay Hotel in 1928, its restaurant was on the top floor. Living up to Shanghai’s name as a glittering and ostentatious city, the Peace Hotel offered its contribution. At a banquet in its restaurant, a large fish dish came with two electric lights inserted in the fish’s head, powered by a battery (Roberts 2002: 42, quoting Ross Terrill). As Irene Corbally Kuhn wrote of her time as a journalist in Shanghai in the 1920s: We had a dazzling array of choices, for restaurants abounded and ranged from the elegant formality of the St. Petersburg, owned and managed by a former White Russian cavalry officer, to the small, dark, and steamy noodle shops of the old Chinese walled city. (Kuhn 1986)

There were numerous other Chinese restaurants that were probably frequented more by the Chinese than foreigners. These were the Lao Yung Shun (Old Splendor), located near a famous temple and catered to temple visitors; the Te Hsing Kuan (Virtue and Glory Hall) was frequented by workers from the surrounding market areas. Other restaurants included the Lin Fu Chai (Lin’s Blessed Vegetarian Restaurant), Yi Chi Fu Hsing (The Righteous Reprospering), the Yung Chiang Chuang Yuan Lou (Imperial Scholar’s Pavilion of Yung Chiang), the Fu Ch’un (Blessed Spring) Tea House and the Food Service Organization of Shanghai. Along Foochow Road, wrote C.E. Darwent, is the Piccadilly of China. Here are the large and fashionable opium shops, which are open to inspection; they are the large square buildings next to the Shantung Road crossing. Here also are the Cantonese tea houses, with wonderful carved fronts; and the fashionable restaurants, where a first-class Chinese dinner may be sampled. (Darwent 1911: 18–19)

Shanghainese cuisine, highly seasonal and featuring both salt water and freshwater fish, was influenced by Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Huangshan culinary principles. Fried green onion noodles, slow-braised bok choy and cold braised little fish with green onions were some of the local dishes served in restaurants (Phillips 2016: 73). Dishes were braised, steamed, sautéed, fried in batter or grilled. Ginger, sugar, Shaoxing wine and soya were used

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extensively in sauces (Pan et al. 1998: 149). Other dishes were Sichuanese, Cantonese, Muslim and there were also Western influences within the Chinese kitchen. Shanghai breaded pork steak came with a Shanghai sauce (Lea & Perrins), served with potato salad in mayonnaise. Those who preferred cosmopolitan meals could choose from a large number of non-Chinese restaurants in the city. To the casual visitor to Shanghai, however, it is the infinite variety and number of cafes and restaurants that prove the measure of Shanghai’s cosmopolitan nature. In picturesque little Japanese houses one may have sukiyaki, eaten with chop sticks of course, and sake, served by charming little figures in bright flowered kimono. At various Russian restaurants hours slip by in the endeavor to survive and surmount those innumerable strange but delicious courses beginning with zakouska and the inevitable vodka, and ending with plombier, that triumph of Russian culinary art. Hidden away in one of the oldest sections of the city is an Italian restaurant where those with a zest for spaghetti and chianti and Verdi may indulge their particular weaknesses. German, French, Spanish, Austrian and Turkish restaurants or cafes are to be found, to say nothing of American restaurants which advertise ham and eggs and freshly percolated coffee. (Crow 1933: 147–148)

Shanghai in the Republican years (1912–1949) went through a period of plenty and scarcity, of feast and famine. There was no shortage in choice of restaurants to eat at. As Xu Guozhen in his 1933 guidebook, Shanghai shenghuo (Shanghai living), wrote (as quoted by Swislocki 2001): Provided you have the money, if you want to eat foreign cuisine, go to a Western restaurant, and if you want Chinese, then it’s even easier, what with Cantonese cuisine, Yunnanese cuisine, Fukienese, Sichuanese, Anhui, Beiping, and so on and so forth – just take your pick. Moreover, if you want a full meal, you can go to a big restaurant (caiguan), you want a snack, go to a small one, and if you want to eat cheap, go to a small food shop (fandian). (Swislocki 2001: 1)

The dining-out culture in Shanghai declined in the Communist years, as elsewhere in China. Restaurants were nationalized, and trade with the West was curtailed. Decades later, Shanghainese food became prominent again after the economic reforms were introduced between the 1980s and 1990s. Restaurants went hand in hand with the new Shanghai lifestyle. The emerging cuisine that resulted from Shanghai’s rising wealth and outside influences gave rise to a new name—benbang, translated as “nouvelle cuisine”, not unlike fusion cooking (Lin-Liu 2009: 220–221).

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Western restaurants were not only for foreigners, as middle-class Shanghainese families also liked dining out on European meals (Gao 2013: 262). To sample Western food, the wealthy would go to the Palace Hotel, situated at the corner of Nanjing Road and the Bund (Pan 1992: 45). The Palace Grill Room at the hotel was known to offer “a cuisine which is reputed to be the best in the Far East and a choice of wines for the most exacting” (Advertisement in The Diamond Jubilee of the International Settlement of Shanghai. Shanghai, Post Mercury Company Fed. Inc. U.S.A. 1938). The Palace Tea Lounge, advertised in the same publication, “is rightly referred to as Shanghai’s Rendezvous for in this charmingly appointed eighteenth century style room the Elite of Shanghai delight to congregate”. There were also the Russian restaurants in the lanes along Avenue Joffre (present-day Huaihai Road, Central), Massenet Road (present-day Nanchang Road). Many restaurants in contemporary times grow their herbs and vegetables in their own gardens around the premises for social, economic and environmental reasons. In Shanghai, in the early decades of the twentieth-century, the six-storey Palace Hotel was already growing its own restaurant vegetables in its own kitchen garden “under European supervision” (Bickers 2004: 44, citing Wright 1908: 688). The location of restaurants and the importance in Shanghai of regional cuisines depended on the prominence and economic activity of those residents from the regions. Goodman gives the following example from a 1937 guide, The Key to Shanghai (Shanghai menjing) (Goodman 1995: 22). As Anhui people formed the majority of the clerks in the Shanghai pawnshop trade, Anhui restaurants sprung up to cater to them. Thus, the proliferation of Anhui restaurants was in direct proportion to the existence of the numerous pawnshops. At the same time, restaurants were differentiated by regional cuisines rather than socio-economic status of their customers. Within a building, many restaurants served food at different prices. Cheap dumplings or noodles were located on the ground floor, medium-range priced food was on the second floor and expensive and elegant banquets were in private rooms on the top floor. Goodman notes that “this gustatory model of all classes together under one sojourning native-place roof serves as a metaphor for the nested social layers of the broader urban regional communities” (Goodman 1995: 29). From the early twentieth century, local Shanghai cooking, known as benbangcai (local cuisine or our people’s food), was distinct from other regional Chinese cuisines in the city. Benbangcai was served in food shops or fandian. Shanghaicai is a term used in later years, denoting cuisine

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relating directly to the city. Shanghaicai was sold in family-type restaurants and 1930s-style Old Shanghai theme restaurants. Swislocki points out that these restaurants constitute two dimensions of a new food trend in Shanghai that have been shaped and animated by broader social processes. These include reform period economic policies and ideologies that have changed the structure of Shanghai society and reevaluated Shanghai’s historical contributions to the development of the Chinese economy and Chinese history more generally (Swislocki 2009: 220–221). Shanghai guidebooks and restaurant chefs encouraged more “exotic” tastes and promoted Guangdong and Sichuan food as fashionable to Shanghainese. Guangdong restaurants were seen as appealing, but most Shanghai residents could not afford them. Nor could they understand the fancy names of menu dishes named, such as “phoenix claws”, “tigers”, “dragons” and “sea dogs”. Cantonese food was generally seen as delicious and acceptable to most palates, but Anhui and Ningbo cuisines were not so popular (Goodman 1995: 23). Two leading Chinese department stores, Wing On and Sincere (owners originally from Sydney), on Nanjing Road, had restaurants specializing in banquets of Chinese food. It was common for banquets to serve up to 500 meals. It was said that the number of meals served could be as high as 2000. All the large, luxury hotels, notably the Cathay, offered European cuisine. The French Club was seen as serving the most sophisticated cuisine (Kuhn 1986). The arrival of Western food culture to Shanghai towards the end of the nineteenth century helps to promote Shanghai as China’s modern and cosmopolitan city and at the same time as needing traditional family structures (Swislocki 2009: 220). The Republican period seen as a “renaissance of regional Chinese food provided city residents with a template for imagining a national Chinese culinary heritage”. Although the Chinese Communist Party’s mission was to make Shanghai a model of socialist industrial development, its members were supportive of its culinary history, including “the distinctive historical foodstuffs of the neighbourhood of the City God Temple” and the offerings of the city’s excellent chefs. Swislocki (2009: 220) notes that in the post-Mao period from 1976 onwards, Shanghai residents enjoyed a variety of local cooking that was served in two kinds of restaurants, the jiachang, or family-style restaurants, and the high-end Old Shanghai theme restaurants that harked back to the 1930s.

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Shanghailanders and other Westerners were well catered for dining out. Advertisements appeared in guidebooks to the city as well as newspapers. Venus Cafe was the “most outstanding cabaret in town. All food is prepared in a model kitchen under scrupulous conditions of cleanliness” (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 50). The Ambassador Ballroom on 745 Avenue Edward Seventh provided “superb dance music, good food and pure liquors”. The Vienna Garden Ballroom on Majestic Road also advertised its “first class catering” (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 75). The Astor House, founded by D.C. Jansen, had 211 rooms and seven suites and had a French chef on the premises. The Hotel de France, on 36 Rue Montauban, near the Rue Du Consulat, advertised its “international cuisine” overseen by a French chef. Grand Hotel Kalee Limited on 25A Kiange Road served “First Class” cuisine prepared by a Swiss chef. Other restaurants featured in a 1920 handbook for Shanghai included the Shepherd’s Pension and Dining Rooms on 33–35 Kiangse Road, Carlton Café on 4–6 Ningpo Road and the Royal Tea and Dining Room on 18 Nanking Road. Afternoon teas were served at the following places: The Scotch Bakery on 8 Nanking Road, Sullivan’s on 11 Nanking Road, C. Bianchi’s on 97 Szechuen Road, Sweetmeat Castle on 36 Nanking Road and Marcell’s on Szechuen Road (Darwent 1911: viii–ix). The Cathay Hotel featured tea dances and dinner dances, while in winter, the Astor House Hotel hosted tea dances. The Palace Hotel offered concerts during the tea and dinner hours. The Majestic Cafe featured the largest cabaret in Shanghai (All About Shanghai and Environs 1934: 77–78). In the 1940s, there were cafes for all nationalities. Marcel, a French cafe on the corner of Avenue Joffre and Yates Road, served cakes and tea. The Italian cafe, Bianchi, on Nanking Road served cakes, including little finger rolls with foie gras. There was also the German Café Fédéral on Bubbling Well Road. The Chocolate Shop, an American restaurant on Nanking Road, served cakes, ice cream, sundaes, hamburgers and club sandwiches. The Scottish bakery sold scones, pancakes and haggis and was particularly popular with mainly the Scottish ship’s masters (Cook 1985). For the foreigner wishing to dine out on Chinese meals in Shanghai in the 1930s, there were no restaurants that could be said to be representative of such a cosmopolitan city. Taking a small section of the area around Foochow Road, the diner could choose Cantonese food at Hang Fa Lau, at 526 Foochow Road; Peking food at Da Ya Loo, 231 Foochow Road; Szechuan food at Toa Loo Chuen, 243 Hankow Road; and Fukien food at Siao Yu Tien, 148 Hankow Road (a block north of Foochow Road). A typical dinner

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at any of these restaurants consists of four cold dishes, four starter hot dishes, ten main dishes, four dishes of meat or vegetables with rice, a sweet gruel usually made from almonds and four kinds of desserts (Crow 1933: 148). Thousands of “white” Russians had fled to Shanghai after the Russian Revolution. Settling in the French Concession, the Russians opened tiny cafes along Avenue Joffre, serving cream cakes and chocolate (Crow 1933: 139). In the 1980s, a former Russian bakery became state-owned and produced the same cakes topped with fresh cream, and there were also pastries (Cheng 1986: 649). Other restaurants in the older sections of Shanghai included Italian, German, French, Spanish, Austrian and Turkish. The American restaurants advertised ham and eggs and freshly percolated coffee. The Park Hotel in the 1940s served afternoon tea in the Sky Terrace Hall in the fourteenth floor. It was a popular venue for the well-to-do and businessmen. Among its 1946 menus, the Park Hotel restaurant offered a variety of Western and Asian meals. Among them were chicken tea with abalone, mock turtle in sherry, lobster thermidor, roast turkey and ham, wild duck and fish maw soup, milk pigeon Oriental, partridge and chicken feet, curried chicken and rice and pork chop “Napolitaine” (menus sighted by author’s visit to Park Hotel on 25 May 2015). Several well-known restaurants and cafes in Shanghai started as humble food stalls in the laneways, the most popular being the Wang Jia Sha Snack Bar. Wang Jia Sha exists even today, on Nanjing Road West, serving noodles and meat buns, including xialongbao. In the days when schools and offices did not operate their own canteens, food stalls prepared meals for students and workers. Food for each meal was delivered to the customer’s home. The better ones even catered for festive meals for special occasions (You 1985: 137–138). One chef who had humble beginnings from a street stall and rose to celebrity status came not from Shanghai but from Singapore. Jereme Leung grew up in Singapore helping his grandparents selling wontons from an outdoor food market stall. Their food stall became so successful that they opened three more outlets in Singapore and later brought their business to Hong Kong (Lin-liu 2009: 223). Leung who had worked in restaurants around the world, including Singapore, started the famous Whampoa Club in Shanghai in the early 2000s. Prior to that, he spent years exploring and experimenting different ingredients and cooking methods from the different regions in China. Leung is credited with pioneering modern Chinese cuisine (http:// www.jeremeleung.com/JL_aboutus.html#. Accessed 24 August 2017).

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One eatery that provided flavoursome and cheap meals was one experienced by Ross Terrill. Eating at neighbourhood eating house on Nanjing Road in 1971: “food is excellent. It costs under Y3 for two. To remember what dishes to bring to what table, waiters fix a numbered clothespin on a bowl in the center of the table: ‘7’ is ‘noodles with fish’, ‘16’ is ‘chicken soup’ … Stacks of small red stickers hang on the walls. A notice says: if you have an illness, put a sticker in or bowl when finished, and special care will be taken when washing the bowl” (Roberts 2002: 115, quoting Ross Terrill).

Chinese Restaurants in Singapore Among the Chinese, food has been of paramount importance for millennia—with the ancient classics ranking food as the first of eight concerns of government. Legend has it that the founder of the Shang dynasty appointed his cook Yi Yin as the prime minister with the cooking cauldron as the principle symbol of government (Pilcher 2017: 9). Through the centuries, food has played a role in matters of state, philosophy, social hierarchies and medicine. As Jeffrey Pilcher notes, “Chinese agriculturalists have used cooking as a standard of civilization to distinguish themselves from the nomads living beyond the Great Wall. Savage tribes, such as the Ti to the north and the Jung to the west, supposedly ate raw meat or did not eat grain, violating rules of civilized dining” (Pilcher 2017: 11). A twentieth-century diner who wished to know the difference between Chinese hawker food and dining at a restaurant specializing in a particular regional Chinese cuisine restaurant could do well to check a comparison made by Tan Chee-Beng. Tan suggests that a standard Chinese restaurant cuisine may be compared to classical music—(a restaurant serving Shanghai food would want to conform to perceived standard of Shanghai food), the hawker food is like poplar music—it is dynamic, emphasizes t­ ransformation and is popular in taste. He adds that although certain hawker foods are now served in restaurants in major hotels, they are at much higher prices (Tan 2001: 134). In the 1950s and 1960s, four men, Tham Yew Kai, Sin Leong, Lau Yoke Pui and Hooi Kok Wai, became known as master chefs and established famous Chinese restaurants in Singapore. Known as the four heavenly kings of Cantonese cuisine, the four met when they worked at the Cathay Restaurant. The Cathay was considered the most prestigious Chinese restaurant in Singapore from the 1950s. The four were trained by the grandmaster chef, Luo Chen. They are also credited with inventing

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the famous Singapore dishes: chilli crab (among many “inventors” of this dish as mentioned at the beginning of this chapter), yam ring and yu sheng (fresh fish salad for Chinese New Year) (https://sethlui.com/best-dimsums-singapore-guide/, accessed 13 May 2018). In 1962, the four went their separate ways. Tham and Lau started a small restaurant in Tiong Bahru. Hooi and his wife opened a 20-table restaurant at the Metropole Cinema (the present Fairfield Methodist Church). Sin started a cooking school in Geylang with his wife. There, Sin experimented with the use of spices and the making of sauces from a Malay cuisine chef and a Western cuisine chef, respectively. Sin also ran a mobile kitchen, using a modified van, selling at Kallang. He started the Sin Leong Restaurant in 1965 and had three branches by the 1980s. His famous creations were the USA duck, crystal prawn and Siamese Chicken. Hooi started the Dragon Phoenix Restaurant in 1963. In the 1970s, the four chefs established the Red Star Restaurant (http://gastronautdiary.blogspot.com/2011/08/ masterclass-with-sin-leong.html. Accessed 14 September 2016). The consistent quality of the Dragon Phoenix and Red Star has ensured that the two restaurants are open even today. Red Star and Dragon Phoenix are run by the remaining chefs of that gained fame and multiple culinary awards in the 1970s. “USA duck” was created by Sin Leong in 1978 after a visit to the United States. He concocted a special sauce to accompany the crispy duck. Sin Leong also introduced the crystal prawn dish, so-named due to its semitransparent, crunchy texture. Both these dishes were served at Red Star Restaurant which was founded by the four in 1974 at Chin Swee Road (http://gastronautdiary.blogspot.com/2011/08/masterclass-with-sinleong.html. Accessed 14 September 2016). Around this time, the Great Shanghai Restaurant in the Mayfair Hotel Building on Armenian Street served northern Chinese cuisine, specializing in bird’s nest soup with shredded chicken and shark’s fin soup with crab roe (Mitchell 1973: 8). In the 1950s, dining out for Chinatown residents at restaurants was reserved for birthdays or weddings. Tai Thong Restaurant was such a restaurant for celebratory meals. The restaurant could seat 15 banquet tables. A wedding banquet table would cost about $30. There was also a tea house and restaurant at the high-end Nam Tin Hotel. Family feasts were celebrated here (Notes from Chinatown Heritage Centre, Singapore, March 2017). Dishes or meals constantly evolve, new recipes are created, recreated and appropriated. Through experimentation with new ingredients and cooking methods as well as from other cultures, new recipes emerge. Although the four chefs had parted ways in the business, they met frequently and discussed

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ways to create new dishes. One incentive was on how to make more money for Chinese New Year, a major celebration in Singapore. Hooi and his wife suggested ways of a creating raw fish dish with fresh vegetables, named yu sheng, for the occasion. The four agreed on a raw fish dish. It is claimed that these four chefs created the dish, but the earliest known written record of the dish can be traced to 823 BCE during the Zhou dynasty. It became so popular after the Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE) that Chinese scholars such as Cao Zhi wrote poems praising the dish. The dish almost disappeared in China towards the end of the Qing dynasty, and was eaten only in the southern parts of Guangzhou and Chaozhou. On Chinese New Year 1964, the fish dish, yu sheng, was launched simultaneously in the four restaurants. It was not greeted well, and with tinkering the recipe and six years later, the dish took off. Raw fish, often smoked salmon, was sliced thinly and presented with thinly shredded vegetables and many herbs and spices. However, others dispute this timeline, as Chia Yee Kwan, in his oral interview with Singapore National Archives, stated that he first tasted the dish in the 1950s at the Meng Gei restaurant. Chia also pointed out that hawker stalls and coffee shops also served the fish dish, usually with radish and carrot (Chia Yee Kwan, Accession No. 002381).

Chinese Restaurants in Sydney Chinese market gardeners and cooks in twentieth-century Sydney had previous lives as miners and workers in the goldfields of New South Wales. Many of these men had left Guangzhou destitute, in search of riches ­overseas. Some of these, with savings from labouring in the goldfields or other work, tried their hand in the Chinese restaurant business. Sydney’s first eating houses were in The Rocks where Chinatown was initially located—close to the wharves with provisions and new incoming groups of hopeful gold “miners”. The eating houses catered to boarders in the area and patrons of the gambling houses. In the 1950s, above the 56 Dixon Street grocery store that Say Tin Fong owned, he also had a boarding house; he eventually converted the five-storey building into 92 rooms (Shun and Aitkin 1999: 129; Fitzgerald 2008). Many of the boarders were retired cooks and gardeners, unable to return to China due to the China’s closed door policy at the time, from the 1950s for about 20 years. China’s borders opened in 1973, and family members in China were able to join the elderly men in Sydney (Shun and Aitkin 1999: 131). The White Australia Policy drove the number of Chinese down to 6600 in the 1940s and about 3300 in Sydney. The policy dictated that the Chinese and other

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non-white people could stay in the country if they had merchant status. Many Chinese ran import and export businesses, and food was a popular trade item (Shun and Aitkin 1999: 130). The Chinese restaurants from the 1930s made their presence felt among the general population. An article encouraging readers to dine out at “foreign” restaurants was headlined, “All the World’s Fare in Australia: Foreign Restaurants for Adventurous Diners” (Smith’s Gourmet 1939: 12). The author posed a question to the reader, illustrating the meals consumed at the time: “[T]ired of the beefsteak and kidney pie, the plum pudding and the jelly and cream which decorate Australian menu?” He or she then suggested, “[T]hen come with me and eat cheaply and well at any one of a dozen foreign restaurants in Sydney or Melbourne”. The author noted that at the Chinese cafes, “shark’s fin soup, beche de mer soup, and bird’s nest soup are traditional delicacies, but they are not to be recommended to the novice diner”, describing bird’s nest soup “as nothing so much as shredded gelatine incompletely dissolved in lukewarm chicken broth”. Smith’s Gourmet then went on to authoritatively and, at times, erroneously, recommend and comment: if you wish to be respected by the Chinese cooks don’t order chow mein or chop suey. They are what the Chinese thought up especially for Occidentals. Dim sims, mixtures of minced meat, prawns, and vegetables steamed in flour-and-water envelopes, are also regarded with some disfavor by the Chinese. To order them in a good café is comparable to asking for a ­fourpenny hot pie in the restaurant of the Hotel Australia. Long soup and short soup are chicken broth with vegetables and noodles. These noodles are for all the world the counterpart of Italian spaghetti. … The dim sim, too, has a close resemblance to Italian ravioli. … After your soup will come fried rice, very like risotto with its scraps of prawn, vegetables, chicken, pork, and eggs, or you will have bor lor kai, chicken fried in batter and served with a sauce of pineapple and ginger or chicken and almonds or a prawn or oyster omelette. Lightly fried lean pork or fresh fish are also served with the sweet and pungent sauce that accompanies the chicken in bor lor kai. Ducks and pigeons are excellently cooked by the Chinese. You may have them roasted on spits over glowing charcoal, or boned and braised with mushrooms, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, young onions and Chinese seasonings. Some restaurants served a splendid dish called chun goon. This dish consisted of prawns, pork, chicken and vegetables, fried in egg batter roll. Your meal in a Chinese restaurant will cost from 2/- to 20/-, according to your tastes. (Smith’s Gourmet 1939: 12)

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The Shanghai Café and Peking Café became the earlier restaurants that were patronized by both the Chinese and the general public. The Shanghai Café/Chinese Chop Suey House and Restaurant, on 65–67 Campbell Street, had a Western restaurant on the ground floor and a Chinese one on the upper floor. The Nanking Restaurant opened in 1949 and became the largest Chinese restaurant in Sydney in the 1950s, taking up two floors, furnished sparsely with bare wooden tables. The more expensive dishes included shark’s fin or abalone. Other restaurants at the time were the Tientsin Café and Harry Sing, both lasting until the 1950s. The Bamboo Restaurant in King Street catered to non-Chinese with staples such as chop suey and sweet and sour dishes. By the 1960s, most of these restaurants had closed and were quickly replaced by the New Dixon Restaurant, the Mandarin and the Sun Ah.

The Buying and Selling of Street Food In France, from the thirteenth century, different kinds of food traders sold cooked meats and other food in the streets, but these were not consumed on the premises but taken elsewhere. At the “goose-cooks” or coquinarii, cuisiniers (cooks) sold boiled or roast beef, mutton, pork, lamb, kid, pigeon, capon and goose. In 1292, there were 21 cuisiniers selling cooked meat. In 1467, the guild of cuisiniers were split into two categories, the rôtisseurs or cookshop keepers, and chaircuitiers-saulcissiers or ­cooked-­meat and sausage vendors. The present-day charcutier is derived from chaircuitiers-saulcissiers. There were also the poulaillers or poulterers who sold cooked game. Travelling vendors in Paris continued to sell cooked meat, chicken, goose or mutton rissoles and fried potatoes until the beginning of the twentieth century (Andrieu 1956: 3–4). Easy access to street meals, affordable prices and the wide-ranging flavours of street food have increased and expanded the culinary offer of this form of consumption. Migrants or itinerant workers to cities are usually confronted with the lack of time for cooking and the long working hours, and the time and the lack of cooking facilities find street food a necessity (Vázquez-Medina et al. 2016: 141–142). Poor immigrants from abroad and within the country to a city found selling street food a viable means of livelihood. Relatively low capital was needed in terms of overhead and equipment costs. Vendors usually sold one or two dishes or snacks. Aside from the economic interests, itinerant food vendors enjoyed the social space which they shared with other vendors as well as their customers. At the same time, tension always existed between street vendors and the local government.

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In Singapore, there was a tug-of-war between the colonial authorities and the street hawkers. Hawkers were seen as obstructers to traffic flow and for transmitting diseases through unhygienic food preparation. The independent Singaporean government overhauled street food and reorganized street stalls into modern gleaming food courts. In his work on pushcarts in New  York City between 1890 and 1940, Daniel M.  Bluestone discussed the coexistence of pushcarts and skyscrapers as a polarization of urban life between poverty and progress. He noted that various reform efforts to curb the pushcart markets “went hand in hand with xenophobic Americanization and immigration restriction campaigns directed at working-­class immigrants”. The push for eliminating street peddling was seen as enforcing working class practices to more middle-class norms (Bluestone 1991: 75).

