Valerie
Valerie came to the UK from Malaysia in 1998 to study computing. Her dad died in 2011 and her mum in 2012.
In 2019 she opened her own restaurant – Dapur Malaysia.
“Food is a bit like music; it can take you to a certain place, a certain moment; a certain smell, taste, it can take you back. Food connects me to my life in Malaysia; my friends, my family, my parents, and especially the connection with my mum.
I wasn’t actually very close with my mum growing up. She was a perfectionist and not an easy person at the best of times, but she was an amazing cook and as I got older - and as she got older - we found a connection through food.
The real cooking started when I was pregnant and my mum came over from Malaysia to help out. Things are very different here, people are very different towards each other, I felt quite alienated, and I just needed that support, somebody familiar that I could really connect to.
I wanted to know how to cook all the dishes that she cooked at home and from there it really kicked off properly.
My mum had dementia, I struggled to see her that way. By the time they diagnosed her it was quite advanced so when I went back to Malaysia she didn’t even recognise me. The cooking has helped me cope with that, it’s a positive way of remembering her.
“I’m very emotional about food in general because it's so close to me - there is a real connection there.
I think that's what drives me.”
Recently I realised that I never talk about her. I can’t get the words out still without bursting into tears so for me being able to do this kind of thing is another step in my therapy as such because you can’t internalise everything - it makes it really hard.
Pork Vindaloo was mum’s dish; it’s a dish specifically unique to the Malayalee Christians in Kerala and she learned it from my dad’s mum so it’s a real family recipe. All the family would come to eat it just from her.
When mum was in hospital my dad asked me to make him the Pork Vindaloo; I made it for him the first time and he looked at me and said, ‘it's not spicy enough and it doesn't have enough vinegar’. I thought alright fair enough, I’ll take it on board, and I made it again a couple of weeks later and gave me this look, nodded his head and said it was good. That was the highest praise.
It always gives me a huge amount of pleasure to hear someone, see someone enjoy something that I’ve cooked. We have an open plan kitchen and when the restaurant is full, I think to myself I’m here, I’m doing it I’m cooking for all these people, coming to eat food that I’ve grown up eating - that's the whole concept of the restaurant.
Dapur means kitchen. So it’s Dapur Malaysia - flavours from my mum’s kitchen.
Pork Vindaloo is on the menu.”
Dapur Malaysia is situated in the heart of Chapel Allerton, Leeds.
You can book a table or order takeaway from the website www.dapurmalaysia.co.uk
Written by Faye Dawson