Itinerant Food Vendors in Shanghai Before the mid-nineteenth century, there were no food markets in residential areas in Shanghai. Butcheries, fish and poultry shops were on the streets. Farmers and peddlers alike sold vegetables, from door to door, carrying their wares on shoulders from a pole and baskets (Jing 1985: 150). Lynn Pan, in her memoir of life in Shanghai, describes street vendors roaming the streets with particular cries or ditties, when she was a child (Pan 1992: 135). Pan describes “the itinerant cooks with their wheeled kitchens” selling cool fermented white rice, eggs stewed in brown tea, golden doughnut twists, roasted chestnuts, candied red applies, dates stuffed with nougat, fermented bean curd, noodles and dumplings. There were the sweet makers who blew boiled syrup into whatever shape was asked for—pig or bird, car or boat, leaf or gourd, fan or comb. The walnut porridge seller, on Route Winling or Wanping Road, sang (Pan 1992: 136): Duk! Duk! Duk! Sugared puree for sale Three catties of walnut, Four catties of shell. You have the nut, I’ll have the shell.

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Street vendors advertised their food wares through art and song too. Herbal pear syrup candy was a popular sweet, and sellers attracted customers by singing ballads accompanied by accordion playing. As a crowd gathered around the music and singer, the seller would display the different kinds of herbal pear syrup candy for sale (Wei Wei 1985: 107). Peddlers chanted whatever food snacks they were selling, roaming around alleyway houses, carrying their wares on their shoulder with a pole. Shanghainese bought boiled or fried noodles with ham, shrimp or chicken, sweet almond broth, sweet or savoury cakes with bean and pork or vegetable stuffings as snacks for in-between meals. Wontons late in the night were bought by residents by lowering a container and money from their upper floor houses to the ground. The containers were filled with hot wonton soup and the wontons filled with ingredients such as pork or shrimp and onions or mushroom (Lu 2004: 199). These peddlers also catered to Shanghainese’ fondness for season produce, such as new season sweet corn, sour plums, ginkgo nuts roasted on small portable stoves and spicy olives in winter. In summer, food hawkers sold ice, ice cream and water melon. Apart from selling snacks, peddlers also sold rice and vegetables from early morning (Lu 2004: 202–209). Mobile food carts carried on shoulders, on bicycles and three-wheelers contained red bean soup flavoured with sweet osmanthus flowers, sweet rice porridge with lotus seeds, spiced boiled eggs, soup with gluten and minced meat wrapped in bean curd sheets, wonton soup, noodles, sugared New Year cakes and deep-fried marinated bean curd cakes. The alleyways and little lanes bustled with peddlers hawking their food at all hours (Wei Wei 1985: 104–106). For women who did not work outside the home, shopping for fresh produce was a daily ritual. Some preferred to shop early in the morning to get the freshest vegetables and meat. Others who were thrifty went to the food markets in the evening, near closing time when vendors would sell their goods at cheaper prices Most of the dishes were a combination of vegetables and a smaller portion of sliced meat or fish (Feng 2009: 77). Most Shanghainese lived in shikumen dwellings, two- or three-storey brick houses set in rows along narrow alleys, as described in Chap. 3. When Shanghainese ate breakfast at home, it was usually paofan (plain rice, usually reheated leftover rice from the day before) and pickles (Lu 2004: 13). For others who could afford to purchase food from outside, they would buy sesame cakes, fried dough sticks, steamed bread, fried bread, glutinous rice cakes, noodle soup, wonton soup and soya bean milk from the sesame

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cake store and tiger store located within the neighbourhood. They could also visit the open-air food market known as the xiaoce shan (little food market) in the Shanghai dialect or xiao chang in Mandarin. “Little” refers to the type of food sold and not the size. The term food xiaoce (little food) is of Suzhou origin. The food market also sold meat, eggs, fish, bean products, vegetables and rice. Lu explains the term xiaoce also referred to homecooked foods, as distinct from restaurant foods (Lu 2004: 268). With origins from the southern Yangtze River, you tiao (fried dough sticks or Chinese crullers) has become popular as a breakfast and snack food in Singapore and, indeed, all over Asia. Also known as char kwei in Singapore and Malaysia, fried dough sticks had a rather ghoulish history. Legend has it that Yue Fei, a general in the Song dynasty, was falsely accused of a plot instigated by Qin Gui. It is said that Qin Gui was hated so much by people from the southern Yangzi River area that they made human-shaped bread to be fried and eaten (Feng 2009: 49–50). Writing in the early 1920s, Elizabeth Crump Enders described the food vendors’ paraphernalia as the traveling cafeteria, suspended on either end of a carrying pole is omnipresent. When needed, it is always to be found; a hot red stove is suspended from one end while a bamboo cabinet of cooked food and tea dangles from the other. On one shelf, perhaps, are steaming greasy crullers, vegetables and meat, on another, tea bowls and rice. Red candied crab apples strung on sticks may adorn its sides, and the rapping of the hollow bamboo and the peculiar cry of the food hawker are unmistakably prophetic sounds, often heard throughout the night. (Enders 1923: 19)

Lu Xun, one of China’s writers of the New Culture Movement, in his On the business in Alleys, observed that food vendors would move inside and outside the alleys around Zhabei (nowadays, site of the Shanghai Railway Station), crying out their snacks from day to night. He recorded about 30 different kinds of snacks (Feng 2009: 42).

From Food Stalls to Food Courts The foodscape for dining out in Singapore as in other global cities is in a state of transformation from the local to cosmopolitan. The typical neighbourhood comprises a heterogeneity of food outlets, from hawker stalls to

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fast food cafes, from gourmet restaurants to bistros (Bishop 2011: 63). The trajectory of how street food in Singapore developed is one of ramshackle, unplanned stalls sprouting up haphazardly in efficient and sanitized centres for food consumption. Hawker centres or food courts in shopping malls grew out of the early street food from the early days of colonizations when migrant labour arrived from around Asia. Hawker food and those who hawked it in Singapore now have an “an assured place in Singapore’s culinary history” (Duruz and Khoo 2015: 99). The new settlement of Singapore attracted many traders, using the port city as a base for their trade in neighbouring territories. The attraction of large numbers of immigrants to Singapore was triggered over three decades before with the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The expansion of steamship increased trade activities in primary products such as rubber, tin, copra and sugar. Singapore’s first modern industries in tin smelting, rubber processing and pineapple canning also happened at this time. The sizeable Chinese labour recruits were poor, with little prospects of work in China. They signed up to take a chance at making a sum of money before returning to China. By the mid-1920s, many had decided to make Singapore their permanent home. Migrants from the region and beyond flocked to the island. By the beginning of the twentieth century, Singapore had become the most cosmopolitan city in Asia. In 1911, the population was listed at 185,000. Seventy-five per cent of the inhabitants were Chinese; the rest were Malays from the peninsular, Sumatran, Javanese, Bugis, Boyanese, Indians, Ceylonese, Arabs, Jews, Eurasians and Europeans (Turnbull 1977: 91–97). They formed the bulk of the labour force. The highly regulated food courts, hawker stalls, canteens, coffee shops and restaurants in Singapore today had origins from the colonial government. The enforcement of health regulations in food preparation and the licensing of hawkers were initially put in place by the British rulers. It was the post-independence era, however, that saw the movement of street food off the streetscape and into shopping centres, housing units and other built-up structures. As historian Nicki Tarulevicz puts it, “[D]edicated and forceful regulation has reinvented the street food so synonymous with Singapore’s past. This journey moved from chaos to order, from itinerant sellers who walked the streets hawking goods, to tight regulation and indoor spaces” (Tarulevicz 2018: 174).

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An eatery that came from rural Singapore to the city was the sarabat stalls, operated by the Indian community. The stalls sold mainly drinks from rural Singapore and made their way to Orchard Road in the 1960s. Sarabat refers to the name of a ginger drink sold in the stalls. The sarabat stalls sold coffee, teh tarikh, bandung (rose water syrup with milk) and sarabat (ginger drink). Later, cold factory-manufactured drinks from Fraser & Neave came in and, from the 1970s, 7-Up became the drink of choice for the young. As the stalls along Orchard Road became popular, snacks like sugi biscuits (an Indian delicacy) and peanut biscuits (crushed peanuts combined with treacle) were sold. More substantial dishes like nasi lemak (rice and anchovies) cost about ten cents a packet in the 1960s. This was probably influenced by the Malay “boys” who were hired to help run the stalls. Sarabat stalls opened from four in the morning, and some remained open twenty-four hours, providing breakfast and lunch to workers, and later for people to snack before venturing to the nightclub Golden Venus, operated by the Orchard Hotel. Other areas where sarabat stalls were found included Newton, Waterloo Street, Bras Basah Road, Bencoolen Street East Coast Road and all over Katong. These stalls were frequented mainly by the Malay, Indian, Eurasian and Jewish communities (Vernon Christopher Cornelius Accession No. 001711). But patronizing the stalls had its dangers too. Street hawkers who sold a variety of meals and snacks faced surveillance from the colonial authorities on breaches of hygiene and food safety. In the early years of hawking, crockery was washed over open drains. The major concern was unhealthy food preparation and serving practices that led to outbreaks of gastrointestinal diseases such as cholera and typhoid. The first proposal for the control of hawkers was in a submission to the Colonial Secretary in 1931. There were moves to enforce hygiene standards in the selling of food and to ensure that hawkers were licensed (Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Hawker Question in Singapore. Singapore, 4 November 1931, page 1). While there were strong pronouncements to regulate street hawking, there were also statements made by officials who understood the need for the availability of cheap food for workers. One proposal stated: We most strongly emphasise the point that, in order to control hawking at all, it is absolutely necessary that all unlicensed hawkers should be driven off the streets. … We therefore recommend that the law be amended to empower any police officer to seize the paraphernalia and stock-in-trade of the unlicensed hawker, and take it to the nearest police station for confiscation by a responsible officer.

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R.J.  Farrer, president of the municipal commissioners, wrote to the Colonial Secretary that a largish proportion of the population of Singapore are at present living in circumstances which make procuring their raw food and cooking at home a practicable impossibility. These people depend upon the itinerant cooked food hawker who brings food to their doors. (Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Hawker Question in Singapore, page 37)

Farrer also pointed out that “coolies” classes who worked as loading coolies and in the godown (warehouse), as well as rickshaw pullers, lodged together in groups of four or five in a room. These labourers living at subsistence level would only get their first meal after they had finished their first job. Often, they could only access food from itinerant hawkers or a nearby food stall. Similarly, the rickshaw puller would be unable to leave rickshaw while in search of food (Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Hawker Question in Singapore, pages 37–38). The rickshaw pullers provided cheap public transport for both Shanghai and Singaporean residents. Originally developed in Japan in the 1860s, the rickshaw first appeared in Shanghai around 1873. Although the number of motor vehicles increased substantially on Shanghai roads from the early 1900s, rickshaws were seen as efficient in reaching narrow lanes. As well, taxis and cars were used mainly by the wealthy (Wright 1991: 84). Bullock carts, private carriages, pony carts, public “hack-gharries” and bicycles crowded the narrow streets of the town centre (Turnbull 1977: 111). The first consignment of rickshaws to Singapore came from Shanghai in 1880. By the twentieth century, their sheer numbers in being employed in a public space and at low cost spawned a street food culture in Singapore. The predominantly Chinese rickshaw pullers worked long hours, from early morning to late at night. By 1924, there were 28,800 rickshaws on the road, providing transport to every strata of society, from colonial administrators and other Europeans to Singaporean workers, school children and all who went about their business in the city. The colonial men usually drove about in horse and trap, with a syce. Some preferred to go to their offices in Raffles Square or nearby by rickshaw. J.B. Van Cuylenburg wrote that “to show their superiority, they had in addition to the puller a runner behind, whose head emerged immediately behind the sitter. This runner also had his value in that he pushed the ricksha up the many hillocks which beset the roads” (Van Cuylenburg 1982: 3).

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Chinese food hawkers with their baskets and stoves of food slung over the shoulders went where rickshaw pullers rested underneath trees by the roadside. For example, rickshaw pullers would gather under the shade of the flame of the forest trees by Raffles Square to sip hot coffee with hot buns from a Bengali hawker (Van Cuylenburg 1982: 27). Quickly slurping a bowl of noodles or devouring rice while squatting or on a stool provided by the vendor, kept the rickshaw pullers working all hours. All the meals were prepared on site. There were also outdoor hawker stalls where the food was cheap and wholesome. A notch up are the eating houses where the pullers could eat several courses more leisurely and chat over tea (Warren 2003: 194). It was in Chinatown and Rochore Road where rickshaw traffic was the heaviest, where many of the hawkers were located. Most of the night hawkers were from the Hock Chia and Hock Chew dialect groups, originally from the Fujian province (Warren 2003: 194). These two groups were engaged mainly as rickshaw pullers, carpenters, barbers, cooks and tailors. At one point, 50 per cent of the coffee shops in Singapore were operated by Hock Chews (Straits Times, Singapore. 4 May 2017, accessed 18 April 2018). Other workers, coal labourers and stevedores also ate from itinerant hawkers and from food stalls. R. Warren’s research revealed: The staple foods were rice, prepared as a porridge, congee, or fried with bits of pork or vegetables, and Chinese mee, a sort of noodle, which in a few minutes expert hawkers cooked for hungry coolies into an appetizing mixture of port, prawns, various vegetables and mee that was as colourful to look at as it was delicious. A chief source of protein was tofu, soya bean cakes, made to rejuvenate the strength of a puller who stopped for a timely snack. Bowl of bean curd from a street vendor … scalding hot snow-white bean curd, the vinegar, soy sauce, chilli pepper oil, and scallion tips gave off an absolutely wonderful smell…. Rice porridge was the favourite and rickshawmen ate when they rubbed shoulders with one another in the early hours of the morning at food stalls in the streets of their quarters. (Warren 2003: 196–197)

Hawkers matched their wares to the low incomes of the pullers. A filling meal sold by the Chinese hawkers was “economy rice”, rice served with choices of different vegetables or meat. When they could not afford a meal, a cup of coffee with milk was priced at two cents (three cents at a coffee shop). On the “five-footway”, satay was sold at two cents a stick and kwei teow (rice noodle) was three cents for a large plate. A substantial place of Hokkien mee

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was ten cents (Warren 2003: 198). One of Singapore’s signature dishes today, chicken rice, had origins from Hainan, the island province off southern China. The flesh of the bony wengcheng chicken was poached and served with rice, chilli and ginger sauces. Since then, the Hainanese chicken rice has had its recipe tweaked by Cantonese cooks. The chicken rice the hawkers served to rickshaw pullers was simply plain rice and boiled chicken (http://eresources. nlb.gov.sg/infopedia/articles/SIP_910_2005-01-11.html?s=chicken%20 rice. Accessed 12 May 2018). Not all rickshaw pullers bought street food. At the lodging houses where the majority of the pullers lived, there was usually a communal kitchen at the back. For those who chose to cook their own food (relatively cheaper than hawker food), they took turns in preparing meals, ­usually of rice and vegetables, in the afternoon or evening. They bought small quantities of food from fresh food hawkers nearby (Warren 2003: 196). It would seem that Singaporeans’ penchant for eating out today has beginnings from those early years of street food consumption by the workers who laboured in the construction of the island city. Tarulevicz states that regardless of income, more Singaporeans today are eating meals outside the home than in it. She adds that public foodscapes, sites of food purchase and consumption, have a meaning at both the personal and national levels and form a vital part of Singaporean life (Tarulevicz 2018: 174). The Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Hawker Question in Singapore 1931 report noted that among the Chinese hawkers, the Hokkiens formed the largest group, selling coffee and cooked food; then there were the Teo Chius, the Cantonese, Hockchias, Hockchius and Shanghainese. It stated that “every Cantonese thrown out of employment can be regarded as a potential hawker”. They usually sold cooked food, pork, vegetables, durian and mangosteen. They were usually found in large numbers in People’s Park, Park Road, Kreta Ayer district and Jalan Besar. Other non-Chinese hawkers mentioned in the report were the 230 licensed Malabar ice water sellers, the Javanese and Malay hawkers who sold satay, 100 North Indians and also about 500 Tamil Hindu hawkers. Much of the debate on health concerns centred on the low standards of hygiene in food handling. However, it was also acknowledged that the hawkers were not the only traders that were offenders. Municipal health inspections of the kitchens of food shops along Arab Street, coffee shops and the Southern Hotel indicated that their cleanliness was a problem. Further, it was noted that many hawkers sold food prepared in the “clean homes of Straits Chinese women” (Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Hawker Question in Singapore, pages 115–116).

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Prior to the 1990s, there was little mingling among the different groups with their distinct differences in language, religion and custom (Turnbull 1977: 65). These differences also meant that the food practices of each group were unique from backgrounds of food traditions. Many of the dishes that are deemed by Singaporeans as their national dishes were and are sold as street or hawker food. As discussed in Chap. 4, there are debates whether Singapore’s signature dishes are intrinsically Singaporean or have origins or association with other groups in the Asian region. Chinatown became known as Singapore’s “Black Hole” and “Chicago of the East” in the early 1900s. At the same time, the street markets, opera shows and cabaret dances helped to make it the heart of the city. A peculiar feature of colonial town planning in Chinatown was the five-foot way along the streets where market traders did a roaring business. Life in shophouses and in the streets below merged seamlessly. As in Shanghai, upper storey residents used contraptions to haul up bowls of noodles from street hawkers. Hawkers roamed the streets, carrying baskets on poles over shoulders, peddling bananas, star fruit and durian. Between the 1950s and 1960s, there were more than 1000 street stalls in Chinatown (Notes from Chinatown Heritage Centre, Singapore, March 2017). Hawker food to all appearances would seem the ultimate in culinary democracy—cheap food, catering to every major ethnic group, with religious dietary requirements adhered to. For example, Muslims consumed food from specially designated cutlery and crockery. However, there are groups that found no familiar foods from their homeland represented in hawker stalls. From the mid-1980s, there was an influx of foreign workers to Singapore in construction and domestic service. These included the Bangladeshis, Filipinos and Myanmarese. One of the main reasons for this is that hawker licences are granted only to Singaporean citizens and permanent residents (Tam 2017).

The Coffee Shop or kopitiam in Singapore The kopitiam or coffee shop probably arose from simple stalls in the village or street from the colonial period of mass immigration. The Chinese stalls sold different kinds of noodles and “economy rice”, set meals of rice with vegetables and various dishes such as salted eggs or fish (Lai 2010: 3). Later, roast meats became available. The Indian and Indian Muslims operated stalls selling breads of prata and thosai, rice with curries, noodles and

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coffee, tea and ginger drink (sarabat). These stalls are known as mamak food shop. In the areas where Javanese, Sumatrans, Boyanese, Bugis and Madurese settled, stalls catering to them sold rice dishes such as padang, rawan, jenganan (blanched vegetables served with peanut sauce and sometimes served with meat or chicken), lemak, sambal, spicy meat and vegetables and foods from their homelands (Lai 2010: 6). The kopitiam was not only for sustenance but for men to socialize, reading newspapers that were provided, chatting with each other or playing card games or chess. Lee Liang Hye states that “the furniture is also the old style, coffee shop type. The marble top, round table with the coffeeshop chairs. But Singapore food, as far as food in Singapore is concerned, as represented by Joo Chiat, it’s second to none” (Accession No. 002186). Lim Kee Chan remembers that “my father used to take me to Marine Parade, there was one coffeeshop. Thick coffee cup and the coffee was beautiful” (Accession No. 002068). Kopitiam operators included those Hainanese cooks previously employed by British households. Large numbers of the British left just before Japanese Occupation, and most of those remaining also left after the war and before independence. Apart from kopitiams, they also started bakeries and eating outlets. Those without capital opted to work as cooks and waiters in Western-style hotel restaurants, clubs and cafes (Lai 2010: 8). Lai’s study on the kopitiam of Singapore states that the core distinctiveness of Hainanese kopitiams and eateries was their foods. Drawn from their culinary backgrounds in work in European households, some dishes were hybridised creations with Hainanese-Western roots. The breakfast of specially brewed coffee with kaya-butter toast and half-boiled eggs with soya sauce was a development of the original British breakfast; Hainanese pork chops was a soya sauce- tomato-chilli version of Western pork chop; batter for fish and chips was enhanced with beer; and inche kabin chicken a curried version of fried chicken; new cakes with local fillings were gradually added to the range of traditional Western chocolate cakes, cream puffs and Swiss rolls; and Hainanese coffee merchants and kopitiam operators also developed their special recipes and distinctive forms of roasting coffee beans and brewing coffee. Other Hainanese eateries offered distinct Hainanese dishes such as chicken rice, curried chicken and beef noodles. The Hainanese kopitiams, bakeries and eateries, from the late 1920s onwards, may thus be credited with introducing to the public Hainanese, Western, Hainanese-recreated local foods for Western tastes and Western foods adapted for local palates, most of which have now become iconic or favourite Singapore foods. (Lai 2010: 9–10)

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Confectionary was sold by both hawkers and a few specialized shops. Ice-­cream shops were Joseph Baker’s, Molteni’s and da Silva’s Victoria Confectionery, all in Victoria Street. Joseph Baker, the proprietor, took orders for cakes, ices and drinks, assisted by his Hainanese “boys” (dressed in spotless white suits and Chinese pump shoes). Baker’s most popular items for sale were vanilla or raspberry ice-cream soda. Molteni’s also had another shop in Dhoby Ghaut. Another was the Victoria Confectionery owned by Claudio A. da Silva. These shops were open up to midnight (Van Cuylenburg 1982: 26). Chinese-run snack shops sold both confectionery and savouries. Kye Ming, a Chinese confectioner, was a caterer of tasty cakes, which were manufactured in a shop in Bras Basah Road. Kye Ming also had a group of hawkers selling his products from baskets. The hawker had charcoal stoves to keep the curry puffs warm and crispy. Jimmy, another retailer, sold ice cream, including one with durian flavour (Van Cuylenburg 1982: 27).

References All About Shanghai and Environs: A Standard Guide Book. 1934. Shanghai: The University Press. No author listed. Andrieu, Pierre. 1956. Fine Bouche: A History of the Restaurant in France. Trans. Arthur L. Hayward. London: Cassell and Company Ltd. Beriss, David, and David Sutton, eds. 2007. The Restaurants Book: Ethnographies of Where We Eat. New York: Berg. Bickers, Robert. 2004. Empire Made Me: An Englishman Adrift in Shanghai. Penguin Books. Bishop, P. 2011. Eating in the Contact Zone: Singapore Foodscape and Cosmopolitan Timespace. Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies 25 (5): 637–652. Bluestone, Daniel. 1991. Pushcart Evil. Journal of Urban History 18 (1): 68–92. Cheng, Nien. 1986. Life and Death in Shanghai. London: Grafton Books. Chia, Yee Kwan. 2000. Accession No. 002381. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. June 29. Cook, Christopher. 1985. The Lion and the Dragon: British Voices from the China Coast. London: Elm Tree Books. Cornelius, Vernon Christopher. 1995. Accession No. 001711. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Nov 21. Crow, C. 1933. Handbook for China. Kelly & Walsh, Limited: Shanghai. Darwent, C.E. 1911. Shanghai: A Handbook for Travellers and Residents to the Chief Objects of Interest in and Around the Foreign Settlements and Native City. Shanghai: Kelly & Walsh. Duruz, Jean, and Gaik Cheng Khoo. 2015. Eating Together: Food, Space and Identity in Malaysia and Singapore. Petaling Jaya: Rowman and Littlefield.

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Enders, Elizabeth Crump. 1923. Swinging Lanterns. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Feng, Shaoting. 2009. Shikumen: Experiencing Civil Residence and Alleys of Shanghai Style. Trans. Li bing shi. Shanghai: Shanghai People’s Publishing House. Finkelstein, Joanne. 2014. Fashioning Appetite: Restaurants and the Making of Modern Identity. New York: Columbia University Press. Fitzgerald, Shirley. 2008. Chinatown, Dictionary of Sydney. http://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/chinatown. Accessed 9 Mar 2018. Gao, James Z. 2013. Eating, Cooking, and Shanghai’s ‘Less-than-Manly Men’: The Social Consequences of Food Rationing and Economic Reforms. Frontiers of History in China 8 (2): 259–293. Goodman, Bryna. 1995. Native Place, City, and Nation: Regional Networks and Identities in Shanghai, 1853–1937. Berkeley: University of California Press. https://www.fairprice.com.sg/wps/portal/fp/milestones. Accessed 27 Feb 2018. Jing, Cuan. 1985. Odds and Ends of the Old Times. In Anecdotes of Old Shanghai. Trans. Min Dayong and Liu Hao. Shanghai: Shanghai Cultural Publishing House. Kuhn, Irene Corbally. 1986. Shanghai: The Way It Was: A Glance Back at a Short, but Extraordinary Era. Los Angeles Times, October 19. Lai, Ah Eng. 2010. The Kopitiam in Singapore: An Evolving Story About Migration and Cultural Diversity. Asia Research Institute Working Paper Series No. 132. National University of Singapore. Lee, Liang Hye. 1999. Accession No. 002186. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Aug 24. Lim, Kee Chan. 1998. Accession No. 002068. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. Nov 2. Lin-Liu, Jen. 2009. Serve the People: A Stir-Fried Journey Through China. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Lu, Hanchao. 2004. Beyond the Neon Lights: Everyday Shanghai in the Early Twentieth Century. Berkeley: University of California Press. Mitchell, Kenneth. 1973. The Flavour of Singapore. Singapore: Four Corners Publishing. Pan, Lynn. 1992. Tracing It Home: Journeys Around a Chinese Family. London: Secker & Warburg. Pan, Lynn, et  al. 1998. Odyssey Illustrated Guide to Shanghai. Hong Kong: Odyssey Books. Phillips, Carolyn. 2016. All Under Heaven: Recipes from the 35 Cuisines of China. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press. Pilcher, Jeffrey M. 2017. Food in World History. New York: Routledge. Ray, Krishnendu. 2016. The Ethnic Restaurateur. London/New York: Bloomsbury Publishing. Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Hawker Question in Singapore. Singapore, 4 November 1931. Roberts, J.A.G. 2002. China to Chinatown: Chinese Food in the West. London: Reaktion Books Ltd.

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Shun, Wah Annette, and Greg Aitkin. 1999. Banquet: Ten Courses to Harmony. Sydney: Doubleday. Smart, Josephine. 2003. Ethnic Entrepreneurship, Transmigration, and Social Integration: An Ethnographic Study of Chinese Restaurant Owners in Rural Western Canada. Urban Anthropology and Studies of Cultural Systems and World Economic Development 32 (3/4): 311–342. Smith’s Gourmet. 1939. All the World’s Fare in Australia: Foreign Restaurants for Adventurous Diners. Smith’s Weekly, 25 November. Spang, R. 2000. The Invention of the Restaurant: Paris and Modern Gastronomic Culture. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Swislocki, Mark S. 2001. Feast and Famine in Republican Shanghai: Urban Food Culture, Nutrition, and the State. PhD Dissertation, Stanford University. Swislocki, M. 2009. Culinary Nostalgia: Regional Food Culture and the Urban Experience in Shanghai. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Tam, Andrew. 2017. Singapore Hawker Centers: Origins, Identity, Authenticity and Distinction. Gastronomica: The Journal of Critical Food Studies 17 (1): 44–55. Tan, Chee-beng. 2001. Food and Ethnicity with Reference to the Chinese in Malaysia. In Changing Chinese Foodways in Asia, ed. D.H.Y. Wu and C.B. Tan. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Tarulevicz, Nicole. 2018. Sensing Safety in Singapore, 1900–2015. Food, Culture & Society 21 (2): 164–179. The Diamond Jubilee of the International Settlement of Shanghai. 1938. Shanghai: Post Mercury Company Fed. Inc. U.S.A. Turnbull, C.M. 1977. A History of Singapore: 1819–1975. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press. Van Cuylenburg, J.B. 1982. Singapore Through Sunshine and Shadow. Singapore: Heinemann Asia. Vázquez-Medina, José Antonio, et al. 2016. Edible Heritage: Tradition, Health, and Ephemeral Consumption Spaces in Mexican Street Food. In Urban Foodways and Communication: Ethnographic Studies in Intangible Cultural Food Heritages Around the World, ed. Casey Man Kong Lum and Marc de Ferrière le Vayer, 2016. London: Rowman & Littlefield. Warren, J.F. 2003. Rickshaw Coolie: A People’s History of Singapore 1880–1940. Singapore: Singapore University Press. Wei, Wei. 1985 Street Vendors in Old Shanghai. In Anecdotes of Old Shanghai. Trans. Yuan Bing. Shanghai: Shanghai Cultural Publishing House. Wright, Arnold, ed. 1908. Twentieth Century Impressions of Hong Kong, Shanghai and Other Treaty Ports of China. London: Lloyds Greater Britain Publishing Company. Wright, Tim. 1991. Shanghai Imperialists Versus Rickshaw Racketeers: The Defeat of the 1934 Rickshaw Reforms. Modern China 17 (1): 76–111. You, Jia. 1985. General Aspects of Street-lanes in Shanghai. In Anecdotes of Old Shanghai. Trans. Min Dayong. Shanghai: Shanghai Cultural Publishing House.

CHAPTER 7

Markets and Supermarkets

Chook stared at the vegetable stalls with murder in his eyes, for here stood slant-eyed Mongolians behind heaps of potatoes, onions, cabbages, beans, and cauliflowers, crying the prices in broken English, or chattering with their neighbours in barbaric, guttural sounds. To Chook they were the scum of the earth, less than human, taking the bread out of his mouth, selling cheaply because they lived like vermin in their gardens. (Louis Stone, Jonah. 1933. Sydney: The Endeavour Press, pages 100–101)

Chook is a character in Louis Stone’s Jonah, an account of life in the Sydney slums. Critical reviews of this novel praised the accurate depiction of Sydney places and people. The above, in one paragraph, not only illustrates what the Chinese market gardeners were selling but also how the wider community viewed them. The racist sentiment attributed to Chook at Paddy’s Market is vicious. This is compounded by the economic reality that by growing and selling vegetables, they were seen to be stealing the livelihood of Australians. Both legislated and social discrimination against the Chinese over many years reduced them to being market gardeners as the major occupation. In recent years, communities worldwide are turning to encourage the growth of “farmers markets” and community gardens. The “paddock-to-­ plate” is a well-known slogan in the exhortation for ideological reasons. This grassroots food movement is motivated out of concern for eating less processed food, closer engagement with the land, and a reduction of food miles, greenhouse emissions and other negative by-products associated © The Author(s) 2019 C. Leong-Salobir, Urban Food Culture, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6_7

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with large-scale and industrialized food production enterprises. Proponents of the movement tend to suggest it as a new and progressive campaign advanced by environmental and other social activists. In truth, growing fresh produce and rearing domestic animals for one’s family consumption or for sale within the community were the norms since time immemorial. In twentieth-century Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore, market gardens were sites of food production; fruit and vegetable crops were grown to supply local and nearby households. These markets more than supplied sustenance, however. Vegetable gardening has a long tradition in China for thousands of years. When Chinese immigrants from southern China travelled to Australia and New Zealand from the mid-nineteenth century in search of gold, they brought their vegetable-growing skills with them. From the 1860s until the 1960s, they were instrumental in supplying fresh vegetables to Sydneysiders (Boileau 2017: 2). The produce they grew represented the growers’ heritage and cultures and traditions. The Chinese were the single most important community that were the growers of vegetables on small farms or market gardens that supplied households and wholesale markets in the three cities. It is said that Australia owes a debt to the early Chinese gardeners for demonstrating that a wide range of vegetables could be grown using age-­ old furrow irrigation methods instead of hand water. The Chinese practice of using night soil to fertilize crops was used in the three cities, a cause for anxiety and disgust among the white population. Over the decades, urbanization and global city developments have increasingly encroached on market gardens and small farms at the fringes of urban centres. Supermarkets have gradually replaced the traditional fresh food shops. This chapter traces the historical development of market gardens and fresh food markets, and how globalization and other forces have precipitated in the advent of the supermarket.

Market Gardens in Sydney Most of the early histories of the Chinese in Australia have focused on their activities in the goldfields and the urban landscapes. There has been relatively little discussion on the history of Chinese market gardening. This can be attributed to a number of factors. The small-scale planting in vegetable gardening (deemed unimportant), few archival records and the disappearance of market gardens have contributed to the paucity of h ­ istorical analysis. “Chinese market gardens in southern and western New South Wales” (Australian Humanities Review. Issue 36, July 2005).

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Historically in Australia, the suburban backyard was the site of producing food for the family. Lemon, apple and other fruit trees grew beside the vegetable patch (Gaynor 2006: 1–2). Market gardens in Australian cities were commonplace. Usually located on low-lying land at the edge of wetlands or rivers, they were small mixed farms, consisting of livestock, orchards and cereal crops. District authorities maintained dairies, and many households kept a cow for milk. In Sydney, in 1902, cow-keepers could graze their cattle on Moore Park for 2 s a week for the day, and in half the price for night grazing (Gaynor 2006: 20). However, it was the early Chinese immigrants to Australia who came looking for riches in gold, and many of them ended up feeding Australians from their market gardens, their market stalls, and from selling fruit and vegetables door to door. As in Shanghai and Singapore, these sellers carried their vegetables and fruits in baskets balanced on a pole on the shoulders. This practice ceased from the 1920s (Metherell 2006: 3). From the early years of their arrival, the Chinese were seen as primary producers, growing vegetables and rearing pigs in the goldfields. When the gold rush years ended, they took their market gardening skills to the city, growing cabbage, cauliflower, turnips, salads, carrots, onion and shallots. The 1901 census showed that there were 3563 Chinese market gardeners, almost all of whom were male, in the state, forming about 67 per cent of the total number of market gardeners (Census of New South Wales 1901: 344). This figure was actually lower than the 1891 census, when 3841 Chinese market gardeners were listed for the state. It has been acknowledged that Chinese market gardeners contributed substantially to the Australian diet from the late nineteenth century. Historian C.F. Yong noted, for example, that scurvy was kept at bay with a ready supply of vegetables (Yong 1977: 38). When Chinese market gardeners came to the city to sell their produce, they would stay overnight in the Chinatown boarding houses near the cattle markets in Campbell Street. When Sydney’s main fruit and vegetable markets were relocated to the area here, a new Chinatown emerged (previously at The Rocks). From the late 1900s to the 1930s, Chinese market gardeners dominated the production and distribution of vegetables in New South Wales. Usually operating in groups of four or five, the Chinese market gardeners shared in planting, weeding, watering, harvesting and hawking. They also worked closely with the greengrocers as they converged nightly on the central markets. During the White Australia Policy period, those Chinese who were resident could remain, and others who were permitted

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to enter were merchants, students and ministers of religion. In 1934, the ruling was relaxed to allow assistant and replacement traders, gardeners and cooks traders (Symons 2007: 89–90). As in the goldfields, the Chinese continued to be at the receiving end of racial discrimination. While the Chinese were involved in other trades as in fishing, banana plantations and tobacco growing, it was in market gardening and cabinet making that placed them at the forefront to be targeted. The Australian sense of racial superiority against the primitive Chinese was expressed in name-calling and other forms of verbal and physical abuse. This was similar to British and European colonials giving nicknames to their domestic servants and other workers in Africa and Asia. In the colonies in the two continents, even where servants were conversant in English, it was the norm for British colonists to use “mongrel” language. The colonizers’ view that the colonized were childlike meant that they had to “talk down” in “mongrel” language—a combination of almost baby-talk and pidgin. Mongrel language and derogatory nicknames were articulated both directly to servants and in colonial circles for amusement. “John Chinaman” was the generic name given to Chinese market gardeners and other workers, a name with origins from British sailors who could not be bothered learning names of Chinese men they came in contact with. John Chinaman was used both in Australia and the United States. In Australia, the market gardeners were seen as hardworking but mysterious outsiders, and were known by derogatory names such as “Chows”, “Pats”, “Yella Mondays” or “Chinee” (Metherell 2006: 3). Many of the lonely Chinese men, after the end of the gold rush years, worked as market gardeners, growing and selling vegetables. Ann Curthoys puts it succinctly, “these Chinese men perch at the edge of our historical consciousness, figures of fun and shame” (Curthoys 2001: 103–104). One of the earliest records of Chinese vegetable farming in Sydney was a market garden by the Rushcutters’ Bay swamp in 1867. “John Chinaman” cultivated using a bed system, “with entire disregard for straight lines”. The beds were thickly sowed or planted and made weed-­ free. Crops were fertilized with liquid manure and not with solid manures that other farmers used. Vegetables grown then were similar to those grown a century later, namely, cabbage, cauliflower, turnips, salads, carrot, onions and eschallots (Morris 2001: 6–7). In 1896, Duck Lee, a Chinese fruiterer, had his shop next to the New Brighton Hotel. The Chinese in the area sold white grapes and Shanghai peaches. Chinese gardeners delivered to shops between Manly Vale and Newport. They delivered by horse

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and cart from eight in the morning until four in the afternoon, “sitting asleep on the shafts. When the horse would stop he would wake up, and deliver his wares and start up again” (Metherell 2006: 7). The 1901 census noted five Chinese as living at the dwelling of Ah Chong and another three Chinese lived in streets nearby. By the 1920s, the gardens had gone. In official surveys, the “Chinese Humpy” had a large room with a verandah, an adjacent toilet and a well in the vegetable garden. There was also a shed (for storing liquid manure) and a stable in the garden in 1912. A “Fraser family member” who lived in the colonial homestead from 1903 to 1913, described the garden cultivated by “coolie Chinese”, recalling the Chinese gardens as near a creek, noting that the Chinese had several large planks of wood where the men would run along with a long pole over their shoulders and large watering cans at each end. They dipped down one can at a time all day long. The family member noted that “we had lots of good vegetables from the Chinese” (Rate Assessment Books, Anderson Ward, Borough of Parramatta; & Detail Survey Branch, Sydney water F.B. No. 2356, cited in Morris page 6). As a marginalized group with no prospect of purchasing prime agricultural land, most of Chinese market gardens were in areas with sandy and swampy soils. The market gardens in Randwick and Botany were typical of those Chinese gardens with poor soils. Each farmer paid rent of four shillings. In Randwick, vegetables were washed in a central shed. New Zealand Flax (Phormium tenax) was used to tie bundles of vegetables together. Cooking was done over open fires, and the men lived in corrugated iron huts. The gardeners rode in their carts to the Sydney markets at four in the morning. On their return trip, they would pack straw manure on to their carts. Night soil was transported at night to be used as fertilizer. Many of these gardeners came from Guangdong and were Cantonese speakers. By the early 1900s, Chinese presence was well established, with their market gardens all over New South Wales, including Roseville, Banks Meadow, Marraville, Mascot, La Perouse and Rockdale (Morris 2001: 8). The majority of the gardens were leased by groups of five to ten, an arrangement that suited the itinerant Chinese who travelled between Australian and China, sometimes staying up to two years in China. A temporary gardener would usually take the place of the traveller. There were also those cooks who grew vegetables as a side income. The vegetables were sold door to door to households or at the Belmore markets. The market gardener who spoke limited English would sell his produce to Chinese dealers, who, in turn, sold it in the markets (Williams 1999: 42).

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The Chinese gardens that sprang up in Manly, a beach-side suburb of Sydney, were typical of most Chinese market gardens in the state. They were usually sited on the fringes of suburbs, on swampy land, prone to flooding or not suitable for housing. These unutilized tracts of wasteland were turned into productive land, yielding fresh fruit and vegetables. The Chinese either leased or squatted on private or Crown land. These areas were later developed for recreational or commercial uses. The peak of their market gardening years was in the 1920s to 1930s. They used primitive tools and produced vegetables for the white population. With the introduction of the White Australia Policy, restricting the immigration of Asian to Australia, these Chinese men could not bring their womenfolk to the country. Market gardening was not a gendered means of livelihood but dictated by racial discriminatory laws. It was often stated needlessly that there was “no sighting of Chinese women or children” in records about the Chinese market gardens. Chinese women and children were not seen because they were not there. Many of the vegetable farmers in the Manly-Brookvale district disappeared before World War II. Chinese vendors were going door to door, with shoulder poles and baskets, selling vegetables and fruit. Door-to-door selling ceased in the 1920s. At other times, local people or their children went directly to the market gardens to buy vegetables from the nearby market gardens. One of the first Chinese market gardens in Manly was around Condamine Street in Manly vale. In 1904, John Ork Lee had a fruit shop at No. 80, Condamine Street (Metherell 2006: 1–2). Burnt Bridge Creek was the site of Chinese market gardens for many years. In later years, they were replaced by dairies and the expansion of Manly Golf Course. By 1905, produce from the numerous Chinese market gardens in Manly was sent to the Sydney markets by ferry. In the areas along the Manly and Curl Curl Lagoons, there were seven Chinese market gardens. Up to six Chinese labourers lived on site in shanties or “humpies”. Vegetables grown included carrots, turnips, parsnips and beetroot. Chinese market gardens were seen along Greendale Creek in 1912. These were relocated from Greendale Creek to near Harbord Road. The Chinese here lived in a tin “humpy”. Chinese gardeners worked the land from dawn to dark, with yokes over their shoulders to carry water or fertilizer in buckets and picked vegetables in large woven baskets. There were also Chinese market ­gardens along Burnt Creek and Kenneth Road. Some of these Chinese (who lived in sheds) went to Sydney on Sundays to smoke opium. Chinese market gardeners on Kenneth Road delivered vegetables to the Pacific Hotel on

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North Steyne every morning by horse and cart. The local people bought vegetables from these gardeners. A “sugar bag” of lettuces, tomatoes, beetroot and other vegetables cost one shilling (Metherell 2006: 1–5). Where goldmine workers and cabinet makers were seen as direct competition in the employment sphere, Chinese market gardeners faced less animosity, although name-calling was common. Their dependence on traditional agricultural methods, frugality, cooperative techniques and reliance on door-to-door marketing (Stanin 2004: 29) was not seen as a threat. In fact, in some quarters, the Chinese were highly regarded as market gardeners for their work ethics. Still, the market gardeners were viewed by mainstream Australians as odd with unfamiliar practices, but they managed to create a communal atmosphere among themselves. There appeared to be a sense of conviviality among them in food preparation, eating, opium smoking and drinking. There were even attempts at cultural exchange. Rent collectors were sometimes given vegetables, and, at Chinese New Year, they were given a jar of ginger, dried lychees and even fire crackers (Morris 2001: 7). With the arrival of mechanized farming, and better infrastructure for operating further afield agricultural activities, the days of the small-scale market gardening became numbered. The increasing importance of the food canning industry and cold storage also was another contributing factor. By 1979, four of the remaining last six Chinese market gardeners were evicted from La Perouse and the nearby areas (Symons 2007: 91). With the demise of market gardens, the Sydney Chinese gardeners turned their hand to starting cafes and restaurants. Not all the Chinese in Sydney were cooks and market gardeners. There were those who started off as cooks and gardeners, and went on to owning large business enterprises. Many Chinese merchants prospered, including fruit companies like the Wing Sang, the Tiy Sang and the Wing On. They started off as distributors for bananas from Queensland. Storekeepers that began business in the years of the gold rush imported Chinese goods, including rice, silks, teas, porcelain and ginger. The network of entrepreneurs from Wing Sang and Wing On in Sydney were founders of the three largest department stores, the Wing On, the Sincere and the Sun in Shanghai. The Guo brothers were owners, first of the Wing On fruit store in Sydney and later the department store in Shanghai of the same name. Guo Le, aged 18, on arriving in Sydney worked in vegetable gardens, later hawking vegetables from door to door. He started Wing On fruit store a few years later, and went on to Shanghai to start Wing On textile mills as well as the department store in 1918 on Nanjing Road.

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Between 1901 and 1921, the Chinese in Sydney developed a banana trade with Fiji. Chinese fruit agents in Sydney had large banana plantations in Fiji. The Tiy Sang owned more than a hundred acres of banana plantation in Fiji and shipped 4000 bunches of bananas to Sydney every fortnight. There was consternation within the New South Wales Fruit Exchange that “the Fijian banana trade had passed absolutely out of the hands of the British into the hands of the Chinese”. Chinese fruit merchants supplied bananas to the city’s inhabitants, both Australian and Chinese as well as to country towns in the state (Yong 1977: 50).

Vegetable Farms in Singapore It is difficult for Singaporeans today in their Housing & Development Board (HDB) environment to imagine that in the 1950s there were thousands of small, commercialized and intensively worked Chinese farms that produced food all over the island. These were high-yielding and labour-­intensive farms, averaging between two and three acres each (Blaut 1958: 2). Before Singapore became wholly urbanized, Cantonese farmers had traditionally practised a highly intensive form of commercialized vegetable farming, growing leaf-stem vegetables for the Chinese population. In the 1950s, several thousands of these types of farms of two or three acreages were found in Singapore. In field work done between 1951 and 1953 for his PhD thesis, J.M.  Blaut and his researchers focused on the Lower Kallang Plain, the most important leaf-stem vegetable farming area in Singapore at the time. The study included 170 farms, averaging half an acre each. The main crops grown were eight varieties of leaf-stem vegetables. Blaut’s study of the intensive farms found that the average yield is 58 tons per cultivated acre (Blaut 1958: xv). Significantly, the practices followed in these vegetable farms had migrated from South China without essential change from South China to Singapore. By contrast, elsewhere in Singapore, the mixed farms that reared pigs and other crops evolved from pepper and gambier cultivation in nineteenth-century Malaysia. The high demand for leaf-stem vegetables accounted for the large number of vegetable farms (Blaut 1958: xiv). Singapore has never had an agricultural hinterland, and the colonial government was actively promoting food production, even among smallholders. R.A. Wright, the colony’s chief veterinary officer, “was charged with developing a programme to increase domestic supplies of perishable vegetables and meat” (Blaut 1958: 2). While some scholars have commented that the encouragement to farming was to benefit the colonial community in other colonies, this was not the case for

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Singapore. The government’s aim was to reduce food import costs. For instance, Luc J.A. Mougeot noted that “cities had always accommodated some measure of agricultural activity, often encouraged by colonial powers, although in a highly selective and regulated fashion, and mainly in designated areas and for an expatriate submarket” (Mougeot 2015: 163). Leaf-stem vegetables were grown mainly for the Chinese population. The common practice of using night soil as manure for vegetable growing was evident in Singapore too. As there was no proper system of sewage, and no underground drains existed to carry off night soil, it was removed daily in the early hours of the morning by Chinese gardeners and other Chinese. This was sold to the gardeners in buckets made on a model furnished by the police authorities. The European community was wary of this practice, and many would not knowingly eat them. It was said that the excessive use of such manure imparted an unpleasant flavour to vegetables. The night soil was stored in pits in the vegetable gardens and is removed as required by the gardeners and poured over the plants (Vaughan 1971: 21). Until 1912, vegetable gardens dominated the Newton district where the only landmark was the railway station. Singapore-born J.B. Van Cuylenburg, in writing his personal narrative of Singapore, commented on the use of night soil on vegetable gardens. He wrote that “the stench was abominable, especially on moonlight nights when people usually took the air either for ricksha drives or in horse drawn vehicles” (Van Cuylenburg 1982: 39). Chinese syndicates were given the business of the removal and disposal of night soil from Singapore households. Night soil was collected in buckets and transferred to market gardens and plantation on the outskirts of the town. Market gardeners and others who used night soil as fertilizers used to pay for removing for it from every house once every three days. As the population grew, the value of night soil had depreciated so much that the positions of householder and collector were reversed. The householder then had to pay the collector for the removal of night soil (Yeoh 2003: 191). The century-old night-soil bucket system was finally phased out in 1987 and replaced with “on-site” sanitation system (“History: From nightsoil buckets to World Toilet Day”. The Independent. 5 January 2014. http://theindependent.sg/history-from-night-soil-buckets-to-world-toilet-day/ Accessed 15 June 2018). The Singaporean government’s efforts to modernize post-independent Singapore included the phasing out of more than 900,000 pigs on 8000 farms. The major problem with these farms was pig waste polluting streams and other waterways. As well, the number of food-fish ponds were also reduced (Lee 2000: 179). Singapore’s first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew wrote:

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Resettling farmers was the toughest. We paid compensation based on size of farm structures, the cemented area of open space within their farm holding, and the number of fruit trees and fishponds. As our economy thrived, we increased the amount, but even the most generous payment was not enough. Older farmers did not know what to do with themselves and their compensation. Living in apartments, they missed their pigs, ducks, chickens, fruit trees, and vegetable plots which had provided them with free food. (Lee 2000: 180)

Farmers were resettled in Housing and Development Board homes, government-sponsored public housing. The resentment and resistance was keenly felt even two decades later and translated politically when they continued to vote against the People’s Action Party, the government of the day (Lee 2000: 180).

Singapore Wet Markets Wet markets, or fresh produce markets, found all over Asia are made of stalls designated to sections for fruit, vegetables, poultry, pork, beef, seafood and dry grocery goods. Some may stock only fruit and vegetables, and others feature only seafood. Wet markets in Asia are so called because the floor is constantly wet from the spraying of water on the fresh produce, fish and vegetables, to freshen them. There is also the continual hosing of benchtops and floors as poultry are killed, plucked and dressed on the premises. Wet markets in Singapore are generally open-air, partially sheltered spaces populated with dozens of vendors selling fresh food products, such as fish, poultry, pork, beef, vegetables and fruits, as well as spices and other sundries. The mass construction of large-scale housing estates quickly transformed tens of thousands of Singaporeans from villagers to urban dwellers. Traditionally in Asian wet markets, both buyers and sellers wore wooden clogs to keep their feet dry. Foo Kee Sing (Accession No. 002017), in recalling memories of the Katong wet market (until the 1990s) in Singapore, remembers that clogs were differentiated according to ethnic lines too. The different ethnic groups had their own types of clogs: Chinese, Malay and Indian. Chinese clogs had elongated pieces of wood; the Malays ones were made more stylishly, with patterns; and the Indians had leather straps on theirs. Foo recalled there was no refrigeration for the produce; it was very much farm to market. He noted that “the eggs come from the farm, the vegetables come from the farm, the fish from the sea” (Foo Kee Sing 1998: Accession No. 002017). There were only a few kinds

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of fish on sale. The fish that was considered superior was the parang fish (wolf herring). Pork and chicken were considered festival foods. The kinds of fruit available for sale in the wet market were limited too, usually pineapple, papaya and bananas. Rambutan, mangosteen and durian were the seasonal fruits. Much was home grown, including towgay (mung bean sprouts) and onions. At Katong, the customers were Chinese and Malay, mainly from the lower socio-economic groups. The well-to-do would send their amahs to the market. Foo pointed out that Katong was a place for just buying and selling, without much interaction, and not a place for socializing. The dialogue was mainly on prices and produce. The Chinese dialects most commonly spoken here were Hainanese and Hokkien (Foo Kee Sing 1998: Accession No. 002017). Wet markets in Singapore cater to a population of diverse cultures, traditions and customs. Sanitation and food safety in wet markets and hawkers were a concern for both the colonial and postcolonial governments in Singapore. Current policies and regulations governing these food centres have origins from the early years of colonial rule. Probably the only group that did not frequent the wet markets in the twentieth century would be the colonial or European community. Even if they needed food items from the markets, it would be their servants who shopped for them. For the majority of the people, the market was the place for social interaction on buying and selling food for the day’s meals. There would be discussion between buyer and seller, and among buyers themselves, on what ingredients to buy, negotiation on prices and so on. The types of social interactions in these meat, fish, fruit and vegetable markets differed according to the ethnicities, generations, social statuses and classes. The markets were and are seen as “spaces of unmediated social interactions” (Mele et al. 2015: 105). Live chickens and ducks were slaughtered and sold in the wet markets. In 1991, the Environment Ministry required vendors to hire abattoir-trained sellers to slaughter poultry, and within two years, all wet markets were allowed to sell only chilled and frozen chicken at their stalls (Straits Times, 1 March 1993, “No more slaughtering of poultry at wet markets from today”, page 1). While Singaporeans have embraced modernity wholeheartedly in the home and at the workplace, the traditional market for food shopping remains an area they hold on to. This is particularly relevant in twentieth-­ century Singapore when home cooking was more frequent, similar to the shopping habits of Shanghainese. Although the sources for the foods sold at wet markets and supermarkets are similar, the perception remains that the meat, fish, fruits and vegetables sold at wet markets are fresher, less

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processed and healthier. Display and presentation of unpackaged food at markets and the perceived knowledge and personal attentiveness of meat, fish and vegetable vendors have much to do with this.

Shanghai Markets Shanghai’s experimentation of establishing a covered food market in the style of European markets failed, against age-old traditions and customs. Before the mid-nineteenth century, there were no food markets in the residential areas in Shanghai. Butcheries, fish and poultry shops were on the streets. Farmers and sellers alike sold vegetables, from door to door, carrying their wares on shoulders from a pole and baskets. The first food market was established in 1865 on Ningxing Street, later called Caishi Street of Vegetable Market Street, present-day Ninghai Road, East. In 1864, two real estate agents, La Borderie and Hanbury, applied to the Municipal Council of the French Concession to set up food markets in the style of those in European cities. They proposed to pay 500 taels of silver per year to the council as taxes for ten years. Thus, the Central Vegetable Market was started with several large sheds on open ground, north of Yangjingbang. The two merchants imposed rent on vegetable vendors. The council directed that all vegetable sellers had to move to the new market. Shanghai residents, however, were not used to buying vegetables from markets and preferred home deliveries. Sellers were also unhappy with the directive. The market was closed within a year. A second market, the Nanjing Road Food Market, was built in 1884 (Jing 1985: 150). Farmers brought their produce direct to sell in the markets. From seven to nine in the morning, farmers carried live ducks and geese in large baskets on bamboo poles across shoulders at the Garden Bridge on Soochow Creek. There were also hired labourers who carried fish and other produce. On the northern side of Soochow Creek, among the scrap iron trade stalls were the stalls for fruit and vegetables. From early morning, produce were unloaded from boats. In summer, there were piles of melons, persimmons, eggplant, chillies and sugar cane for sale. The winter vegetables were mainly cabbages and carrots (Darwent 1911: 41–42).

From Wet Markets to Supermarkets in Shanghai Like Singaporeans, Shanghainese rely on a diet of year-round fresh vegetables, particularly on the leafy green variety. Street vendors, grocery stores, wet markets or supermarkets survive on a quick turnover of fresh

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produce. With one of the largest urban populations in China, Shanghai has the most developed retail system in the country. Traditional wet markets in twentieth-century Asian cities indicate that they maintained a stronghold in fresh food trade. A 1999 study of residents in Hong Kong and Singapore, with similar culinary practices, preferred to buy from wet markets (Goldman et al. 1999: 126–139). By the end of the twentieth century, wet markets were still the choice of shopping venue for consumers for fresh produce. This was despite the fact that supermarkets had been well established for decades. However, globalization, rapid urbanization and other forces have steadily chipped away the existence of wet markets in Shanghai. Self-sufficiency in vegetable production in Shanghai required the municipal government to control distribution of the city vegetable supply. First established in the 1950s, the system of centralized procurement and monopolized retailing was crucial in socialist China. In Shanghai in the 1980s, the municipality comprised ten urban districts, with an urban population of around six million. Although Shanghai’s transport infrastructure and storage were underdeveloped, the city was able to maintain a stable supply of fresh vegetables to its inhabitants (Zhang and Pan 1999: 500–502). Towards the end of the twentieth century, wet markets were on the decline. Three reasons were given for the demise of the markets. Firstly, the rise of the urban real estate meant that public housing declined, taking with them wet markets. Secondly, urban development took over idle land where wet markets existed. Thirdly, wet markets in old residential neighbourhoods disappeared when these neighbourhoods were demolished during the chaiqian (demolition of old neighbourhoods and the relocation of residents between the 1980s and 1990s) (Zhang and Pan: 502–504). While there were still wet markets, these were different from the older traditional ones. These state-run wet markets were introduced during China’s liberalization of the state-controlled agri-food commerce system from the mid-1980s. The wet markets that were not state-sponsored had their own price system and could demand for better quality produce. The competition between private and state-run wet markets in the end caused the collapse of the latter (Zhang and Pan: 507). Wet markets continued to dominate the fresh food retail trade even when hypermarkets, supermarkets and convenience stores appeared from the mid-1990s. From the beginning, Shanghai took the lead in embracing retail modernization, both in domestic and foreign retail supermarket chains. Writing in 1999, Zhang and Pan note, many Chinese consumers still had “a cultural preference for purchasing

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fresh vegetable daily in small quantities and consuming them without refrigeration”. Neighbourhood markets, within walking distance, were viewed favourably. Vegetables were kept fresh and presentable, as vendors continually sort, clean, trim and spray with water (Zhang and Pan: 509). This was necessary as there were no refrigeration facilities for market vendors. They replenished their supplies on a daily basis, ensuring fresh produce for their customers. The rapid introduction of foreign and local supermarkets to Shanghai met with mixed results in the late 1900s. Food shopping habits are deeply entrenched in social and cultural practice, and introducing new ways of shopping may and did produce uneven results. In another study on supermarkets in Shanghai in the late twentieth century, A. Goldman suggests that Shanghainese preferred local supermarket chains and not foreign ones. It was further pointed out that supermarkets were only complementary to other shopping venues (Goldman 2000). For example, there were the Shanghainese who shopped “selectively” in supermarkets, for items that were mostly packaged or processed foods and purchased fresh foods in traditional outlets like wet markets. Sociologist Arjun Appadurai’s work on globalization reminds us that globalization is itself a deeply historical, uneven and even localizing process. He states that globalization does not necessarily imply homogenization or Americanization, and to the extent that different societies appropriate the materials of modernity differently, there is still ample room for the deep study of specific geographies, histories and languages (Appadurai 2001: 17). Jiaming Sun picks up Appadurai’s premise that global cultural flows are shaped by the multiplicity of perspectives generated by flows of people, money, ideologies, media technologies, and symbols. Local cultures incorporate global symbols but in ways specific to the local context. There is no pure local culture that is untainted by global culture but rather a variety of local cultures that are increasingly interpenetrated and constantly remade out of elements of global cultural flows. (Sun and Chen 2009: 216)

They further argue with the premise that the global-local nexus of consumption is often a two-way street involving both changes in  local consumption and local modifications of a global company’s standard products and operating procedures (Sun and Chen 2009: 218).

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Foreign supermarkets that try to gain a stronghold in China are well aware of Chinese people’s preference and enthusiasm for “fresh food”. The world’s largest retailer, Walmart, started trading in Shanghai in 1997. Walmart’s hypermarkets tried to appeal to Shanghai middle-class residents by replicating fresh food produce sold at wet markets. Where items were not packaged attractively, they were sold in bulk food bins, and customers were able to select their choices and portions as they were used to in wet markets. Even today, the American retailer places the importance too of catering to local Chinese tastes and flavours. Interestingly, Walmart does not advertise its American ownership to its customers. Signage is in Chinese (https://www.retailnetgroup.com/public/WalmartShanghai.pdf, accessed 1 March 2018).

Supermarkets in Singapore The government, in its bid to modernize Singapore amidst concerns for sanitation and hygiene, tried to promote the building of supermarkets. As Singapore has traditionally produced little of its food supplies (apart from the small-scale vegetable market gardens in the early twentieth century), most meat, fruits and vegetables and most of its seafood are imported from government-sanctioned purveyors. Singapore’s first supermarket, Cold Storage, an Australian company, was established in 1905, primarily to cater to the needs of the European community. Singapore Cold Storage Co. Ltd was registered in Singapore with Australian interests and expertise two years earlier. The establishment of Cold Storage in 1905 along Orchard Road, Singapore’s first Westernstyle shop, sold frozen beef, mutton, lamb, game, dairy produce, fruit and other Australian food supplies for the colonial community. In fact, Australian fresh meat exports to Singapore were in place 13 years before when live Australian cattle was imported into the colony (Tregonning 1967: 1). Cold Storage together with other Australian companies have been importing Australian food and drink products into Singapore ever since, supplying to supermarkets and other outlets. Prior to Cold Storage’s entrance to the colony, fresh milk was supplied by the few local Bengali milk vendors. Supplies were erratic and fraught with suspicion that the milk was diluted with dirty water. This was the memsahib’s eternal grievance with Asian domestic servants and other local

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people she had to interact with. Indians and other Asians had dirty habits and were dishonest. Other food items catering to the European diet were local buffalo meat or those imported from Thailand; pork was either from local, Chinese or Balinese supplies. Some vegetables, including potatoes, came from Java (Leong-Salobir 2011: 75). Still, the colonials did not get their food supplies exclusively from Cold Storage. The memsahib would buy some items from the European-style shops, while the cook went to the markets nearby. In the 1930s there were several markets in Singapore: at Tanglin Road, Orchard Beach Road, Serangoon Road, Market Street and Maxwell Road. Across the peninsula in the Malay states, large new rubber estates sprang up, and the increasing number of workers included Chinese, Indian and local workers. The European community was increasing in size too, and a Cold Storage retail branch was opened in Kuala Lumpur in 1910. Cold Storage also started manufacturing ice in Singapore in 1916, and, as with its retail branches of frozen foods, ice factories too were set up in several towns of Malaya. In the early years of its existence, only a small number of wealthy local people bought their foodstuff there. Cold Storage featured in the diaries and memoirs of several colonial administrators, referring to the period when Singapore fell to Japanese Occupation. Cold Storage had actually increased its stock of food items and liquor in the months leading to the fall of Singapore, to cater to the units of Australian Imperial Forces in Singapore (Goh 2003: 57). On 10 January 1942, Thomas Kitching, the Chief Surveyor of Singapore, wrote of destroying 1700 cases cigarettes, 50,000 dollars’ worth of whisky and 800 tons of frozen meat in Cold Storage (Kitching 2002: 32). The crates of wine and spirits that were not destroyed by the British were collected by the Japanese (Wong 2009: 88). On 8 February 1942, Kitching noted that “official rationing of frozen meat and butter is postponed for a week. The Cold Storage actually have been rationing butter on their own for some time” (Kitching 2002: 53). The Japanese Military Administration (MAD) took over the dealerships in essential goods, including Cold Storage in February 1942. MAD regulated supplies and prices by publishing lists in newspapers and posting them in public places. With the rising standard of living in later years, many Singaporeans bought their food supplies from Cold Storage and other foreign and local supermarkets. As in other Asian cities, the food retail trade in Asia went

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through several processes. An example of a stark and linear trajectory is of a street vendor in Singapore. The Tay Buan Guan store was started in 1967 by Tay Leck Teck, an itinerant hawker, who progressed from selling household wares contained in two boxes, mounted on a bamboo pole and carried on his shoulders. His next step was to buy a bicycle to carry his goods. Then he rented a shophouse and opened a provision shop on Pennefather Road. His final retail business venture was the supermarket, occupying several floors, including a milk bar and a confectionery selling cakes and pastries. Due to competition from new shopping centres from the 1970s, Tay Buan Guan Supermarket was reduced to a convenience store in the 1990s, and by 2000 closed its doors (Singapore Infopedia, National Library Board, http://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/infopedia/articles/SIP_613_2005-01-28.html, accessed 1 March 2018). Carrefour, the French multinational retailer operating hypermarket chains, set up shop in Singapore in 1997, but had closed all its branches by 2012 due to competition. Increasing food prices fuelled by global events in the early 1970s prompted Singaporean authorities to set up a chain of supermarkets across the nation in 1973. The National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), a national confederation of trade unions established the NTUC FairPrice Co-operative Ltd in 1973, “with a social mission to moderate the cost of living in Singapore”. In 1994, it introduced a basket of Everyday Low Price (EDLP) essential items priced equal to or lower than competitors. In 1997, NTUC FairPrice became the first supermarket to offer online grocery shopping (https://www.fairprice.com.sg/wps/portal/fp/milestones, accessed 27 February 2018). Lee Liang Hye, born in 1924, worked both in the civil service and the private sector and recalled the impersonal nature of supermarkets when the Tay Buan Guan Supermarket first appeared in his neighbourhood, Katong. Food and other household items were bought from grocery shops. Lee remembers that we develop a rapport between the owner of the shop and ourselves. … The moment you come in (to the grocery shop), the owner greets you. … they call you uncle or aunt. They ask how are you this and that and then you can playfully bargain with them. … you go to a supermarket and all that, when you want to ask the price of something, you look around, nobody to attend to you. (Lee Liang Hye 1999: Accession Number 002186)

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Sydney Food Shops Urbanization and the second wave of migrants from the 1880s to the 1920s displaced some of the dairy farms and market gardens to manufacturing industries and retail shops. For instance, the rural suburb of Marrickville that initially attracted Chinese and Scottish market gardeners soon gave way to the operation of woollen mills, bakeries and flour mills. The Cargo Flour Mill in Newtown and the Waratah Flour Mill in Dulwich Hill were two such flour mills in the neighbourhood. Other food manufacturing included chocolate, jam and soft drinks (Cashman and Meader 1990: 176). The first ice-cream cones, or snow-drop cones, were manufactured from 1908 by Austrian migrant Peter Zuttion at 697 King Street, in Tempe. Zuttion manufactured cone and wafers for the next 25 years (Cashman and Meader 1990: 64–65). Food provisions in early Sydney were purchased from ship imports and local producers of fruit, vegetables, poultry, fish, eggs and milk. These were sold in markets, at the corner store and by hawkers who sold from door to door or in the street. On arrival to Sydney, the Greek migrants sold food from door to door, accumulating capital required to start a fish shop, oyster saloon, cafe milk bar or coffee house. Many Greeks who came to Marrickville after 1945 operated cafes, milk bars, butcher shops and delicatessens (Cashman and Meader 1990: 68). Towards the end of the nineteenth century, Sydney, like other Australian cities, was a prosperous city, benefitting from the wool and mining industries as well as from other agricultural activities. New forms of shopping venues were built to cater to the middle classes. Chains of grocery stores, shopping arcades and department stores appeared. Like the Chinese, the Greeks faced discrimination too. There were occasions when they and southern Europeans could not buy businesses. The French faced no such problem. Giannis (Jack) Cordatos was not able to purchase the Classic Milk Bar at 266 Marrickville Road in 1949 on account of his ethnicity. He was successful only after changing his name to “Revel” (Cashman and Meader 1990: 68). There were several markets in Sydney from the nineteenth century, new and better ones replacing seemingly old and inefficient ones. The first market was opened in 1806 by Governor William Bligh at The Rocks. Three years later, a newer market was established in Market Square, a collection of sheds, opening on Tuesdays and Saturdays. Governor Richard Bourke moved the hay and grain traders to the cattle market in Campbell Street in 1834, and these became Paddy’s Markets. Then the Sydney

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Queen Victoria Markets were officially opened on 21 July 1898, to replace the old markets that were “ugly and dilapidated”. The markets were built in four sections, with each section designated for butchery (meat and poultry), retail fruit trade, wholesale fruit trade and one specifically for potatoes (The Sydney Morning Herald, Friday 22 July 1898, page 3). In 1914, a new market complex housed the Haymarket. In 1975, the Sydney markets moved to Flemington. Paddy Markets, in 1988, were temporarily located to Redfern and, in 1993, it returned to Haymarket. E.C. Buley describes fish, game and wild life on sale in the market thus: The fishmonger and game seller sometimes festoons his shop front with strings of bright-plumaged parrots, useless as food, but attractive to the eye. Curious fish are on the marble slabs, pink schnapper, and hideous flat-head, with silver barracoutta [sic] like enormous mackerel, and piles of tiny garfish. The game includes wild duck, magpie-geese, and black swan, with a wallaby or two and tails of the larger kangaroos. The wild turkey – which is really a bustard, and the finest game bird Australia produces – may occasionally be seen, but it is now very rare and shy. (Buley 1905: 119)

In working class Balmain, most families had to shop carefully to keep food prices down. The majority of them bought their groceries, milk, meat, fruit and vegetables exclusively from their own Balmain Co-operative Society (Walker 1990: 41–43). Others bought at the door, as butchers, bakers, milkmen, and greengrocers made their daily round, and the grocer’s man called for the weekly order. Other ways of cutting costs was to decide whether a meal required cooking, taking into consideration the cost of fuel. For example, bread was preferred to oatmeal porridge, as it required cooking over the stove. Those who could afford to, or who were unable or unwilling to cook, could buy cooked meats at the ham and beef shop. In the 1910s, the average red meat consumption was 250 pounds (113 kg) per year, with most families eating meat three times a day. A man who worked physically would eat a pound (about half a kilo) of grilled steak at a meal, or half a pound of meat and three eggs. In 1913, there were two greengrocers, four bakers, seven confectioners and twenty-one butchers serving Balmain’s population of 33,000 (Walker 1990: 42). Poorer families made do with less milk. Some children had to share a pint of milk with four. As income rose, there was no marked increase in expensive food items; instead, those families consumed more bread and sugar. Some families survived mainly on bread and butter, eating them at every meal and

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as snacks. When butter became expensive, jam or dripping were substitutes. The Marrickville Margarine Co. Ltd was started by Englishman Charles Baldry Abel in 1908. By 1936, the company had 630 people on its payroll. Abel also started ETA Foods, manufacturing peanut butter (Cashman and Meader 1990: 176). Milk was delivered twice a day to households, with families preferring unpasteurized milk from the stall-­fed cows in the suburbs instead of the chilled pasteurized milk from the country. Potatoes and cabbage were the most common vegetables. The average family consumed about 22 pounds of white bread a week (Walker 1990: 42–43). By the 1920s, Australian city department stores were large retail operations, serving both urban populations and delivering mail order services to regional areas. Suburban households can also shop from local ­owner-­operated grocery stores. Grocery chains Dickins, Franklins, Crofts and Moran & Cato were converting to self-service stores by the 1950s. In the 1960s, the Sydney householder (usually the woman or housewife) responsible for purchasing food for the family was likely to do so from a supermarket, or from a branch of a department store or a specialty shop. From 1960, Woolworths and Coles became the two largest supermarket chains to dominate Australia for more than half a century. There were still over 3000 smaller supermarkets dotted around the country. High employment growth in the 1950s and 1960s, domestic refrigeration and increasing numbers of women working outside the home were some of the impetus that helped drive change in food retail in Sydney and other cities (Bailey 2014: 60–62). Supermarket shopping in the 1950s was seen as an improvement to grocery stores. In a newspaper article, the author states, “[W]heeling a capacious trolley basket, or carrying a bag, the customer can move around the shelves of the self-service grocery section, or, if she prefers, get attention at the service counters, where goods are often already weighed and packed” (Sydney Morning Herald, Thursday. 2 July 1953, page 5 of Special Food Section). Importantly, the article points out that “Men like this way of shopping. Assistants agree that they make excellent shoppers and are playing an increasing part in the family food shopping”. With the spread of supermarkets and the increasing number of women who worked outside the home, the way Sydneysiders shopped for food changed immensely. From the 1950s, the number of itinerant vendors who sold and delivered food had declined markedly. The days of the milk delivery man were over too. Door-to-door sellers just could not compete with the efficiency and relative cheapness of mass-produced and mass-­ marketed fruit and vegetables (Kingston 1994: 23).

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References Appadurai, Arjun. 2001. Globalization. Durham/London: Duke University Press Books. Bailey, Matthew. 2014. Retailing and the Home in 1960s Sydney. History Australia 11 (1): 59–81. Blaut, J. M. 1958. Chinese Market Gardening in Singapore: A Study in Functional Microgeography. Unpublished PhD thesis, Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University. Boileau, Joanna. 2017. Chinese Market Gardening in Australia and New Zealand: Gardens of Prosperity. Cham: Springer International Publishing. Buley, E.C. 1905. Australian Life in Town and Country. New  York: The Knickerbocker Press. Cashman, Richard, and Chrys Meader. 1990. Marrickville: Rural Outpost to Inner City. Sydney: Hale & Iremonger Pty Limited. Census of New South Wales. 1901. https://www.records.nsw.gov.au/archives/ collections-and-research/guides-and-indexes/census-musters-guide? searchterm=musters%20census. Accessed 28 May 2018. Curthoys, Ann. 2001. Men of All Nations, Except Chinamen: European and Chinese on the Goldfields of New South Wales. In Gold: Forgotten Histories and Lost Objects of Australia, ed. Iain McCalman, Alexander Cook, and Andrew Reeves. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Darwent, C.E. 1911. Shanghai: A Handbook for Travellers and Residents to the Chief Objects of Interest in and Around the Foreign Settlements and Native City. Shanghai: Kelly & Walsh. Foo Kee Sing. 1998. Accession No. 002017. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. May 12. Gaynor, Andrea. 2006. Harvest of the Suburbs: An Environmental History of Growing Food in Australian Cities. Perth: University of Western Australia Press. Goh Chor Boon. 2003. Serving Singapore: A Hundred Years of Cold Storage, 1903–2003. Singapore: Cold Storage. Goldman, A. 2000. Supermarkets in China: The Case of Shanghai. The International Review of Retail, Distribution and Consumer Research 10 (1): 1–21. Goldman, Arieh, Robert Krider, and S. Ramaswami. 1999. The Persistent Competitive Advantage of Traditional Food Retailers in Asia: Wet Markets’ Continued Dominance in Hong Kong. Journal of Macromarketing. 19 (2): 126–139. “History: From Night-Soil Buckets to World Toilet Day.” The Independent. 5 January 2014. http://theindependent.sg/history-from-night-soil-buckets-toworld-toilet-day/. Accessed 15 June 2018. Jing, Cuan. 1985. Trans. Min Dayong and Liu Hao, Odds and Ends of the Old Times. In Anecdotes of Old Shanghai. Shanghai: Shanghai Cultural Publishing House.

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Kingston, Beverly. 1994. Basket, Bag and Trolley: A History of Shopping in Australia. Melbourne: Oxford University Press. Kitching, Thomas. 2002. In Life and Death in Changi: The War and Internment Diary of Thomas Kitching (1942–1944), ed. Goh Eck Kheng. Singapore: Landmark Books. Lee, Kuan Yew. 2000. From Third World to First. The Singapore Story: 1965–2000. New York: Harper Collins Publishers. Lee, Liang Hye. 1999. Accession No. 002186. Oral History Interview Transcripts from National Archives Singapore. August 24. Leong-Salobir, Cecilia. 2011. Food Culture in Colonial Asia: A Taste of Empire. Abingdon/Oxon/New York: Routledge. McGowan, Barry. 2005. Chinese Market Gardens in Southern and Western New South Wales. Australian Humanities Review. Issue 36, July. http://australianhumanitiesreview.org/2005/07/01/chinese-market-gardens-in-southern-andwestern-new-south-wales/ Mele, Christopher, Megan Ng, and May Bo Chim. 2015. Urban Markets as a ‘Corrective’ to Advanced Urbanism: The Social Space of Wet Markets in Contemporary Singapore. Urban Studies 52 (1): 103–120. Metherell, T. 2006. Faster: Manly in the 1920s (“Manly’s Chinese Gardens”). Manly: Manly Council. Morris, Colleen. 2001. Chinese Market Gardens in Sydney. Australian Garden History 12 (5): 5–8. Mougeot, Luc J.A. 2015. Urban Agriculture in Cities of the Global South: Four Logics of Integration. In Food and the City: Histories of Culture and Cultivation, ed. Dorothée Imbert. Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks. No author. 1993. No More Slaughtering of Poultry at Wet Markets from Today. Straits Times, March 1. Singapore Infopedia, National Library Board. http://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/infopedia/articles/SIP_613_2005-01-28.html. Accessed 1 Mar 2018. Stanin, Zvonkica. 2004. From Li Chun to Yong Kit: A Market Garden on the Loddon, 1851–1912. Journal of Australian Colonial History 6: 15–34. Stone, Louis. 1933. Jonah. Sydney: The Endeavour Press. Sun, Jiaming, and Xiangming Chen. 2009. Fast Foods and Brand Clothes in Shanghai: How and Why do Locals Consume Globally? In Shanghai Rising: State Power and Local Transformations in a Global Megacity, ed. Xiangming Chen. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Sydney Morning Herald. 22 July 1898. ———. 2 July 1953. Symons, Michael. 2007. One Continuous Picnic: A Gastronomic History of Australia. Carlton: Melbourne University Press. Tregonning, K.G. 1967. The Singapore Cold Storage: 1903–1966. Singapore: Cold Storage Holdings Ltd.

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CHAPTER 8

Cookbooks: Recipes and Culinary Tales

Fried Rice 4–6 cups of Cooked Rice Egg ½ lb. Pork 4 ozs. Peeled Prawns (optional) 1 dessertspoon Soya 1 dessertspoon Water 1 dessertspoon Oyster Sauce ¼ cup of chopped Eschallots 1 dessertspoon finely-mince Ham 1–2 tablespoons Oil or Lard Rind and shred the pork. Place the oil or lard in a large pan and fry the pork, then add the rice and slat. It is essential to stir well so that the rice does not stick to the pan. When the rice is fried sufficiently, add the prawns and mix well. Then clear a small bay in the rice and drop in the egg, whole. When this is nearly cooked, stir up and mix through the rice and add the oyster sauce, stirring well. Then mix the soya and water together, add to the rice together with the eschallots (spring onions), and mix well. Garnish with the ham. (Yep Yung Hee and Joe Beveridge. Chinese Recipes for Home Cooking. Sydney: Associated General Publications. 1963, page 69)

© The Author(s) 2019 C. Leong-Salobir, Urban Food Culture, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6_8

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The recipe above is from one of the earliest Chinese cookbooks to appear in Sydney. First published in 1951, several editions of Chinese Recipes for Home Cooking came out, in 1952 (two reprints), 1953, 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1960 and 1963. Australian-born Yep wrote the cookbook at a time when increasing numbers of Australians ate out at Chinese restaurants. The author’s aim was “primarily to instruct and help people who often wish to cook Chinese food at home but who feel that the preparation of such a meal is far beyond their culinary ability” (Yep, Author’s Preface). Topics covered in the cookbook include Chinese eating customs, Chinese banquets, Chinese cooking utensil, Chinese ingredients, suggested home menus and “what to order at Chinese cafes”. Yep was writing for mainstream Australians, of course, and stated that “particular attention was paid to the popularity of various types of Chinese food with Europeans”. Considered as “an expert on Chinese dishes suitable for the Occidental taste”, the publisher stated (on the back cover) that Yep’s Australian friends relied “implicitly on his judgment when ordering food at Chinese cafes” in Sydney. To add credential to his apparent claim that he knew the palate of Westerners, the Sydney author stated that he had travelled extensively in China and had dined with Americans, English, Australians, French, Germans and Italians in cosmopolitan Shanghai. There he visited the kitchens of popular cafes, acquired “tricks of the trade” and included these in the cookbook. He noted that both Europeans and the Chinese themselves viewed Cantonese cuisine as the finest among Chinese food. It was a rare enough occurrence for the publication of this “ethnic” cookbook to be featured in the city’s newspaper, the Sydney Morning Herald, on the day it came out. The Herald noted that the cookbook was compiled “primarily to instruct and help people who often wish to cook Chinese food at home but don’t know how to start”. Readers were assured that the authors had “tested and cooked, re-tested and re-cooked all the dishes”. Ingredients used for the dishes, according to the authors, were readily available, except for Ve-Tsin (a brand name for the flavour enhancer, monosodium glutamate), soya sauce and oyster sauce. These could be purchased from the Sydney Chinese stores. Finally, it added that “many of the dishes are economical and easy to prepare – all of them are worth trying for variety and flavour” (“Chinese Recipes” Sydney Morning Herald, 4 Oct 1951, page 12). Large numbers of migrants from Britain and Europe from the late 1940s and 1950s boosted Australia’s export trade. The increasingly ­prosperous Australia nation motivated the nation to distribute largesse in

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the form of aid to neighbouring Asian countries. This was still in the period of the White Australia Policy when various acts of legislation were put in place to exclude people from Asia and the Pacific Islands from immigrating to Australia. In January 1950, representatives from Australia, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, New Zealand and the United Kingdom came up with a joint economic aid package known as the Colombo Plan that worked to reduce poverty and disease in South and Southeast Asia. The Colombo Plan also enabled a large number of international Asian students to enrol at Australian universities. From the 1950s to the 1980s, some 20,000 students arrived in Australia as part of the Colombo Plan, and similar numbers as private students, largely from Asia. Asian food was served across campus-eating outlets, in student halls of residence, nearby cafes and private student accommodation. The increasing number of Australians eating at Chinese restaurants from the 1930s in Sydney indicate their liking for Chinese food. Australians were no strangers to Chinese food as arrivals of Chinese to the goldfields sold food from temporary shops. However, few housewives attempted to cook Chinese meals in the home. Chinese recipes were first featured in a Sydney cookbook in 1937 (The Woman’s Mirror Cookery Book 1937). Cookbooks are a repository of cultural and historical knowledge relating to the life of a community or a nation. Benedict Anderson’s theory on “imagined communities” advances the idea that individuals connect with each other by imagining themselves as doing similar activities. We can apply this notion to cookbooks, that when readers of cookbooks follow recipes they know they are performing similar tasks of everyday life with others. Cookbooks therefore help individuals to claim identity with groups (Anderson 2006). In many ways, cookbooks are ideal as historical documents and for textual analysis. From the numerous editions of one cookbook alone, we can map changes in cookery over the years: in ingredients used, methodology, and fads and fashions reflecting the times. Cookbooks reflect political and social realities too, as Suzanne Cope reminds us, in her analysis of Cuban Nitza Villapol’s cookbook. The first edition of Cocina al Minuto came out in 1949, ten years before the Cuban Revolution, when trade agreements allowed American food imports into the country, paving the way for foreign ingredients to creep into the native cuisine. American-influenced dishes like spaghetti, fried chicken and pie were listed. Cope observed that the cookbook changed immediately after Fidel Castro took power. Dishes using native ingredients such as malanga

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(a root vegetable) and black beans were promoted, while English food references and imported wheat-based desserts disappeared. As Cope studied the subsequent editions of Cocina al Minuto, she noticed how the author’s commentary reflected the Cuban ideology and identity under Castro. There was now no mention of product brand names of ingredients and cooking appliances. There were tips on cooking frugally, using fewer ingredients (Cope 2018). This particular Cuban cookbook helped to forge a sense of national identity through encouraging and supporting the use of local ingredients. It also illustrated the economic realities of a country facing trade embargoes from the United States. In the postcolonial island nation/city-state of Singapore, cookbooks did not function merely as guides for cooking. In the later part of the twentieth century, popular local cooks and writers started publishing cookbooks featuring recipes of popular dishes from hawker centres and restaurants. Some of these titles are Chinese Restaurant Dishes (Chan 1958), Hawkers Delight: A Guide to Malaysia & Singapore Hawkers Food (Jabbar 1991), Favourite Cuisine: Selected Singapore Indian Restaurants’ Recipes (Prema and Lim 1999), and The Guide to Singapore Hawker Food (Hooi 1985). As Nicole Tarulevicz puts it, the symbolic value of the cookbooks in modern Singapore far outshines its culinary regard (Tarulevicz 2013: 92). She notes that through the pages of cookbooks, food in the abstract provides Singaporeans with “an illusion of cultural connection that ultimately serves the government by endorsing a notion of racial harmony based on multiracialism”. Tarulevicz further states that a cookbook in this context is not just a guide to cookery but does important ideological work, “tethering identity to the nation” (Tarulevicz 2013: 92). Jean Duruz suggests that the market intervenes with the production of standard cookbooks, or heritage artefacts, as she calls them. The form of the cookbooks takes on “an increasingly fashionable genre in publishing – storytelling through food – with culinary memoirs and ‘ethnic’ cookbooks providing obvious examples” (Duruz 2016: 18). Duruz observes that “published cookbooks, particularly those with a political mission to ‘save’ an endangered cuisine or to represent a national one as more diverse and ‘different’ than popularly imagined, are, in themselves self-conscious representations of nostalgia and loss, and of hopes for the future” (Duruz 2016: 3). She reflects on how Chua and Rajah (2001: 172) describe that in Singapore, in the mid-1970s, Peranakan cuisines emerged from ­household kitchens and entered into cookbooks and restaurants. Chua

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and Rajah state “the inscribing of Peranakan domestic cooking as recipes in cook books and as a feature in restaurant and coffee-house menus, as well as hawker fare, has resulted in the formalization of a cuisine” (Chua and Rajah 2001: 172). Duruz observes that with agenda like these—to formalize, to preserve and perhaps to proselytize—cookbooks take on an added significance, representing their “mission” to a consuming public (Duruz 2016: 3). Cookbooks reflect the everyday practices in the home and restaurant kitchens. They list the ingredients available or in fashion at a particular time as well as the types of kitchen equipment developed based on the kinds of energy employed for cooking. Importantly, cookbooks also inform us about the kinds of social and cultural values the readers are comfortable with, as with the ingredients used. For example, it would be unthinkable in contemporary Australia to have dishes such as shark’s fin soup or bird’s nest soup as in Yep’s Chinese Recipes for Home Cooking (Yep 1953: 134, 137). Current concerns about the environment and ethical or sustainable ways of living have ensured that contemporary eating practices are often imbued with complex moral choices (Brien 2011: 72). There is debate on the use of cookbooks as historical documents, the main criticism being that the publications were seen as prescriptive of ideals and aspirations. More critically, cookbook readers may not cook from the recipes at all and therefore do not reflect the meals being prepared from them around the time of publication. Modhumita Roy goes as far as to say that cookery books and recipes are “as much about fantasy and desire as they are about the materiality of consumption” (Roy 2010: 74). Community cookbooks, however, probably mirror dishes that were cooked in the home more accurately than other cookbook. The recipes were generally contributed by women who had cooked the dishes, and community cookbooks therefore inform seasonality of ingredients, locality and food trends. Further, in her work on cultural food colonialism, Lisa Heldke (2013: 400–404) queries the ownership of cookbook recipes. Heldke notes that “a cookbook author is described as having ‘stolen’ recipes only if they have previously appeared in published form – a form of communicating that privileges people on the basis of class and education as well as race, and often sex”. She elaborates by saying that cookbook authors usually acknowledge the creator of those recipes (particularly ethnic cooks) only perfunctorily. She points out that these cooks “need not be identified ­definitely, because they cannot be stolen from; they do not own their

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creations in any genuine (read: legally binding) sense of the word. On the other hand, the creations of cookbook authors, who have access to the machinery of publishing, must be respected and properly attributed” (Heldke 2013: 401). While Heldke does not advocate attributing each recipe to its creator, she feels that recipes taken from women in the field have their identities erased or generalized. Cookbooks as a genre by itself can only tell part of the history of foodways of a place. When used in tandem with anecdotes in memoirs, news items and advertisements in newspapers and magazines, records in archives and narratives in travelogues and diaries, cookbooks are a means to confirm the historical veracity of the food practices of communities. This chapter examines cookbooks published in twentieth-century Sydney, Shanghai and Singapore. Promotional cookbooks were published by companies that were keen to advertise their goods and services. There were also community cookbooks that were compiled from recipes contributed by individuals in the community. Another category of cookbooks that will be discussed in this chapter are war-related cookbooks. Food historians employ a variety of tools to document and analyse the ways in which we procure and prepare food, as influenced by cultural mores of taste, custom, habit and even politics. Cookbooks in their different incarnations date back to ancient times, from the cuneiform recipes of professional kitchens to the elaborate cuisines in Mesopotamia (Pilcher 2016: 116). Food historian Jeffrey Pilcher states that cookbooks, as a culinary infrastructure of knowledge, together with the wider publishing industry, have encouraged innovation and complexity in the kitchen (Pilcher 2016: 105). Sociologist Arjun Appadurai neatly sums up cookbooks as usually belonging to “the humble literature of complex civilizations, tell unusual cultural tales”. He explains that “they combine the sturdy pragmatic virtues of all manuals with the vicarious pleasure of the literature of the senses” and “reflect shifts in the boundaries of edibility, the proprieties of the culinary process, the logic of meals, the exigencies of the household budget, the vagaries of the market, and the structure of domestic ideologies” (Appadurai 1988: 3). Margaret Fulton, seen as one of Australia’s first celebrity cookery experts, published the Margaret Fulton’s Chinese Cooking. It was a 16-page mini book with “exciting new recipes” (Fulton 1970). More than a decade before though, Ethel Brice had already published the Chinese Cookery Book: Tested Recipes for Soups, Meat, Fish, Poultry, Vegetable, Egg, Rice and

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Noodle Dishes in Sydney (Brice 1959). Following the enduring success of The Common-sense Cookery Book, Angus & Robertson Publisher put out The Commonsense Chinese Cookery Book in 1976. Author Ella-Mei Wong hoped her recipes would encourage Chinese restaurant diners to attempt to cook those dishes at home. As the mid-morning to lunch yumcha meal (as discussed in Chap. 2) became increasingly popular among both the Chinese diaspora and Australians, Wong devoted 19 pages of yumcha recipes and menus in her book. In the years of British rule, cookbooks pioneered the ways in which colonial foodways were introduced to the early and subsequent arrivals of British families. Newly arrived memsahibs were encouraged to buy or were gifted with such cookbooks to ease them into colonial life. Cookbooks published in later generations added to the repertoire of dishes from other colonies as well as other food practices from other cultures. These publications can be seen as ideological tools too—in the prefaces, dedication pages—authors boldly and proudly proclaimed the colonial woman’s role in upholding the home as the white and ideal household in the colonized environment. The tones of the cookbooks and household guides in the main were authoritative, and sometimes imperious (Leong-Salobir 2015: 131–155). In British colonial Asia, cookbooks were written for sahibs and memsahibs, and yet the work of food preparation was performed by Asian servants. In addition to the recipes, there were instructions on household management. These included the prescribed codes of conduct that defined the boundaries between British rulers and the indigenous people. Cookbooks also served as the reference manual on how to deal with native servants. In Singapore, cookbooks used by the colonial mistress were similar to those used by memsahibs in India and Indian cooks. As most memsahibs in Singapore and other colonies did not cook on a daily basis, the continual publication of colonial cookbooks can be seen merely for reading and not as cooking manuals. This is not unlike the proliferation of cookbooks in contemporary times when not many cookbook purchasers actually cook from the publications. Author W.E. Kinsey in the preface of her cookery book for Singapore, The “Mems” Own Cookery Book wrote “with the hope that it will generally assist to combat the pernicious policy of the native cooks who not only overcharge in the prices of local commodities, but generally will not produce them, or attempt to raise non-existent difficulties”(Kinsey 1929: Preface). Apart from illustrating the types of foods consumed, cooking

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methods used and types and frequency of meals eaten, cookbooks are insightful for analysing the relationship between the colonizer and the colonized. First published in 1920, The “Mems” Own Cookery Book lists ingredients, preparation and cooking method, interspersed with opinionated notes from the author. As other colonial cookbooks, The “Mems” Own Cookery Book included colonial hybrid dishes as well as English and French recipes. My Favourite Recipes, like the author, straddles between two worlds, European and Asian (Handy 1960). Ellice Handy, a Eurasian married to an Englishman, was the first Singaporean to publish the colony’s first comprehensive cookery book. The cookery book lists recipes under several categories, including European, Chinese, Malayan, Indonesia and Indian. Interspersed throughout the book, appearing under different categories, are distinctly colonial hybridized dishes. There are about 30 curries, mulligatawny soup, kedgeree, country captain, chicken pie and sago pudding. It is interesting that Handy chose not to publish a Eurasian cookbook given her heritage. First published in 1952, when Singapore was a British Crown Colony, My Favourite Recipes went into several editions and reprints: in 1954, 1960, 1971, 1972, 1974, 1975, 1976, 1980, 1990 and 2012. There were only a handful of colonial cookbooks published for the Shanghai residents. The Anglo-Chinese Cook Book published in 1916  in Shanghai was both in English and Chinese, the latter for “the mistress to give instructions to the cook with the least possible trouble”. Another cookbook was written by Lady Maze and Mrs V.G. Bowden in 1940, entitled Bon Appetit: Secrets from Shanghai Kitchens (1940). The colonial cookbooks were written by British men and women, and the circulation of these publications helped to spread the colonial cuisine from colony to colony and reaffirm their rulers’ status in the colonies. Australian cookbooks written in the 1900s were mainly by women, and recipes were usually of English origin. Understandably, they served to maintain cultural and historical bonds with Britain, but dishes of imperial culture crept into the cookbooks, such as curries, kedgeree and mulligatawny soup. As well, the early cookbooks included native ingredients like kangaroo, wonga-wonga pigeon and warrigal greens. With the exception of curries and the ubiquitous mulligatawny soup, however, home cooking in the European kitchen in treaty port Shanghai included a variety of European dishes. In fact, Shanghai Anglo-Chinese

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cookbooks did not feature any Anglo-Chinese recipes at all. Cookbooks written for the colonial household helped to give ideas about the colonial cuisine to other women under the imperial project all over the colonies. Where cookbook titles were published in the hundreds in and for colonial India and other Asian colonies, only a handful saw print for Shanghai and other Chinese treaty ports. This suggests that there was not really a peculiarly colonial cuisine in Shanghai as in India and Southeast Asia. The few that were published for Shanghai were similar in content: in addition to recipes, there were instructions on how to run a household and manage servants. Values and representations of empire needed to be upheld, even for semi-colonial Shanghai. In her analysis on the use of cookbooks and recipes, Sian Supski explored the developing, consolidating and extending of food-making knowledge. In Australia, many migrant women brought cookbooks with them, and some purchased cookbooks in Australia in their languages of origin—Polish, Croatian, Dutch, Italian and German. Through cooking and cookbooks, migrant women maintained links with their mother and their cultural traditions (Supski 2005: 88). Supski notes that these women used cookbooks to record and recall cultural traditions. While their cookbooks acted as a source of inspiration, they also provided an insight into the women’s daily lives, the types of meals they cooked for their families and the foods they created for celebrations. Importantly, their cookbooks allowed these women to extend and develop their food-making knowledge and provided an opportunity for the women to share their knowledge intergenerationally, passing down and recreating their “thoughtful practice” (Supski 2005: 88). Women use cookbooks, both published and homemade, not only to improve their food-making practice but also to gain pleasure from reading them. Supski’s interviews with migrant women reveal that spending money on cookbooks was regarded as a luxury in the 1950s. In their stories of 1950s kitchen life, women stated that during their cooking trial-and-error period they believed that they had to be careful with what they cooked because they could not afford to waste either food or money. All women in my study grew up in a time of frugality and were watchful of their limited resources. (Supski 2005: 90)

So cookbooks not only inform, teach and inspire women to cook flavoursome meals, but are seen as an economic tool. Thriftiness and frugality in housekeeping were viewed as womanly virtues. Further, for some

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women who created their own recipe books, this became a means of connecting them with other family members and a link between generations. Many women regard recipes as “rules”, and not following the recipe, presumably, as “breaking the rules”. Women use cookbooks and recipes as a guide, but they apply their learnt skills to make the food (Supski 2005: 90–93). Although cookbooks are not entirely a reliable documentation of the eating practices of a community, they do represent the culture and aspirations of the group. The recipes of the Shanghai Gas Company Cookery Book published in 1937 were all European. British colonial recipes included curried eggs, curried mutton, kedgeree, rice pudding, sago pudding and tapioca pudding. Published in Shanghai, The Anglo-Chinese Cook Book was compiled by Mrs R. Calder-Marshall and Mrs P.L. Bryant, with twofold aims. One was to help colonial women communicate with the household cook, and two, for the proceeds of the sale of the cookbook “to aid the war fund” (specifically to the British Woman’s Work Fund and “other War Funds”). Advertisements at the back of the cookbook included kitchen equipment, provision shops, banks, pharmacies, dairy farms, insurance companies, mineral resource companies and car sales companies (Calder-­ Marshall and Bryant 1916: iii–iv). The Anglo-Chinese Cook Book contained mainly European-type dishes, but like other colonial cookbooks, it featured mulligatawny soup, notes on the serving of curry and recipes for Cleland curry (a mutton curry), curried ox tail, Indian curry and vegetable curry. There are punctilious notes on how to serve curry. Hints about curry serving: 1. A tomato salad may be served with curry, dressed with a sprinkling of sugar and a French dressing. 2. An iced banana salad may be served with curry, the bananas sliced lengthways and marinaded [sic] in oil, lemon juice, a sprinkling of sugar, pepper and salt. 3. Never serve a curry as an entrée, always after the joint. 4. Never offer wine immediately after curry, always iced water. 5. A dry curry is very good served iced, in that case it should be made the day before wanted and iced for quite 2 hours before serving. 6. Iced curry is nice served in curl lettuce leaves, a little chutney mixed through it, or in tomato cups, the centers of the tomatoes scooped out and the cups sprinkled with sugar.

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7. A curry is one of the few things which may be advantageously warmed over. 8. Grated coconut and green ginger may be added with advantage to most curries. (Calder-Marshall and Bryant 1916: 65)

This cookbook, more than any other, supports the view that it was the cook who prepared food for the Westerner in Shanghai at the time. Two volumes of the cookbook were published, one for the use of the mistress and the other to be kept in the kitchen. Bryant states in the preface that the cookbook provides “a ready means of conveying definite instructions to the cook”. Each recipe in the Chinese volume is numbered in both English and Chinese, and has the English as well as the Chinese title, “enabling the mistress to give instructions to the cook with the least possible trouble and without chance of misunderstanding”. A Mr Chang Nieh-yun was credited for the English-Chinese translation. The compilers state that most of the recipes had been tried and tested by European women in Shanghai, using ingredients that could be sourced locally. Bon Appetit: Secrets from Shanghai Kitchens was another community cookbook written to raise fund for the war effort. It was self-published and written by Lady Maze and Mrs V.G. Bowden in 1940. Bon Appetit: Secrets from Shanghai Kitchens, compiled by Lady Maze and Mrs V.G. Bowden in 1940 (second edition), is another community type of cookery book with recipes contributed by the international community. Also specifically compiled “with the aim of benefiting British war funds”, the recipes are grouped in sections under cocktails and zakouska, soups, fish, curries and rice dishes, sukiyaki, vegetables, entrees and luncheon dishes, chicken and game, beef and mutton dishes, desserts (hot and cold), cakes, biscuits and breads, sweets and miscellaneous. They feature French, Dutch, Portuguese, Russian, American, Italian and Austrian dishes. There is little annotation in the cookbook except for the section on curries and rice dishes, where two pages are devoted to the cooking of rice. It states that cooked rice should be light and fluffy, “as we Shanghailanders know it; where every grain is separate, and which looks as appetizing as it tastes” (Maze and Bowden 1940: 47–48). Mrs J.C. McCracken contributed in what is clearly a hybrid dish of several Asian elements. Moh-loh-kai (Malay or Indian Chicken) is accompanied with the “rice dressing”. The chicken is served with rice that has been boiled and fried with lard, raisins and a Cantonese pickle. The recipe for “Goula Malacca” or gula melaka, a coconut and sago pudding, contributed by Mrs Corfield, is obviously

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reproduced from one of the Southeast Asian colonies. Mrs Corfield notes that “this dish is famous in Malaya and, indeed, in most tropical countries. At one time no Sunday tiffin was ever considered complete without it. It formed the perfect complement to the curry which invariably preceded it” (Maze and Bowden 1940: 154). As mentioned in the chapter on colonial legacies, no hybrid Anglo-­ Chinese cuisine emerged in Shanghai or other treaty ports, similar to the colonial hybrid cuisine in India. The Chinese Festive Board, by Corrinne Lamb, was the first Chinese cookbook published for the non-Chinese market in 1935. Resident in the various treaty ports and other parts of China for 20 years, Lamb sought to paint a more sympathetic view of the food habits of the Chinese. In the introduction of her book, she wrote: In no other country does the matter of eating present such serious problems as in China. For the masses it represents a daily struggle against overwhelming odds to obtain food enough to keep body and soul together. To those Chinese, on the other hand, who are more fortunately situated, eating takes on a serious aspect in a different sense. With them it is an affair involving pleasant anticipation, careful thought, meticulous selection, and, finally, a wholehearted if somewhat noisy gusto during the process itself. … Chinese cooks possess that rare ability to work the same marvels with the lowly cabbage purchased for a string of cash that they do with birds’ nests at sixteen dollars an ounce. (Lamb 1985: 9)

In her first chapter “Dinner Is Served”, Lamb describes what constitutes the three meals a day, noting the “widespread habit of nibbling at food between regular meals”. All through the day, she could see people eating titbits, including “fruits, candies, cakes, nuts, and biscuits”. These were sold by itinerant vendors and small shops. She continued, “every railway train theatre, teashop, bath-house and bazaar has its allurements for those feeling the first twinges of appetite” (Lamb 1985: 12). Breakfast at seven o’clock consisted of tea and a ring of light batter deep-fried, “cold, limp, insipid” which Lamb calls “a sort of prehistoric doughnut”. At ten in the morning, there was steamed rice or baked or steamed flour cakes, or man t’ou (native bread) or mien t’iao erb (noodles), yu ping (oil cakes), round biscuits deep-fried or pao tzu (steamed rolls with ground meat and vegetables) (Lamb 1985: 12). Other chapters were:

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Chapter 2: Table Etiquette Chapter 3: A Chinese Dinner Party: Chapter 4: The Life of the Party: dinner party game Chapter 5: The Wine Bowl Chapter 6: In a Chinese Kitchen Lamb states that her recipes were of “genuine Chinese food obtained as the result of actual observation of Chinese cooks engaged in the assembling and preparation of each dish” (Lamb 1985). Australian housewives until the late nineteenth century used British cookbooks (Singley 2013), most notably, Eliza Acton’s Modern Cookery in All Its Branches (1845), and, of course, Beeton’s Beeton’s Book of Household Management (1861). Acton was one of Britain’s first cookbook writers, and Modern Cookery was widely copied by other cookbook writers, particularly by Beeton. It became a popular cookbook for housewives to refer to throughout the colonies. Adele Wessell points out that the persistence of British food practices in Australia was an attempt to maintain “cultural and historical bonds and sustain a shared sense of British identity” (Wessell 2004). The English and Australian Cookery Book by Edward Abbott was Australia’s first cookbook, published in 1864  in Britain. Although this publication lies outside the historical timeline of this book, it is worth examining it for a number of reasons. Abbott’s book flagged an important milestone in Australian culinary history as it suggested for the first time the sense of national identity, in the recipes that promoted native game. This was several years before the Federation of Australia was constituted, in 1901. As a nod to British cookbooks, the first Australian cookbook listed several curry recipes. As in other sections of the cookbook where notes and recipes are evidently copied from other publications, Abbott also emphasized the merits of using the best ingredients for curry powder. The traditional indigenous Australians’ diet consisted of a variety of native meats, of course. Abbott’s promotion of native game was a distinct way of asserting Australianness, as Antipodean native game is unique to this part of the world. Abbott gave several recipes on how to cook native fauna: kangaroo pasty, kangaroo steamer (minced kangaroo stewed with salted pork), roast kangaroo, roast emu, jugged kangaroo, roast wombat, slippery bob (battered kangaroo brains fried in emu fat), pan jam (Abbott 1864: 82–83). None of these were curried. Were curry spices seen as too foreign or too British and therefore lessening the Australianness of native game? However, other cookery books were not so reticent in supplying recipes for currying wild game.

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Various analyses of Abbott’s book point to his appropriating recipes from other cookbooks of the time. It was common practice among British and colonial cookery authors to plagiarize word for word recipes and notes from each other. Indeed, not all cookbooks were written by patriotic authors or honest authors. Many would have been written with pecuniary motives, and there were too many instances of plagiarism to cite here. While the jury is still out on the legitimacy of replicating recipes from other sources, nineteenth- and twentieth-century cookbook authors have blatantly plagiarized supplementary notes to recipes and prescriptive texts in cookbooks. From the 1900s, cookbooks in general increased exponentially in Australia. The majority of these cookbooks were cheap productions by today’s printing standards. The few illustrations were mainly line drawings, even on covers. Most of the publications carried advertisement to help defray printing costs. The number of print runs and editions were high, at figures cookbook publishers today would envy. The Common-sense Cookery Book, first published in 1914 in Sydney, was compiled by the Public School Cookery Teachers’ Association of New South Wales. It was originally published to aid the teaching of home economics in the state’s schools, but it has become an important cookbook in Sydney homes. In 1964, the publishers, Angus & Robertson, stated that more than half a million copies had been sold. Two world wars and an economic depression did not seem to dent the publishing success of The Common-sense Cookery Book. If anything, it seems that in times of hardship, cookbooks probably provide a sense of comfort and homeliness. In fact, the first edition of The Common-sense Cookery Book was published in 1914 when World War I broke out. World War I lasting four years was costly to Australia, as it took 60,000 lives and 156,000 were wounded or taken prisoner. In the midst of the war, the 1916 edition declared that “the proceeds of the cookbook would be donated to the Red Cross Society” (Common-sense Hints on Plain Cookery 1916: Preface). In the 1930s, when the economic depression hit Australia, with unemployment as high as 30 per cent in 1932, publication figures were high for The Common-sense Cookery Book. In the 1931 edition, 174,000 copies were printed, and the 1937 edition put out 207,000 copies. More than a million Australians served in World War II, in Europe, the Mediterranean and North Africa. North-west Australia and Sydney Harbour were also under attack. Still, in 1940, a total of 236,000 copies were printed, in 1941, there were 249,000 copies and, in 1944, there were

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273,000 copies. In its more than a hundred years’ history, The Common-­ sense Cookery Book has sold over a million copies. By this time, the “modern” cookbook was born in Australia. The middle classes were keen to try new tastes from their overseas travel, and printing costs had fallen. Changes in attitudes to food began from the 1950s and 1960s with increasing diversity and multiculturalism, and of the development of a broad range of eating styles: cosmopolitan, ethnic, Asia and indigenous (Duruz 1999: 232). Recipes from the women’s pages in newspaper columns and women’s magazines were compiled into cookbooks. One of the first publications of this type of new cookbooks in the 1960s, published in Sydney, was The Margaret Fulton Cookbook (Fulton 1968). The Australian Women’s Weekly Cookbook, also published in Sydney, followed on its heels (The Australian Women’s Weekly Cookbook 1970). Where the 1960s and 1970s saw the publication of a number of Asian cookbooks, reflecting Asian migration and Australian awareness of Asian culture, there was no corresponding increase of cookbooks from the Mediterranean cuisine groups that significantly changed Australian foodways. As Sarah Jane Shepherd Black observes, Greek and Italian foodways were well represented in the cookbooks from the 1960s but were more integrated into the mainstream, rather than “in contrast to the exotic ‘otherness’ of Asian cuisines” (Black 2010: 103).

Community Cookbooks Within the cookbook genre are the community cookbooks. Community cookbooks are known variously as compiled, regional, charitable, contributory, democratic or fundraising cookbooks. First appearing in the United States at the time of the American Civil War (Driver 1989: 37), compiled or contributed cookbooks, more so than general cookbooks, depict more accurately everyday practices. General cookbooks are seen as more static and not so representative of food preparation and consumption. The dual aspect of the community cookbook, as a community project and recipe collection, tells us the practicalities of the kitchen and the dining table (Black 2010: 5). Lynne Ireland goes as far as to say that the “compiled cookbook” can be viewed as autobiographical, that is, the recipes can be examined for insights into food preference (Ireland 1981: 109). Further, the compiled cookbook, also known as the fund-raising cookbook, has recipes that reflect what is eaten in the home in contrast to magazines and cookbooks

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of the popular press that set standards and attempt to influence consumption (Ireland 1981: 108). They are compilations of favourite recipes of members of organizations, with proceeds of sale of the cookbooks going to charity. Favourite recipes were collected from a charity or a communal organization, with proceeds from sales for a particular cause. The Y.W.C.A. of Malaya & Singapore Cookery Book, written for the colonial community, was published by the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) of Singapore. The YWCA was established in 1875 by missionary Sophia Cooke to provide young women working in the city with accommodation. Proceeds from sales of the cookbook were for the “support, maintenance and extension of the work of the Y.W.C.A. in Malaya and Singapore, which is dedicated to nourishment of the mind and spirit as well as the body” (Llewellyn 1951: Foreword). It provides instructions on meal planning, selection of ingredients and methods of cooking. Detailed notes are given on particular meals and dishes. As a nod to the young local women who were members of the YWCA, the cookbook lists and explains about a hundred local products, including belacan (shrimp paste), sharks’ fin and birds’ nests. It is unlikely the European community would include these three ingredients in their meals (Llewellyn 1951). The “compiled cookbook” can be used as a research guide for gauging preferred food through frequency of inclusion of the recipes (Ireland 1981: 110). This can certainly be applied to Anglo-Indian cookbooks where curry recipes are almost certain to be included in every volume (Leong-Salobir 2015: 135). Each Australian city had its own community cookbooks with more or less the same recipes, with the most important one in New South Wales being The Common-sense Cookery Book. It was compiled by the Public School Cookery Teachers’ Association of New South Wales. Sydney: Angus & Robertson. Community cookbooks in Australia were first published from the end of the nineteenth century. It is likely that the first community cookbook published in Sydney was the Cookery Book of Good and Tried Receipts of 1913. It was compiled for the Women’s Missionary Association in Sydney for the Women’s Missionary Association Sale and Exhibition in 1895. The “plain cookery book of ordinary households” went through several revisions, from 1895 to 1979, with recipes that had gone out of favour deleted and new ones added (Bannerman 1998: 49). Community cookbooks provided a platform for women to articulate and exchange views on food practices in the home. In doing so, kitchen work, household budgets and women’s home duties were placed on

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record. The duties and ideals of Australian womanhood can be gleaned from these cookbooks. Mary Gilmore, writer and journalist, published The Worker Cook Book (Gilmore, Mary 1917. The Worker Cook Book: compiled from the tried recipes of thrifty housekeepers sent from all parts of Australia to The worker’s woman’s page. Sydney: The Worker Trustees). Gilmore was active in the labour movement in Sydney. From 1908 to 1931, she was editor of the women’s pages at The Australian Worker. She also wrote for other publications including The Bulletin and The Sydney Morning Herald. The Australian Workers Union official journal was The Worker. Like Isabella Beeton, whose household management manual was largely based on the column she wrote for the English woman’s domestic magazine, Gilmore drew on the contributions of the Worker’s readers who were invited to write questions and provide tips and family recipes. First published in 1914, The Worker Cook Book was a practical guide containing “every-day recipes of Australian housekeepers in working class homes” (Gilmore 1917: Foreword). Although Gilmore was acclaimed as a writer and for campaigning in The Worker for social and economic reforms, it was The Worker Cook Book that outsold all her other publications. Women saw The Worker Cook Book as a reliable resource for thinking up meals for the family. Certainly the cookbook is valuable for the insight it provides into the food practices of the Australian working class at the time. The Worker Cook Book not only instructed in the traditional culinary practices but also promoted a social and political reform agenda.

War-Related Cookbooks Although there has been no major conflict on Australian soil, Australian soldiers and others have enlisted to fight in the two world wars, regional conflicts in Malaya and Borneo, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the Gulf War in the twentieth century. Involvement in these wars influenced the daily lives of Australians, from contributing to the war effort in various ways to food rationing. Advertisements and articles in newspapers, magazines and radio programmes encouraged the rationing of numerous consumer goods, including food items such as meat, tea, butter and sugar. A poster put out by the government declared, “Australia is a food arsenal of the Allied World. We must share our food” (https://anzacportal.dva.gov. au/history/conflicts/australia-and-second-world-war/resources/all-australian-homefront-19391945/living. Accessed 5 August 2018).

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The two world wars brought out cookbooks to fundraise for the war effort. These are also community cookbooks as they rally readers to purchase the cookbooks not only for the recipes but to buy the products advertised within the books. Patriotic instincts were stirred into action by community groups to commend military victory and to support the troops. The War Chest Cookery Book, published in Sydney, was sold for one shilling six pence, and products advertised included baking powder, gas stoves, hand cream, coffee, tea, mosquito nets, plant nursery, grocery stores and cooking utensils. “The Compiler” wrote in the Foreword it was hoped that funds derived from sales of the book would go towards the War Chest, “whose object is to help our fighting men who have gone out in defence of their country and are suffering and enduring so nobly all the hardships incidental to this terrible war” (War Chest Cookery Book 1917: Foreword). “The Editor” thanked the advertisers for “responding to our financial appeal” and “specially ask the ladies interested in our movement to repay our Advertisers for their co-operation as much as possible by purchasing the advertised articles”. In Shanghai, a cookbook, billed “definitely a war product”, was published in 1918, with all proceeds from the sale of the cookbook going to the Red Cross, the American Red Cross Book of Recipes for the Use of Chinese Foodstuffs (Reisner et  al. 1918). This cookbook, unlike other expatriate cookbooks, encouraged Westerners in Shanghai to prepare food from local products. The author wrote in the Preface, It has been prepared with two very distinct ideas in view: that of utilizing native products as substitutes for the home imported foodstuff and thus help in the conservation of food products for shipment to our Allied Armies, and secondly that of reducing the cost of living, which has greatly increased because of higher first cost of home products, higher freight rates, and depreciated exchange. In other words patriotic duty and economy necessity are responsible for the book. This Book of Recipes is different from all other that have been published in China for foreigners’ use, in that it deals only with native products and recipes which can be made from them. The only exceptions to this are nine products such as certain spices and flavors, baking powder, etc. A number of foreign vegetables have been included, but they are all easily procurable or can be grown in one’s garden. (Reisner et al. 1918: Preface)

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An example of using a local ingredient in a Western-style recipe was contributed by Mrs Alexander Paul for creamed salt fish. Salt fish in Chinese cuisine is usually cooked without soaking. It is usually pan-fried, stir-fried with vegetables, stewed or steamed in egg custard. Mrs Paul’s recipe calls for the salt fish to be broken into pieces and soaked in water overnight. It is then stewed in water until tender, and then milk, flour and a beaten egg are added. Other recipes include chop suey, water chestnut and fish, Kaoliang yeast bread, Chinese gelatine (agar agar) and sauerkraut. A section on Chinese dishes included recipes for kidney flowers, fried pig brains, tea eggs and congee. Like other cookbooks of the time, The American Red Cross Book of Recipes for the Use of Chinese Foodstuffs also carried advertisements. Unlike other similar publications that accepted all kinds of advertising for goods and services, this cookbook only promoted food produce and food products. The back page advertisement featured “Foodstuffs Grown in China”, market reports showing what fruit, vegetables, meat and fish were in season at Shanghai prices. It also advised that the cheapest and best foodstuffs from abroad could be purchased from the larger Shanghai stores. It also usefully noted that the arrival of new food stocks were advertised in the North China Daily News. An Australian connection was the advertisement for Peacock’s Tasmanian Jams, as “a breakfast or tea time preserve with natural fruit flavor and unequalled for use with desserts and pastry”. The jam was sold at Mustard & Co. Sole Agents, 22 Museum Road, Shanghai. George Peacock was one of the first manufacturers of canned jams in the colony. He started processing jams in Tasmania, and later moved his business, Produce Exchange, to Sussex Street in Sydney (http://adb.anu.edu. au/biography/peacock-george-4378. Accessed 29 May 2018). One cookbook published in Singapore after the Japanese Occupation in the 1940s is P.C.B. Newington’s Good Food (Newington 1947). Newington was interned in Singapore by Japanese forces between 1942 and 1945 and wrote that “it is an extraordinary thing how one’s thoughts turn to food when one is starving”. Newington related that he started a Gourmets’ Club outside his hut at the Sime Road Camp, and fellow internees would meet once a week to discuss food preparation. Club members wrote down recipes; recipes were also obtained from the Women’s Camp. Recipes in the cookbook are eclectic and include the standard colonial dishes of curries, mulligatawny, kedgeree and sago pudding. Significantly, Britons interned in wartime were not just thinking of British food but craved for Indian and Southeast Asian dishes, a powerful

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example of food appropriation. A.J.H. Dempster, the assistant food controller of Perak, in his foreword on this wartime cookbook, noted that “no epicure came to Malaya to live on roast beef” (Newington 1947: 24). When Canadian Ethel Rogers Mulvany was a prisoner of war in Changi Jail in Singapore from 1942 to 1945, she collected recipes from fellow prisoners. After liberation, in 1946, she compiled the recipes into a 100-­ page cookbook and had it printed under the title, Prisoners of War Cook Book: This Is a Collection of Recipes Made by Starving Prisoners of War When They Were Interned in Changi Jail, Singapore. She raised $18,000 from the book, and used the proceeds to send food to former POWS still hospitalized in England (Evans 2015: 39). Recipes from Mulvany’s cookbook is not in the format of wartime cookbooks concerned with frugal food preparation. As with the rationale of Newington’s Good Food (thinking about good food in times of hunger and starvation), Mulvany’s cookbook featured rich confections and substantial dishes. She hoped that by discussing and writing the recipes, she helped to alleviate the prisoners’ hunger pains. She believed this was a survival tactic as “many of us slept with the feeling of having had a meal, after two or three hours of recipe writing” (Evans 2015: 40). Mulvany’s cookbook has historical importance relating to wartime practices on many fronts. It details the day-to-day activities of imprisonment. Camp cooking was done by the men, as were the chopping of wood for fuel and hauling sacks of rice. The kitchen was situated on the men’s side of the jail, and the food was then taken to the women’s side and distributed by the women (Evans 2015: 40). As discussed in the chapter on Singapore, food rations in Changi were insufficient, and there was widespread starvation, resulting in prisoners contracting beriberi, tropical ulcers, dysentery and oedema (Evans 2015: 42). Cookbooks inform us of more than what people ate or how they cooked in a particular time and place. The analysis of ingredients tells stories of our food practices. For many years, Barbara Ketcham Wheaton had run seminars at Harvard University on using cookbooks as historical texts. I attended one in 2014 in which she explained that cookbooks tell us about joy and sorrow, feasting and fasting, the quotidian and the spectacular (Wheaton 2014). Within cookbooks are stories of nature and humanity, seasonality, locality and geography, and also of trade routes and global relationships. There are histories and transformations of religion, philosophy, medicine and technology, and also of literature and literacy, markets and marketing. Cookbooks also reveal much about identities and politics,

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such as the role and rights of women. During the early centuries of cookbooks, these texts were written by men and for men, most often the managers of court and estate kitchens, not for cooks themselves and certainly not housewives. The audience, tone, style and content of cookbooks changed over time.

Promotional Cookbooks The twentieth century saw an explosion of technological advances and new products for the home. Utility providers and food companies promoted their goods and services by publishing or sponsoring cookbooks. Changes in how people purchased food, employed new cooking methods and labour-saving kitchen devices helped elevate the role that women played in society. That role was clearly echoed in cookbooks (Wessell 2013: 3). As mentioned elsewhere, cookbooks are important sources for history, not just reflecting historical trends but informing on material culture. The Shanghai Gas Company Cookery Book: For Use with New World Regulo-Controlled Gas Cookers, published in 1937, had Chinese translations side by side. As in colonial India, the mistress of the household, in ordering a meal, simply had to point at the various dishes listed in the cookbook and the cook would read for himself, in Chinese, what was required. Where the cook was illiterate, a friend or another servant could translate for him. Compiled specifically for cooking with the New World Regulo-Controlled Gas Cookers, the recipes “were selected by an expert in domestic cooking”. The compiler also noted that the recipes “have all been subjected to careful trial under ordinary home conditions, and the most suitable settings of the ‘Regulo’, and correct cooking times have been determined and added to each recipe”. All the recipes are European with British colonial hybrid dishes such as curried eggs, curried mutton, kedgeree, rice pudding, sago pudding and tapioca pudding. The 1937 edition was revised and enlarged with the addition of details for a six-­ course dinner in the dinner section. Another new addition was the bottling of fruits and vegetables (Shanghai Gas Company Cookery Book 1937: Introduction). Except for these words, “With the Compliments of the Shanghai Gas Company”, there is no indication that Radiation Cookery Book (1929) was published for Shanghai residents. Each section contains a number of general directions dealing with the preparation of the food as well as numer-

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ous recipes for different dishes. Recipes given were similar to those from cookbooks of the time, including curried eggs, curried mutton, curry of cold meat, sago pudding and tomato chutney. The 1929 edition was enlarged to meet the “growing number of requests for an extension of the popular ‘whole dinner’ section”, with the “useful menus” increased to 50. There were instructions on the “cooking operations on the hotplate”, and the book points out that the Radiation Cookery Book is a worthy handbook of the “New World Cooker”, the most efficient gas cooking appliance in the world (1929: iii). Other versions of the cookbook include three editions for 1927, three editions for 1928 and three enlarged and revised editions for 1929. In Sydney, the Australian factory, Davis Gelatine, established in 1919, put out a recipe booklet, The Davis Dainty Dishes (1937). The first print run was 30,000, and these were sent to readers only for the cost of postage. The recipe booklet went through numerous editions and ceased publication in 1949 (Hunwick 2018: 175). Marketing boards for meat, dairy products and fruit also published cookbooks, with recipes using their ingredients. By the first few decades of the twentieth century, there were promotional pamphlets and cookbooks covering every area of cookery (Bannerman 1998: 46–49). The 1970s in Australia heralded in a new era for lessening women’s work in the home with modern kitchen appliances. Margaret Fulton’s The Margaret Fulton Crock-pot Cookbook, published in 1976, extolls the virtues of the slow cooker: Rarely has an appliance been accepted as quickly and completely as the Crock-pot, … This modern version of the old clay pot that used to sit on the side of the stove, slowly simmering the evening meal, is so wonderfully versatile. In a Crock-Pot foods can cook for eight to ten hours unattended, while you work, play or sleep – very necessary with the hectic pace of life today. (Fulton 1976: 8)

The earlier promotional cookbooks for Singapore were mainly published by energy companies providing energy source for cooking appliances. Some of these companies are the Hagemeyer Electronics (1984), Singapore Municipality Gas Department (1938) and Shellane (1972). Most of the early twentieth-century cookbooks in the three cities carry advertisements: on the back and inside covers, and within the books. Not all advertisements were related to food or kitchen equipment. Banks, insurance companies and even car sales companies featured their products.

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Index

A Abalone, 40, 44, 146, 151 Abbott, Edward, 127, 201, 202 Aboriginal people, 18 Activists, 166 Acton, Eliza, 201 Adams, Virginia, 118 Adaptation, 18, 43, 86, 132–134 Adulterate (d), 31, 76 Advertisements, 143, 145, 194, 198, 202, 205, 207, 210 Afternoon tea, 22, 23, 30, 31, 101, 122, 145, 146 Agrarian food culture, 118 Ah Chong, 169 Aitkin, Greg, 149, 150 Ajinomoto, 66 Albala, Ken, 1, 2 Alexander, Stephanie, 41 All About Shanghai and Environs, 54, 68, 70, 75–77, 145 Alluvial soils, 56 Amah, 67, 70, 175 American Club, 68 Americanization, 35, 152, 178 American restaurants, 142, 145, 146

Anchovies, 88, 101, 122, 123, 129, 156 Ancient China, 139 Anderson, Benedict, 191 Andrieu, Pierre, 139, 151 Ang, Ien, 19 Anglo-Burmese, 94 Anglo-Chinese, 11, 113, 120, 124, 198 Anglo-Indian cuisine, 114, 115, 117 Ang-See, Carmelea, 98 Anhui, 55, 59, 142–144 Anhui people, 143 Antipodean, 126, 201 Appadurai, Arjun, 125, 178, 194 Apple(s), 9, 17, 27, 33, 69, 75, 78, 126, 128–130, 132, 154, 167 Appropriation, 86, 121–124, 208 Arabs, 88, 92, 155, 159 Archives, 10, 14, 149, 194 Argyriou, Ellen, 18 Armenians, 92, 93, 148 Aromatics, 60, 88, 92, 96, 99, 124, 138 Art Gallery Café, 41 Astor ballroom, 68

© The Author(s) 2019 C. Leong-Salobir, Urban Food Culture, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51691-6

235

236 

INDEX

Astor House, 69, 145 Attiki Pty Ltd Food Products, 35 Attiwill, K., 101 Australia, 5, 6, 13, 17–23, 25, 26, 28, 30, 31, 34–36, 38, 39, 41–48, 69, 83, 120, 126–128, 130–132, 134, 150, 166–168, 170, 183, 184, 190, 191, 193, 197, 201–205, 210 Australia Hotel, 28, 132 Australian cuisine, 13, 19, 20, 22, 35–38, 41, 48 Australian ham, 68, 77 Australian Heritage Cookbook, The, 132 Australian Humanities Review, 166 Australian Imperial Forces, 180 Australianness, 201 Australian Women’s Weekly Cookbook, The, 203 Aux Freres Provencaux, Café Restaurant de Paris, 36 Ayam brand, 103 Ayam sioh, 96 A&W, 108 B Babi assam garam, 96 Baby boomers, 134 Bailey, Matthew, 184 Bakerite Bakery, 73 Ballantyne, Tony, 2, 114 Balmain, 183 Bamboo Restaurant, 151 Banana Leaf Apolo, 92 Banana plantations, 168, 172 Bananas, 26, 29, 75, 78, 92, 106, 123, 129, 132, 133, 160, 171, 172, 175, 198 Banerji, C., 131 Bangladeshis, 160 Bangs, Datu Haji Mohamed Yusuf, 105, 107

Banks Meadow, 169 Bannerman, Colin, 19, 128, 129, 204, 210 Banquet(s), 5, 67, 140, 141, 143, 144, 148, 190 Barbarian dishes, 118 Barbecue, 27 Barracks Café, 41 “Bastard” cuisine, 39 Batik Grill, 122 Bean paste, 63, 66, 98 Beckett, Richard, 27, 36 Beckwith-Smith, M.B., 104 Beef, 7–9, 19, 21, 27, 33, 43, 44, 68, 69, 71, 72, 77, 85, 89, 96, 99, 101, 102, 105, 106, 115, 118, 122–124, 126, 128, 131, 151, 161, 174, 179, 183, 199, 208 Bee Hive Coffee Palace, 36 Belimbing, 96 Belmore markets, 169 Benbang, 142 Benbangcai, 143 Bencoolen, 94, 156 Bennelong at the Opera House, 41 Beri beri, 64, 103, 104, 208 Beriss, David, 9, 138 Berowra Waters Inn, 38, 41 Bianchi, 145 Bickers, Robert, 6–8, 66, 115, 116, 143 Billy tea, 23, 27 Bilson, Gay, 38, 39, 41, 42, 48 Bilson, Tony, 38, 39, 41, 42 Bird nest, 44 Bishop, P., 155 Black, Sarah Jane Shepherd, 203 Black Hole, 160 Black pepper crab, 86 Black swan, 19, 183 Black & White 4D Milk Bar, 35 Blainey, Geoffrey, 31 Blake, Myrna L., 94

 INDEX 

Blancmange, 71 Blaut, J.M., 5, 10, 172 Bligh, William, 182 Blue Funnel Liners, 83 Boarders, 149 Boarding houses, 45, 149, 167 Boileau, Janet P., 93 Boileau, Joanna, 45, 166 Boiled water store, 65 Bon Goût, 42, 48 Boone, H.W., 74 Bor lor kai, 150 Boston, 25 Bowden, V.G. Mrs, 11, 120, 196, 199 Boyanese, 155, 161 Bracken, Gregory, 13 Breakfast, 22, 23, 34, 37, 63–65, 68, 69, 71, 73, 88, 91, 105, 106, 153, 154, 156, 161, 200, 207 Brice, Ethel, 194, 195 Brien, Donna Lee, 19, 193 British Armed Forces, 122 British Consulate, 55 British households, 117, 161 British Military Administration (BMA), 103 British war funds, 199 Britons, 7, 8, 13, 23, 32, 54, 71, 113, 115–117, 119, 121, 122, 124, 207 Bryant, P.L. Mrs, 113, 198, 199 Buah keluak, 96 Buffalo meat, 180 Bugis, 104, 155, 161 Buley, E. C., 19, 22–25, 29, 183 Bund, 68, 143 Burghers, 94 Burma, 94, 101 Burnell, A.C., 131 Burton, David, 125 Bush life, 23

237

Butchery (butcheries), 6, 20, 43, 44, 77, 152, 176, 182, 183 Butter, 17, 31–34, 37, 66, 69, 71, 76, 94, 113, 129, 132, 133, 161, 180, 183, 184, 205 C Cabbage, 10, 35, 59, 60, 64, 67, 96, 118, 165, 167, 168, 176, 184 Cabinet making, 168 Cabramatta, 6, 20, 46 Cafes, 1, 6, 9–10, 13, 18, 20, 21, 27, 30, 33–36, 39, 41, 42, 44, 46–48, 66, 69, 85, 88, 89, 108, 119, 121, 122, 128, 137–162, 171, 182, 190, 191 Caiguan, 142 Calder-Marshall, R. Mrs, 113, 198, 199 Caldwell, Melissa, 86, 87 Cameron, J., 72 Camp, 27, 104–107, 207, 208 Canidrome Ballroom, 68 Canteen, 36, 56, 105, 121, 146, 155 Cantonese, 8, 10, 44, 46, 57, 91, 104, 138, 140–142, 147, 159, 169, 172, 190, 199 Cantonese food, 140, 144, 145 Cantonese sausage, 44 Cao, Zhi, 149 Capon, 72, 151 Caramel custard, 100 Cargo Flour Mill, 182 Carlton Café, 69, 145 Carrefour, 181 Carrots, 10, 35, 94, 113, 132, 149, 167, 168, 170, 176 Cashman, Richard, 35, 182, 184 Castro, Fidel, 191 Cathay, 69, 138, 144, 147 Cathay Hotel, 141, 145

238 

INDEX

Cathay Mansions, 70 Cathay Restaurant, 138, 147 Cattle food nut cake, 104 Cattle markets, 167, 182 Cauliflower, 10, 35, 165, 167, 168 Celebrity status, 146 Census of New South Wales, 167 Centennial Park Café, 41 Central Vegetable Market, 176 Cercle e Francais, 68 Ceylonese, 155 Chaircuitiers-saulcissiers, 151 Champagne, 32, 71 Champérard, 38 Chan, Gabrielle, 23, 25 Chan, Sow Lin, 192 Chang, F.L., 58, 199 Chang Nieh-yun, 199 Changi Jail, 208 Changi Military Camp, 104 Char kway teow, 86, 99 Char kwei, 154 Charcoal stoves, 140 Chaudhuri, N., 125 Cheeses, 20, 23, 32, 35, 69, 71, 104 Chen, Xiangming, 9, 178 Chen, Yong, 43, 44 Cheng, Nien, 60, 62, 63, 68, 146 Chez Rovere, 119 Chia, Felix, 102, 103 Chia Yee Kwan, 149 Chianti, 142 Chicago of the East, 160 Chicken chop, 3, 100, 117, 121, 122 Chicken country captain, 7 Chicken pie, 21, 94, 196 Chicken rice, 85, 98, 104, 119, 159, 161 Chien, Y. Ng, 95, 97 Children, 26, 67, 102, 106, 157, 170, 183 Chilli crab, 85, 86, 137, 138, 148

Chim, May Bo, 186 China, 4, 5, 7, 8, 32, 39, 40, 43, 45–47, 53–61, 66, 70, 71, 73, 74, 83, 84, 86, 90, 91, 99, 117, 118, 139–142, 146, 149, 155, 166, 169, 177, 179, 190, 200, 206, 207 Chinatown, 6, 20, 39, 40, 45–47, 148, 149, 158, 160, 167 Chinatown Heritage Centre, 148, 160 Chinee, 168 Chinese, 4, 12, 20, 53, 54, 85, 115, 138, 165, 190 Chinese cafes, 27, 35, 150, 190 Chinese cookbooks, 190, 196–197, 200 Chinese diaspora, 4, 5, 47 Chinese Humpy, 169 Chinese vegetables, 21, 24, 44, 168 Chinese women, 159, 170 Chitty Melaka, 95, 96 Chocolate Shop, 73, 145 Cholera, 74, 104, 156 Chook, 165 Chow mein, 30, 150 Chows, 168 Christmas, 33, 74, 94, 106 Christmas Day, 106 Chu, Shuen Choo, 102 Chua, Beng Huat, 8, 86, 93, 97–99, 192, 193 Chui kuih, 88 Chun goon, 150 Chutney, 9, 123, 126, 129, 132, 133, 198, 210 Cinema, 35, 58, 148 Citrus fruit, 69 Claremont Café, 42 Class, 2, 28, 66, 102, 113, 115, 122, 124, 126, 131, 193, 205 Classic Milk Bar, 182 Cleland curry, 120, 198 Clifford, Nicholas R., 68, 70, 71 Clogs, 174

 INDEX 

Clubs, 5, 20, 42, 66–69, 89, 101, 115, 116, 119, 123, 144–146, 161, 207 Clunies-Ross, Barbara, 105, 106 CM Ping, 45 Cocktail, 23, 68, 71, 101, 199 Coconut milk, 88, 89, 94, 100, 123, 129, 131 Coffee palaces, 36 Coffee shop, 20, 34, 92, 101, 104, 149, 155, 158–162 Colbar, 121, 122 Cold meat, 128, 129, 210 Cold storage, 5, 171 Cold Storage, 179, 180 Coles, 30, 184 Collaboration, 117 Collingham, L., 124–126, 130 Colombo Plan, 191 Colonial Bar, 121 Colonial cuisine, 2, 3, 7, 11, 13, 72, 100, 114, 117, 121, 196, 197 Colonial foodways, 9, 114, 195 Colonial legacies, 1, 8–9, 113–134, 200 Colonial past, 21, 22, 67, 121 Colonial Secretary, 156, 157 Colonial structures, 116, 122 Colony, 2, 3, 7–9, 11, 13, 17–48, 67, 70–72, 83, 84, 93, 100, 113–116, 121, 122, 124–127, 168, 172, 179, 195–197, 200, 201, 207 Commensality, 10, 87 Commonsense Cookery Book, The, 23, 24, 26, 127, 128 Communal kitchen, 63, 159 Community cookbooks, 193, 194, 199, 203–206 Compass points, 55, 56 Compiled cookbook, 203, 204 Concessions, 55, 62, 66, 146, 176 Coney Dogs, 108 Congee, 64, 158, 207 Convenience stores, 177, 181

239

Convict, 3, 5, 6, 17–48, 91 Cook, Christopher, 68–70, 145 Cookbooks, 1–3, 10–11, 14, 17, 19, 21, 23, 26, 29, 36, 41, 72, 93, 94, 97, 113, 115, 120, 124, 125, 127, 128, 130, 190–210 Cooks, 11, 13, 25, 36, 38, 40, 41, 57, 67, 68, 70, 72, 73, 93, 96, 97, 107, 113, 118, 120, 122, 127, 129, 147, 159, 180, 183, 190, 191, 193, 195–199, 201, 209, 210 Cook shops, 139 Coolie, 67, 70, 157, 158, 169 Cope, Suzanne, 191, 192 Copra, 84, 155 Coquinarii, 151 Cornelius, Vernon Christopher, 156 Coronation Cookery Book, The, 132, 133 Cosmopolitan, 4, 7, 17–48, 53–55, 60, 84, 140, 142, 144, 145, 154, 155, 190, 203 Cotton mills, 43, 55, 63, 64 Courtesans, 57 Cousland, P.B., 74 Crab paste, 66 Craw, Charlotte, 19 Crêpes suzette, 122 Creste, 68 Crewe Circular, 93 Crispy duck, 148 Crockpot, 128 Crofts, 184 Crow, C., 70, 73, 140, 142, 146 Crystal prawn, 148 Cucumber, 31, 87, 89, 101, 102, 104, 123 Cuisine, 1, 3–8, 11–13, 19–22, 29, 35–44, 48, 55, 56, 58–61, 68–70, 84–88, 91, 93–96, 98, 100, 114–120, 122, 125, 126, 130, 131, 141–148, 190–193, 200, 203, 207 Cuisiniers, 151

240 

INDEX

Culinary nostalgia, 7, 61 Culinary Occidentalism, 118, 120 Culinary relic(s), 8, 113 Cultural connection, 192 Cultural exchange, 3, 131, 171 Cultural tales, 194 Culty’s Milk, 76 Cuneiform recipes, 194 Curried bananas, 129, 133 Curried chicken rice, 119, 146, 161 Curried ox tail, 120, 198 Curried Oysters, 129 Curry, 2, 3, 9, 17, 22, 24, 32, 71, 85, 86, 88, 92, 94, 98, 100, 102, 107, 113, 114, 119–130, 132, 133, 198–201, 204, 210 Curry and rice, 71, 72, 126–128 Curry chicken, 121 Curry powder, 9, 17, 24, 94, 113, 124–130, 132, 133, 201 Curry puffs, 101, 122, 162 Curry tiffin, 100, 101, 123, 128 Curthoys, Ann, 168 D da Silva’s Victoria Confectionery, 162 Dai fan, 64 Dairy, 4, 75–77, 167, 170, 179, 182, 198, 210 Dale, David, 36, 47 Damper, 21, 27 Dansereau, Serge, 38 Darwent, C. E., 73, 77, 141, 145, 176 Daunton-Fear, F., 21 Davenport, C.J., 74 David Jones, 30 Davis Dainty Dishes, The, 210 Davison, Julian, 123 Debal, 94 Delicatessen, 6, 20, 21, 27, 182

Department store(s), 5, 30, 116, 144, 171, 182, 184 Depression, 17, 19, 24, 32, 34, 202 Diamond Jubilee, 119, 143 Diaspora, 4, 5, 47, 97, 195 Dickins, 184 Dinner, 21–23, 27–30, 32, 36, 37, 64, 67–69, 71–74, 97, 101, 104–107, 113, 117, 126, 131–133, 140, 141, 145, 209 Dinner dances, 68, 145 Diphtheria, 104 Disgust, 117, 166 Dishonesty, 72, 73 Domestic cooks, 93, 117, 193, 209 Dong, Stella, 56 Downes, Stephen, 33, 37, 38, 40, 41, 48 Doyle, Peter, 38 Dragon Phoenix Restaurant, 138, 148 Dragons, 54, 144 Dried fruit industry, 130 Driver, Elizabeth, 203 Drunken chicken, 59 Duck, 19, 44–46, 56, 57, 60, 61, 65, 67, 69, 73, 91, 105, 117, 123, 146, 148, 150, 168, 174–176, 183 Dumpling(s), 60, 61, 65, 143, 152 Dupleix, Jill, 47 Duruz, Jean, 1, 46, 87, 95, 155, 192, 193, 203 Dutch pea soup, 69 Dysentery, 74, 104, 208 Dyson, Laurel Evelyn, 20, 26, 29 E E, Mrs, 126 Earnshaw, Graham, 68 Eastern cuisine, Chinese, 55, 56, 59 East India Company, 115, 131 East-Meets-West, 38

 INDEX 

Economic boom, 108 Economic tool, 197 Economy rice, 99, 158, 160 Egalitarian, 131 Eggs with sausage and chips, 121 Eight Precious Chicken, 57 Elderly men, 65, 149 Electric trams, 58 Elizabethan Grill, 122 Emperor of Japan, 104 Empire, 1–3, 17, 23, 30, 53, 72, 85, 100, 114–116, 124, 139, 197 Endangered cuisine, 192 Enders, Elizabeth Crump, 7, 63, 65, 67, 154 Energy companies, 210 Entrepôt, 84 Entrepreneur, 5, 6, 20, 32, 139, 171 Environment Ministry, 175 Espresso bars, 34 Ethnic cuisines, 88 Eurasians, 12, 85, 93–95, 98, 103, 105, 107, 115, 121, 155, 156, 196 Europeans, 5, 6, 8, 10, 13, 17, 18, 20, 21, 29, 34, 41, 44, 48, 55, 57, 66–68, 70, 72, 84, 93, 94, 101, 103, 107, 113–116, 119–122, 124, 130, 138–140, 143, 144, 155, 157, 161, 168, 173, 175, 176, 179, 180, 182, 190, 196, 198, 199, 204, 209 Evans, Suzanne, 208 Evening Star, The, 73, 77, 117, 118 Everyday Low Price (EDLP), 181 Excrement, 75 Exotic, 13, 40, 46, 134, 144 Exoticism, 9, 125, 138 F Familiarity, 10, 11, 134, 138 Famine, 4, 60, 90, 142 Fandian, 142, 143

241

Farmers, 10, 56, 105, 152, 168–170, 172, 174, 176 Farmers markets, 165 Farmstead, 20 Farrer, James, 55, 118, 120 Farrer, R.J., 157 Feast and famine, 142 Federation of Malaysia, 108, 121 Fei, H.T., 59 Feng Shaoting, 7, 62, 63, 65, 66, 153, 154 Ferguson, Priscilla Parkhurst, 11 Fernandez Fish Café, 34 Fernandez-Armesto, Felipe, 134 Fertilizers, 75, 77, 104, 107, 170, 173 Field Bakery, 105 Fiji, 172 Filipinos, 160 Fine dining, 4, 9, 10, 21, 30, 36–43, 47, 48, 91, 122, 138 Finkelstein, Joanne, 139 First Fleet, 17, 18 Fish, 3, 19, 23, 24, 32–34, 36, 40, 43–46, 53, 54, 56, 57, 59, 60, 64, 67, 69, 71, 72, 74, 75, 78, 89–91, 96, 98, 99, 101–107, 118, 122, 123, 125, 128, 129, 131, 141, 146, 149, 150, 152–154, 160, 174–176, 182, 183, 199, 207 Fish and chips, 27, 121, 161 Fishcafs, 33–34 Fishermen, 44, 56 Fish head curry, 86, 92 Fishing village, 3, 53, 54, 84 Fitzgerald, Shirley, 46, 149 Five-footway, 158 Flour mills, 182 Flu epidemic, 24 Foo, Kee Sing, 174, 175 Food and water contamination, 74 Food anxiety, 74–78 Food appropriation, 86, 208

242 

INDEX

Food control inspector, 103 Food court, 8, 85, 92, 122, 152, 154–160 Food culture, 2, 4, 7, 11, 19, 21, 28, 55, 58, 61, 100, 115, 118, 120, 130, 144, 157 Food exchange, 6, 18 Food history, 1, 2, 14, 19, 26, 122 Food market, 1, 9, 10, 62, 138, 146, 152–154, 166, 176 Food metaphor, 87 Food shortage(s), 23, 60, 83, 101–108 Food stall, 5, 8, 63, 108, 122, 146, 154–160 Foodways, 1, 2, 4, 6, 8–10, 18, 21, 46, 55, 95, 114, 115, 118, 120, 123, 128, 138, 194, 195, 203 Foraging, 18 Formal dinner(s), 29, 117, 126 Forsyth, Ann, 80 Fortune, Robert, 53 Franck, Harry, 116 Franklins, 184 French, 28, 29, 36–38, 40–42, 47, 48, 55, 94, 119, 122, 132, 142, 145, 146, 181, 182, 190, 196, 198, 199 French classics, 122 French Club, 69, 144 French Concession, 55, 62, 176 French Revolution, 139 Fried dough stick, 63, 65, 153, 154 Fried rice, 67, 99, 105, 150, 189 Frogs’ legs, 67 Frozen sewage, 78 Fruiterer, 168 Fruit trade, 183 Fu Ch’un, 141 Fuchs, G.M., 58 Fujian, 8, 55, 90 Fujian province, 90, 158 Fukien food, 145 Fukienese, 142

Fulton, Margaret, 128, 194, 203, 210 Fundraising cookbook, 203 Furniture factory workers, 43, 44 Furrow irrigation, 166 G Gabaccia, Donna R., 12, 13 Gabriel, Vincent, 89, 91, 92 Galangal, 88 Gao, James Z., 58, 143 Garlic, 58, 64, 88, 90, 92, 94, 99, 105, 125, 128, 129, 131, 137 Gas lighting, 57 Gastronomy, 36, 59 Gault et Millau, 38, 48 Gaynor, Andrea, 167 Gender, 2, 66, 131 Germans, 38, 55, 142, 145, 146, 190, 197 Geylang Serai, 89, 98 Gill, Lydia, 27, 30, 33–35 Gilmore, Mary, 205 Ginger drink, 156, 161 Ginger tea, 89 Global cultural flows, 178 Global dish, 114, 124 Globalization, 1–4, 10, 12, 54, 101, 166, 177, 178 Glutinous rice balls, 63, 65 Goh, Chor Boon, 180 Golden Wattle Cookery Book, The, 132 Goldfields, 5, 6, 10, 20, 45, 166–168 Goldman, Arieh, 177, 178 Gomes, Mary, 94 Gomez, M.J., 92 Goodman, Bryna, 60, 61, 143, 144 Goose, 60, 151 Goose-cooks, 151 Gourds, 96, 152 Gourmet cooking, 56 Governance, 13, 113

 INDEX 

Government House, 29 Grand Central Coffee Palace, 36 Great Depression, 24 Great Leap Forward Campaign, 60 Great Western Coffee Palace, 36 Greek café, 30, 34–36 Greengrocer, 6, 13, 20, 167, 183 Green mango, 96 Guangdong, 44, 55, 61, 140, 144, 169 Guangzhou, 55, 91, 104, 149 Gula malacca, 100 Gula melaka, 100, 123, 124, 199 Guo brothers, 5, 63, 171 Gwee, Thian Hock, 97 H Hagemeyer Electronics, 210 Haggis, 145 Hainanese, 8, 98, 159, 161, 162, 175 Hairy crabs, 57 Hakka, 98 Halal, 98, 99 Ham, 27, 31, 40, 67, 68, 71, 77, 118, 130, 132, 142, 146, 153, 183, 189 Hamburger steak, 119 Handy, Ellice, 131, 196 Hang Fa Lau, 140, 145 Harry Sing, 151 Harvard University, 208 Haute cuisine, 29, 36, 48, 131 Hawker centre, 9, 115, 138, 192 Hawker(s), 7–9, 22, 24, 86, 93, 98, 102, 108, 115, 138–140, 147, 149, 152–160, 162, 175, 181, 182, 192, 193 Hawkerpreneur, 139 Hawkesbury River, 41 Health tonics, 139 Heldke, Lisa, 193, 194 Helper, 70 Henderson, James, 71

243

Henderson, Joan Catherine, 12, 86, 95 Henriot, Christian, 58 Herald, The, 27, 190 Herbal pear syrup candy, 153 Heritage, 8, 12, 24, 86, 93, 94, 144, 160, 166, 192, 196 Heritage artefacts, 192 Hilda Cross, 19 Historical documents, 191, 193 Historical texts, 208 Ho, Chi Tim, 107 Hock Chew, 158 Hock Chia, 158 Hokkien, 90, 91, 95, 158, 159, 175 Hokkien mee, 90, 158 Hokkien-Malay, 95 Höllmann, Thomas O., 56, 59 Holuigue, Diane, 47 Home cooking, 13, 21–27, 72, 85, 91, 121, 128, 175, 193, 196 Homes, 4, 6, 7, 13, 18, 21–27, 29, 30, 32, 36, 37, 46, 58, 61–66, 68–74, 77, 83, 85, 87, 89, 91, 96, 100, 103, 105, 115, 116, 118, 121, 123, 126–128, 130, 146, 153–155, 157, 159, 175, 176, 184, 190, 191, 193, 195, 196, 202–206, 209, 210 Homogenization, 178 Homogenizing cultures, 9, 138 Hongkew Dairy, 76 Hong Kong, 45–47, 91 Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels, 119 Hong Sing, 45 Honig, Emily, 63, 64 Hooi, James, 148, 149, 192 Hooi Kok Wai, 147 Horner, R.M., 104–106 Hors d’oeuvres, 37, 57, 69 Hotel, 27–29, 37, 47, 67–70, 101, 103, 116, 119, 121, 122, 132, 141, 143–148, 150, 156, 159, 161, 170

244 

INDEX

Hotel de France, 145 Hot water stores, 65 Household, 2, 10, 13, 24, 25, 59, 60, 65, 70, 72, 73, 78, 93, 100, 103, 116, 117, 120, 126, 161, 166, 167, 169, 173, 181, 184, 192, 194, 195, 197, 198, 201, 204, 205, 209 Household manuals, 2, 10 Housewives, 22, 26, 58, 118, 127, 191, 201, 209 Housing & Development Board, 172, 174 Huangshan, 141 Huaqiao, 4 Hudd, Sandra, 102, 105, 122 Humble, Nicola, 11, 126 Hummus wars, 86 Hunan, 46, 55, 60 Hunwick, Heather, 210 Hurstville, 46 Hush, Joanna, 59 Hutcheon, Jane, 57 Hutton, Wendy, 94, 122 Hyam, Ronald, 93 Hybrid cuisine, 3, 8, 94, 115, 116, 126, 200 Hybridized cuisine, 117, 118 Hygiene, 71, 73, 75, 76, 156, 159, 179 Hypermarkets, 177, 179, 181 I Ice, 25, 26, 30, 35, 71, 78, 145, 153, 159, 162, 180, 182 Ice chest, 78 Ice cream, 30, 35, 145, 162, 182 Ice-cream sodas, 35, 162 Ice water sellers, 159 Iconic dishes, 12, 85, 86 Ikan bilis, 88, 123 Ilangovan, Malarvele, 92, 99

Imagined communities, 191 Immigrants, 6, 9, 20, 24, 29, 39, 84–85, 90, 96, 138, 139, 151, 152, 155, 166, 167 Imperial chef, 57 Imperialism, 53, 114, 121 Imperial tea, 32 Imprisonment, 76, 208 Inche kabin, 161 Independence, 31, 97, 108, 121, 161 India, 3, 7, 8, 11, 13, 21, 70, 72, 83, 84, 86, 91, 95, 100, 114–117, 120, 123, 125, 126, 128, 130, 131, 191, 195, 197, 200, 209 Indian curry, 120, 198 Indian Mee Goreng, 90 Indian-Muslim Bakery & Confectionary, 92 Indians, 2, 3, 6, 8, 11, 12, 20, 31, 64, 70, 84–86, 88, 89, 91–99, 107, 114, 115, 125, 126, 131, 155, 156, 159, 160, 174, 180, 195, 196, 199 Indigenous Australians, 201 Indonesia(n), 8, 86–88, 96, 196 Indus region, 125 Infrastructure, 46, 47, 57, 171, 177, 194 Ingredients, 2, 4–6, 11–14, 17, 21, 24, 38, 40, 42–44, 48, 55, 66, 85, 87, 91, 92, 94, 96–100, 105, 114, 115, 118, 124, 127, 128, 131–133, 146, 148, 153, 175, 190–193, 196, 199, 201, 204, 207, 208, 210 International Settlement, 54, 55, 57, 62, 66, 118, 119, 143 Internees, 104, 106, 107, 207 Ireland, Lynne, 203, 204 Irwin, William Wallace, 47 Islamic Restaurant, 92 Islamization, 98

 INDEX 

Islamized food, 99 Italian, 6, 20, 24, 30, 34, 36, 37, 39, 42, 43, 142, 145, 146, 150, 190, 197, 199, 203 Itinerant food vendors, 7, 151–154 J Jabbar, Ibrahim, 192 Jansen, D.C., 145 Japanese, 40, 42, 55, 66, 97, 101–107, 142, 161, 180, 207 Japanese houses, 142 Japanese Military Administration (MAD), 102, 180 Japanese Occupation, 97, 104, 161, 180, 207 Javanese, 88, 98, 155, 159, 161 Jenganan, 161 Jewish, 6, 20, 42, 156 Jews, 92, 93, 155 Jiachang, 144 Jiangsu, 55, 59, 140, 141 Jing, Cuan, 152, 176 John Chinaman, 10, 168 Joint of roast, 27 Jonah, 165 Joseph Baker’s, 162 Jugged kangaroo, 201 Junor, Andrew, 22 K Kaishas, 102 Kallang River, 138 Kan, Har Ye, 80 Kangaroo, 11, 19, 126, 132, 183, 196, 201 Kangaroo pasty, 201 Kangaroo steamer, 19, 201 Kangkung, 104, 105 Katong Rest House, 101 Kaya, 97

245

Kearney, A.T., 1 Kebab, 88, 89 Kedgeree, 3, 7, 8, 11, 100, 114, 115, 117, 119, 121, 130, 196, 198, 207, 209 Keema Roti, 122 Kenney-Herbert, A. R., 115 Kerala, 91, 92 Ketupat, 89 KFC, 108 Khoo, Gaik Cheng, 87, 95, 155 King, Paul, 71, 74 King’s Chinese, 96 Kingston, Beverly, 184 Kinsey, W.E., 195 Kirkby, Diane, 28, 30 Kitchen, 22, 25, 38, 39, 56, 62, 63, 67, 72, 93, 94, 96, 97, 139, 142, 143, 145, 148, 152, 159, 190, 192–194, 196–199, 203, 204, 208–210 Kitching, Thomas, 180 Knight, Jessica, 26, 31, 32 Knipp, Peter A., 121 Koh, Tommy, 86 Kopitiam, 160–162 Krider, Robert, 185 Krupuk, 123 Kueh koci, 95, 97 Kueh lapis, 97 Kuhn, Irene Corbally, 5, 69, 141, 144 Kumiai, 102 Kwong Who Hin Sauce Factory, 91 Kwong, Kylie, 42 Kye Ming, 162 Kyritsis, Janni, 38, 41 L La Palette, 42 La Perouse, 169, 171 La Pyramide, 42 Lai, Ah Eng, 160, 161

246 

INDEX

Laksa, 95, 132 Lamb, 9, 19, 21, 27, 33, 69, 113, 126, 151, 179, 200 Lamb, Corinne, 200, 201 Lao Yung Shun, 141 Laohuzao, 65 Lapaloma, 101 Lau Yoke Pui, 147 Laudan, Rachel, 36 Leaf-stem vegetable, 8, 10, 172, 173 Lea & Perrins, 142 Le Coq d’Or, 42 Lee, Chin Koon, 93 Lee, Kuan Yew, 8, 108, 173, 174 Lee, Liang Hye, 161, 181 Leisure, 26, 67 Lemon, 69, 88, 99, 128, 129, 132, 133, 167, 198 Leong-Salobir, Cecilia, 3, 13, 68, 72, 75, 93, 100, 115–117, 123, 124, 131, 180, 195, 204 Leung, Jereme, 5, 146 Liew, Cheong, 38 Lim, C.J., 4 Lim, Kee Chan, 101, 161 Lim, Keng, 192 Lin Fu Chai, 141 Lin, Hsiang Ju, 56, 57, 59, 60 Lin, Tsuifeng, 56, 57, 59, 60 Lin-Liu, Jen, 56, 60, 142, 146 Lion’s head, 60 Llewellyn, A.E., 204 Lo, Eileen Yin-Fei, 57 L’Oasis at La Napoule, 42 Lobster, 44, 69, 122, 146 Longtou, 54 Loong Shan Tea House, 32 Lotus seeds, 57, 153 Lu Xun, 65, 154 Lu, Hanchao, 7, 55, 57, 62, 63, 65, 153, 154 Lucio Galletto, 36

Lucio’s, 36 Luckins, Tanja, 28 Luo Chen, 147 Lychee, 44, 73, 171 M Macgregor, Paul, 120 Maclurcan, H., 19, 29, 129 Magazines, 10, 14, 21, 47, 48, 116, 194, 203, 205 Magnus, Walter, 42 Magpie-geese, 19, 183 Majestic Café, 145 Malaria, 104 Malay, 4, 7, 8, 53, 84–91, 93, 95–100, 103, 104, 107, 127, 148, 155, 156, 159, 174, 175, 180, 199 Malaya, 4, 91, 93, 128, 180, 200, 204, 205, 208 Malay hegemony, 87 Mallos, Tess, 18 Mamak, 161 The Mandarin, 40, 151 Man t’ou, 200 Mandarin, 40, 154 Manfredi, Stefano, 38, 39, 42, 43 Mangosteen, 72, 159, 175 Manly, 168, 170 Mao Tze-Tung (Chairman), 60, 62 Marcell’s, 145 Market garden(s)(er)(ing), 4–6, 8, 10, 14, 20, 21, 24, 27, 32, 44, 45, 77, 149, 165–173, 179, 182 Markey, Douglas Clive, 21 Marrickville, 35, 182 Marrickville Margarine Co Ltd, 184 Marschall, Sabine, 121 Mascot, 169 Masculinity, 23, 27, 28, 31 Mass-marketed, 184 Mass-produced, 184

 INDEX 

Matriarch, 97 Maze, Lady Laura G, 11, 120, 196, 199, 200 McDonaldization, 9, 138 McDonalds, 9, 108, 138 Meader, Chrys, 35, 182, 184 Meat and three veg, 22–24, 30, 35 Mechanized farming, 171 Medhurst, W.H., 69, 117 Mediterranean cuisine, 203 Mee rebus, 89, 98 Mele, Christopher, 175 Memoirs, 10, 14, 67, 97, 113, 152, 180, 192, 194 Memsahib, 11, 70, 179, 180, 195 Menu(s), 2, 17, 23, 27–29, 33, 34, 37, 40, 42, 48, 69, 70, 93, 105–107, 119, 121, 123, 125, 126, 132, 139, 144, 146, 150, 190, 193, 195, 210 Merrony, Paul, 38 Metallic Meals, 74 Metcalf, Thomas, 2, 70, 114 Metherell, T., 167–171 Metropole, 2, 93, 124 Metropole Cinema, 148 Middle East, 2, 8, 83, 86 Mien t’iao erb, 200 Migrants, 2, 4–7, 12, 17, 18, 20, 21, 34, 35, 38, 39, 43, 45, 48, 58, 62, 83, 84, 92, 119, 140, 151, 155, 182, 190, 197 Milano, 30 Milk, 23, 26, 33, 35, 37, 63, 65, 73–77, 88, 89, 94, 100, 102, 104, 106, 107, 123, 129, 131, 133, 153, 156, 158, 167, 179, 182–184, 207 Milk bars, 26, 30, 34, 35, 181, 182 Milk delivery, 184 Milk pigeon Oriental, 146 Milkshakes, 26, 30, 35

247

Millet, 106 Mintz, Sydney W., 11, 12, 93 Missionary, 74, 115, 204 Missy, 70 Mitchell, Kenneth, 137, 138, 148 Mitsubishi Shoji Kabushiki, 102, 103 Mitsui Bussan Kabushiki, 102 Mixed marriages, 93, 95 Mock turtle, 146 Mod Oz, 37 Model Dairy Farm, 76 Modern Australian, 6, 20, 37, 38, 40, 41, 43 Modernity, 32, 37, 175, 178 Moh-loh-kai, 199 Molteni’s, 162 Mongrel language, 72, 168 Monosodium glutamate, 137, 190 Moran & Cato, 184 Moran, F.A., 126, 130 Morris, Colleen, 10, 168, 169, 171 Morris, Jan, 85 Mougeot, Luc J.A., 173 Mulligatawny, 7, 8, 11, 21, 72, 100, 113–115, 117, 119–122, 125, 126, 130–132, 196, 198, 207 Multi-culturalism, 48, 86, 87, 203 Municipal Slaughterhouse, 77 Municipal Sterilising Station, 76 Muskett, Philip E., 21, 22, 71, 130 Mustard & Co. Sole Agents, 207 Muthu’s Curry, 92 Mutton, 7, 8, 17, 21, 24, 27, 71, 72, 77, 89, 99, 113, 115, 118, 120, 123, 132, 151, 179, 198, 199, 209, 210 Myanmarese, 160 N Name-calling, 168, 171 Nam Tin, 148

248 

INDEX

Nanjing pressed duck, 56 Nanjing Road, 66, 143, 144, 146, 147, 171 Nanjing Road Food Market, 176 Nanking Restaurant, 151 Narayan, Uma, 125 Narrative, 1, 10, 21, 67, 173, 194 Nasi briyani, 92 Nasi goreng, 86 Nasi lemak, 88, 89, 156 Nasi padang, 89 National cuisine, 7, 12, 58, 86, 130, 145 National dish, 21, 22, 71, 130, 160 National Heritage Board, 12, 85, 86 National identity, 9, 12, 138, 192, 201 Nationalism, 21, 120 National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), 181 Native bread, 200 Native fruits, 18 Native game, 18, 201 Native-place cuisine, 60 Negotiation, 117, 175 New Californian, 38 New Catalan, 38 New Dixon Restaurant, 151 New German, 38 Newington, P.C.B., 207, 208 New South Wales, 6, 18, 43, 126, 127, 149, 166, 167, 169, 202, 204 New South Wales Fruit Exchange, 172 Newspapers, 10, 14, 21, 22, 27, 64, 68, 83, 102, 116, 128, 139, 145, 161, 180, 184, 190, 194, 203, 205 Newton, John, 30, 35, 37, 47, 156, 173 New York of the West, 53 New Zealand, 21, 69, 166, 191 Ng, Megan, 186 Nicknames, 54, 168 Night soil, 5, 77, 166, 169, 173

Nitza Villapol, 191 Nonya, 88, 95–97, 99 Noodles, 44, 57, 59, 60, 64, 65, 67, 91, 98, 99, 140, 141, 143, 146, 150, 152, 153, 158, 160, 161, 195, 200 Northern cuisine, Chinese, 55 Nouvelle cuisine, 41, 48, 142 Novelty, 118 Number one boy, 70 Nuts, 23, 31, 44, 57–59, 73, 96, 152, 153, 200 O Oasis Seros Restaurant, 42 O’Brien, Charmaine, 19 Observatory Café, 39 Oddities, 133 Olds, Margaret, 23, 25 Olympia Milk Bar, 35 Onion, 10, 17, 19, 60, 63, 65, 87, 89, 92, 101, 104, 105, 113, 118, 123, 128, 129, 131, 132, 141, 150, 153, 165, 167, 168, 175, 189 Oon, Violet, 88, 93 Opium, 141, 170, 171 Orchard, 6, 20, 167 Oriental, 134, 146 Orion Café, 35 Osmanthus flowers, 153 Ousbäck, Anders, 38, 41 Overconsumption, 71 Oyster bar, 33 Oyster omelette, 90, 150 P Pacific Hotel, 170 Padang, 161 Paddock-to-plate, 165 Paddy’s Markets, 165, 182, 183

 INDEX 

Palace Grill Room, 119, 143 Palace Hotel, 119, 143, 145 Palace Tea Lounge, 119, 143 Pan, Lynn, 7, 58–60, 63, 68, 142, 143, 152, 153 Pan, Zi., 177, 178 Pancake(s), 63, 65, 145 Pang, Leo, 46 Paris of the East, 53 Park, Ruth, 37 Parramatta, 10, 46, 126, 169 Parrot pies, 19, 21 Partridge and chicken feet, 146 Pastoralist, 126 Pats, 168 Pâté de foie gras, 122 Peace Hotel, 141 Peacock’s Tasmanian Jams, 207 Peanut butter, 66, 184 Pearl, Denis, 105 Pearl of the Orient, 54 Pearl River Delta, 44 Peasant, 57, 59, 118 Peddlers, 62, 152, 153 Peet, George L., 123 Peking Café, 151 Peking food, 140, 145 People’s Park, 159 People’s Restaurants, 107 Pepper paste, 66 Peranakan, 4, 8, 93, 95–98, 103, 192, 193 Peranakan Chinese, 95, 96 Perry, Neil, 38, 40–42 Philippines, 98 Phillips, Carolyn, 141 Phoenix claws, 144 Pickle stores, 66 Picnic, 26, 27, 31, 36 Pidgin, 72, 73, 168 Pigeons’ eggs, 67, 117 Pig head, 44

249

Pignolet, Damien, 38 Pigs, 10, 69, 77, 91, 92, 105, 152, 167, 172–174, 207 Pig trotters, 44 Pilchards, 105 Pilcher, Jeffrey M., 1, 3, 12, 38, 147, 194 Pineapple, 22, 29, 35, 72, 84, 87, 90, 96, 104–107, 123, 133, 150, 155, 175 Pish pash, 8, 100, 115, 117 Pittwater Online News, 33 Plagiarism, 202 Plaintains, 72 Plenty and scarcity, 142 Plombier, 142 Pomelos, 72 Pongteh, 95 Popiah, 90, 97 Pork chop Napolitaine, 119, 146 Pork chop with chips and mushroom, 121 Pork crackling, 106 Port treaty, 3 Portuguese, 6, 20, 24, 93–95, 97, 199 Portuguese Eurasians, 94 Postcolonial, 14, 85, 114, 120, 124, 175, 192 Potassium permanganate, 75, 78 Poulaillers, 151 Poulain, Jean-Pierre, 38 Poulterers, 151 Prata, 88, 160 Prawn crackers, 101, 122, 123 Prema, Letchumanan, 192 Preserved duck eggs, 65 Price, Jenna, 47 Prime rib of beef, 122 Prince, 30 Prisoner of war, 208 Promotional cookbooks, 194, 209–210 Prostitutes, 58, 63, 116

250 

INDEX

Public utilities, 57 Pub meals, 28 Puftaloons, 133 Pushcarts, 103, 138, 152 Q Quong Tart, 32 Qwong Hop, 44 R Rabbit, 17, 19, 24, 25, 27 Rabbitohs, 17, 24, 25 Race, 2, 66, 92, 115, 131, 193 Racial abuse, 5 Racial discrimination, 5, 168, 170 Racist sentiment, 165 Radiation Cookery Book, 209, 210 Raffles, Stamford, 84, 85, 122 Raffles class, 122 Raffles Girls School, 122 Raffles Hotel, 101, 103, 122 Raffles Square, 157, 158 Raisins, 9, 24, 32, 71, 73, 104, 123, 126, 128, 130, 199 Raj, 8, 13, 70, 115, 120 Raja, I., 125 Rajah, Ananda, 8, 86, 93, 97–99, 192, 193 Ramaswami, S., 185 Rambutan, 72, 175 Rapley, Stephen, 24 Rappaport, Erika, 23, 31 Rations, 103, 104, 107, 208 Rawan, 161 Rawson, Lance Mrs, 19 Ray, Krishnendu, 1, 12, 125, 139 Recession, 70 Recipes, 3, 11, 13, 17, 19, 21, 24, 26, 29, 70, 72, 93–95, 115, 120, 124–133, 138, 139, 148, 159, 161, 190–210

Red-braised pork, 60 Red-cooked dishes, 56, 60 Red Cross, 106, 202, 206 Red Guards, 63 Red Star restaurants, 148 Refrigeration, 26, 69, 174, 178, 184 Refrigerator, 25, 26, 78 Regional cooking, 55, 59, 91 Reisner, M. J. H., 206 Rempah, 89, 94 Rendang, 85, 86, 88, 89, 123 Rengayah-Knight, Veni, 95 Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Hawker Question in Singapore, 156, 157, 159 Republican years, 142 Resistance, 174 Restaurant, 1, 18, 55, 85, 113, 138, 171, 190 The Restaurant, 38, 39, 43 Restaurant Manfredi, 39, 42, 43 Restaurant review, 2, 47 Restaurants, 1, 4–7, 9–10, 13, 14, 18, 20–22, 24, 26, 27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 36–48, 55, 56, 58–61, 66–68, 70, 72, 85, 88, 89, 91–93, 97–99, 101, 103, 107, 108, 115, 118, 119, 121–123, 128, 132, 137–162, 171, 190–193, 195 Restaurant Troisgros, 41 Restaurateurs, 38, 40, 41, 47, 48, 92, 139 Restorative places, 139 Rice, 7, 8, 17, 44, 45, 56, 57, 59–61, 63–67, 71–73, 85, 88, 89, 92, 94–99, 101–107, 118, 119, 123, 126–130, 132, 133, 140, 146, 150, 152–154, 156, 158–161, 171, 189, 194, 198–200, 208, 209 Rice cultivation, 56 Rice milling, 90 Rice pods, 106 Rice porridge, 104, 105, 153, 158

 INDEX 

Rice stores, 65, 66 Rickshaw, 57, 58, 157, 158 Rickshaw puller, 57, 58, 102, 157–159 Ricsha meal tickets, 57 Rijsttafel, 123 Ripe, Cherry, 47 Risson, Toni, 35 Roast duck, 46, 91 Roast emu, 201 Roast kangaroo, 201 Roast pork, 33, 45, 91, 94 Roast turkey and ham, 146 Roast wombat, 201 Roberts, J.A.G., 56, 67, 69, 117, 141, 147 Rockdale, 169 Rocklily Hotel/Tavern, 37 The Rocks, 38, 45, 149, 167, 182 Roden, Claudia, 13 Rojak, 86–88, 91, 99 Rolls, Eric, 47 Roman Empire, 139 Romano’s, 30 Rose and Crown Coffee Palace, 36 Roseville, 169 Roti John, 122 Rôtisseurs, 151 Rowe, Peter G., 54, 62 Roy, Modhumita, 131, 193 Royal Hotel, 27, 47 Rubber, 84, 90, 91, 96, 155, 180 Rudolph, J., 95 Russian bakeries, 63, 146 Russian Revolution, 146 Russians, 55, 58, 86, 142, 143, 146, 199 Rutledge, Forster (Jean) Mrs, 132 S Sago pudding, 7, 8, 100, 115, 124, 196, 198, 199, 207, 209, 210 St. Petersburg, 34, 141

251

Sakamoto, Nobuko, 57, 59 Salary, 64, 70 Salted fish, 44–46, 123 Sambal, 72, 88, 101, 122, 123, 138, 161 Sambal belacan, 94, 97, 99 Sandwiches, 31–33, 39, 67, 101, 122, 145 Sanitation, 173, 175, 179 Sanmugam, Devagi, 92 Santich, Barbara, 19, 130, 132, 133 Sarabat, 89, 156, 161 Sarabat stalls, 89, 156 Sargent’s tearooms, 32, 33 Sassen, Saskia, 4 Satay, 85, 86, 88, 89, 99, 158, 159 Sawmilling, 90 Say Tin Fong, 46, 149 Schauer, Amy, 132 Scheen, Lena, 54 Schell, Orville, 64 Scholliers, P., 2 School(s), 102, 122, 127, 146, 148, 157, 202 Scones, 26, 32, 133, 145 Scotch Bakery, 145 Scurvy, 167 Sea dogs, 144 Seafood, 9, 18, 29, 33, 37, 56, 57, 91, 126, 174, 179 Second language, 73 Semi-colonial Shanghai, 72, 197 Sensorial cultures, 139 Servant girls, 58 Servants, 5, 7, 9, 34, 57, 63, 66, 67, 70, 72, 73, 75, 97, 100, 114–116, 120, 121, 127, 128, 168, 175, 179, 195, 197, 209 Serviced apartments, 69 Sesame paste, 66 Settlement, 2, 6, 13, 17, 20, 23, 45, 54, 55, 84, 93, 94, 115, 117, 124, 126, 130, 155

252 

INDEX

Shahrim Ab. Karim, 95, 97 Shallot, 88, 167 Shandong, 55 Shang dynasty, 147 Shanghai, 1, 3–9, 24, 53–78, 91, 114, 138, 166, 190 Shanghai Café, 151 Shanghaicai, 143, 144 Shanghai Club, 68 Shanghai Electrical Machinery Factory, 64 Shanghai Gas Company Cookery Book, The, 198, 209 Shanghailanders, 8, 13, 54, 66–74, 115, 118, 120, 145, 199 Shanghai Milk Supply, 77 Shanghai Morning Post, The, 57 Shanghai Municipal, 63 Shanghai Municipal Annual Report, 64 Shanghai Municipal Council Report, 76 Shanghai Municipal Police, 74, 77, 116 Shanghainese, 4, 56, 57, 59, 60, 62, 66, 116, 118–120, 141, 143, 144, 153, 159, 175, 176, 178 Shanghainese food, 57, 118, 142 Shanghai Paper Hunt Club, 69 Shanghai peaches, 168 Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, 141 Shanghai Village Restaurant, 40 Shaoxing wine, 57, 59, 141 Sharks’ fin, 45, 67, 117, 204 Sharp, Ilsa, 101, 122 Shellane, 210 Shell fish, 75, 78 Shepherd’s Pension and Dining Rooms, 145 Sherry, 69, 71, 72, 146 Shikumen, 7, 55, 62, 63, 65, 153 Shoulders, 7, 24, 40, 63, 140, 152, 153, 158, 160, 167, 169, 170, 176, 181 Shrimp paste, 66, 88, 94, 97–99, 204

Shun Wah, Annette, 149, 150 Siamese Chicken, 148 Sichuan, 46, 55, 58, 60, 144 Sichuanese, 142 Simoons, Frederick J., 56, 57, 60 Sincere, 144, 171 Singapore, 1, 3–5, 7–11, 13, 24, 53, 58, 72, 74, 83–108, 115, 116, 120–125, 130, 131, 133, 134, 137–140, 146–149, 152, 154–158, 160–162, 166, 167, 172–177, 179–181, 192, 194–196, 204, 207, 208, 210 Singapore Airlines, 122 Singaporean tourism, 138 Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser, 100 Singapore fruit curry, 133 Singapore Infopedia, 181 Singapore Municipality Gas Department, 210 Singley, Blake, 19, 201 Sinkheh, 90 Sin Leong, 147, 148 Six o’clock swill, 28 Sky Terrace Hall, 119, 146 Slaughtering, 175 Slippery bob, 201 Smart, Josephine, 138 Smith’s Gourmet, 150 Smoked salmon, 149 Snacks, 7, 47, 60, 62, 63, 65, 67, 90, 92, 97, 142, 151, 153, 154, 156, 158, 162, 184 Snobbery, 59, 131 Snow-drop cones, 182 Social interactions, 175 Sociology, 2 Soda biscuits, 94 Soh Teow Seng, 103 Sole meunière, 122 Soto Mee, 90 Southern cuisine, Chinese, 55

 INDEX 

Soya bean milk, 63, 65, 153 Soya sauce, 59, 66, 90, 91, 94, 99, 161, 190 Soya sauce shop, 66 Spang, R., 139 Spanish, 6, 24, 142, 146 Spice(s), 8, 85, 88, 89, 94–97, 99, 124, 125, 131, 148, 149, 174, 201, 206 Sri Lanka, 94, 191 Srinivas, Tulasi, 125 Standard Dairy Farm Co., 77 Staples, 4, 8, 44, 60, 65, 101, 103, 107, 151, 158 Steak au poivre, 122 Steamers, 19, 71, 201 Steamship, 84, 116, 155 Sterilization, 76 Steys Dairy Farm, 77 Stone, Louis, 165 Stone, Richard, 28 Straits Times, 83, 91, 158, 175 Straits Times Annual, 92 Street food, 1, 8–10, 12, 55, 58, 62, 67, 85, 88, 89, 97, 98, 108, 137–162 Street stores, 30, 65–66 Street vendor(s), 60, 62, 63, 108, 151–153, 158, 176, 181 Substantials, 22, 26, 29, 71, 72, 106, 156, 158, 208 Suckling pig, 69, 91 Suez Canal, 84, 155 Sugar, 59, 60, 63, 84, 88, 90, 100, 102, 103, 106, 131–133, 137, 141, 155, 176, 183, 198, 205 Sumatran, 88, 94, 155, 161 Sun, Jiaming, 9, 178 Sun, The, 44 Sun Ah, 151 Sung Sung Dairy, 76 Sun Kwong Loong and Co., 44, 45 Supermarkets, 1, 10, 14, 165–184

253

Sup kambing, 99 Supski, Sian, 197, 198 Sutton, David, 9, 138 Suzhou, 57, 154 Swampy land, 170 Sweet and sour pork, 30, 99 Sweet flour paste, 66 Sweetmeat Castle, 145 Sweetmeats, 23, 58 Sweet potato, 7, 63, 99, 102, 103, 105, 106, 133 Swislocki, Mark S., 7, 9, 55, 61, 118–120, 138, 142, 144 Sydney, 1, 3–6, 9, 10, 13, 14, 17–48, 63, 71, 125–132, 138, 140, 144, 149–151, 165–172, 182–184, 189–191, 194, 195, 202–207, 210 Sydney Coffee Palace, 36 Sydney Cove, 5, 18 Sydney Harbour, 18, 19, 202 Sydney Herald, The, 36, 47 Sydney Mail, 128 Sydney Morning Herald, 20, 31, 32, 35, 47, 183, 184, 190, 205 Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide, 41, 47 Sydney Queen Victoria Markets, 183 Sydneysiders, 18, 24, 30, 32, 34, 38, 46, 166, 184 Sydney slums, 165 Symons, Michael, 19, 20, 26, 27, 168, 171 Szechuen Road, 145 T Table boy, 70 Tables d’hôte, 139 Tai Thong, 148 Takeaway meals, 30, 91 Tam, Andrew, 160 Tam, Siumi Maria, 47 Tamarind, 88, 94–96, 131

254 

INDEX

Tamil Nadu, 91, 99, 131 Tamils, 91, 95, 99, 124, 131, 159 Tan, Chye Yee, 90, 93 Tan, Terry, 90, 96, 147 Tapioca, 97, 102, 103, 105, 198, 209 Tarulevicz, Nicole, 1, 7, 87, 139, 155, 159, 192 Taste, 9, 12, 13, 21, 27, 32, 36, 44, 58, 61, 73, 88, 93, 105, 117, 118, 122, 134, 138, 139, 144, 147, 149, 150, 161, 179, 194, 199, 203 Tauhu goreng, 86 Tauhu telur, 86 Tau yew bak, 90 Tay Leck Teck, 181 Tay, Leslie, 86, 99 Tay Buan Guan store, 181 Te Hsing Kuan, 141 Tea, 7, 22, 30, 32, 34, 36, 44, 45, 47, 55, 57, 63, 65, 68, 71, 89, 91, 101, 106, 119, 122, 130, 141, 143, 145, 146, 148, 152, 154, 158, 161, 200, 205–207 Tea dances, 145 Tearooms, 30–33 Teochew, 8, 90, 91, 99 Textile mills, 5, 171 Tham Yew Kai, 147 Thieme, J., 125 Thomas, Francis, 107 Thompson, David, 38 Thosai, 160 Tientsin Café, 151 Tiffin, 67, 68, 71, 100, 116, 117, 122, 123, 128, 200 Tiffin Room, 122 Tigers, 65, 144, 154 Timbs, Gladys, 24, 25 Tin, 31, 40, 84, 96, 105, 155, 170 Tinkler, Maurice, 116 Tin mining, 96 Titbits, 200

Tiy Sang, 171, 172 Tobacco, 105, 168 Tompkins, Gladys, 106, 107 Town Hall Coffee Palace, 36 Travellers’ inns, 139 Travers, Robert, 32 Tregonning, K.G, 5, 179 Trolley basket, 184 Tropical fruits, 29 Tropical ulcers, 208 Tuberculosis, 64, 75 Turnbull, C.M., 90, 102, 155, 157, 160 Turnips, 10, 59, 64, 130, 132, 167, 168, 170 Turtle soups, 29 Typhoid, 74, 156 U Udang goreng asam, 95 Underground mutton, 17, 24 Urbanization, 10, 166, 177, 182 USA duck, 148 V Van Cuylenburg, J. B., 157, 158, 162, 173 Vaughan, J. D., 173 Vázquez-Medina, José Antonio, 151 Vegetable curry, 22, 120, 123, 130, 198 Vegetable patch, 24, 167 Vegetables, 5, 8, 10, 18, 20–24, 27, 29, 33, 35, 44, 45, 48, 55, 59, 60, 63–65, 69, 71, 72, 74, 75, 77, 78, 87–89, 97, 99, 101–105, 107, 113, 118, 120, 122, 123, 125, 129–132, 140, 143, 146, 149, 150, 152–154, 158–161, 165–178, 182, 184, 194, 198–200, 206, 207, 209 Verdi, 142

 INDEX 

Ve-Tsin, 190 Victoria Confectionery, 162 Victorian ideals, 96 Vietnamese, 6, 20 Village kitchens, 139 Vineyard, 6, 20, 126 Vivian Gordon Bowden, 120 Vodka, 142 W Wakuda, Tetsuya, 39, 40, 42, 48 Walker, Robin, 183, 184 Wallaby, 19, 21, 37, 183 Walmart, 179 Walnut porridge, 152 Wang Jia Sha Snack Bar, 146 Waratah Flour Mill, 182 War Chest Cookery Book, The, 206 War effort, 199, 205, 206 War fund, 198, 199 War-related cookbooks, 194, 205–209 Warren, J. F., 158, 159 Wasteland, 170 Wei, Wei, 65, 153 Wengcheng chicken, 159 Wentworth Hotel, 29, 37 Wessell, Adele, 19, 201, 209 Western cuisine, Chinese, 55, 118, 148 Western food, 7, 9, 101, 118, 119, 138, 143, 144, 161 Western restaurants, 7, 101, 115, 118, 119, 123, 142, 143, 151 West Lake vinegar fish, 59 Wet markets, 174–179 Whampoa Club, 5, 146 Wheaton Ketcham, Barbara, 208 Whisky, 101, 180 White Australia Policy, 45, 46, 149, 167, 170, 191 White frontier masculinity, 23 White Russians, 63, 141, 146 Wholesale markets, 166

255

Wibisono, Djoko, 90, 92, 99 Widdowson, W. H. I., 74, 75, 77, 78 Wild duck and fish maw soup, 146 Wilkinson, John, 26, 106 Williams, Michael, 4, 169 Wilson, Marie, 40, 42 Wilton, Janis, 45 Wing On, 5, 144, 171 Wing Sang, 171 Wockpool, 40, 41 Woman’s Mirror cookery book, The, 191 Women’s Missionary Association, 204 Women’s pages, 22, 27, 128, 203 Wong, Ella-Mei, 195 Wong, Hong Suen, 102, 107, 180 Wong, Peter, 59 Wontons, 5, 65, 146, 153 Woo Hoh, 91 Wood, Frances, 67, 72, 73 Woollen mills, 182 Woolworth, 184 Worcestershire sauce, 129 Working class, 28, 124, 126, 152, 183, 205 World War II, 20, 83, 101, 170, 202 World wars, 24, 202, 205, 206 Wright, Arnold, 143 Wright, Tim, 157 X Xialongbao, 146 Xiaoce, 154 Xiaoce shan, 154 Xiao chang, 154 Xiao long bao, 60 Xu Guozhen, 142 Y Yam bean, 87 Yam ring, 148 Yangzi River, 54, 56, 154

256 

INDEX

Yella Mondays, 168 Yen, Ching-hwang, 5, 63 Yeoh, Brenda S.A., 173 Yep, Yung Hee, 189, 190, 193 Yi Yin, 147 Yi Chi Fu Hsing, 141 Yip, Dawn, 104 Yip, Jean, 104 Yit Yung, 43 Yizhuan, 118 Yong tau foo, 98 You, Jia, 62, 65, 146 You tiao, 154 Yu, Hai, 62 Yule, H., 131

Yumcha, 47, 195 Yung Chiang Chuang Yuan Lou, 141 Yunnanese cuisine, 142 Yu ping, 200 Yu sheng, 148, 149 Z Zakouska, 142, 199 Zhang, Qian Forrest, 60, 177, 178 Zhejiang, 55, 59, 61, 65, 66, 140, 141 Zhou, Fang, 57, 149 Zlotnick, Susan, 125 Zongzi, 61 Zuttion, Peter, 182