Kuching’s annual food galore is on!

EVERY August for three weeks, carnival-like festivities pervade throughout the Kuching South City Council (MBKS) Community Hall grounds.

This year, the Kuching Festival Food Fair had kicked off on July 22, and will conclude this Aug 16.

I was there on Thursday evening with some good friends, and were lucky enough to grab a table and enjoyed the proceedings.

There were over 330 brightly-decorated stalls of all sorts of food and drinks – local, foreign, fusion and perhaps, some of somewhat dubious origin, with the tables sparsely placed all in front of them.

There was a good crowd comprising mostly locals, with the ‘Yuppies’ (those in the 18-28 age group of entry-level wage earners) representing the majority.

In my two hours there, I managed to meet just two people whom I knew: Penny Ling, a long-time friend since her days when she had operated a culinary business; and Soh Win Win, a well-known food influencer whom I have known for some time.

We sat in front of a ‘moochi’ ice cream stall, where the queue was of at least 12 customers for almost the entire time that we were there.

Business appeared to be brisk, where we did not see a single stall without at least a couple of customers in the queue.

It was pretty amazing.

We ordered a variety of different food items – from satays to rojak, from sushi to fried oyster omelette, from barbequed pork to sambal-grilled sardines, and from mud clams to ‘kuih pie tie’.

We also had plenty of pale ale and dark ale from the 1602 beer tent, which was draught.

At RM15 per mug, they might seem pricey, but were reasonable for the rental that the vendor had to pay.

We heard that this year’s rental was the highest ever on record, so we could not begrudge the pricing of most food.

There was a vendor selling plain white rice for RM4 / RM5 per bowl – nothing else, just plain old ‘nasi puteh’!

This year is somewhat special, it’s the festival’s 40th edition.

Not many people today are aware of the origins of the festival, which was started as a 10-stall event at the Kuching Reservoir Park in 1986 during the time when Datuk Song Swee Guan was the chairman of then-Kuching Municipal Council (KMC).

Only two years later, the KMC became MBKS.

The Kuching North City Commission was a separate authority, demarcated for the areas after the Satok Bridge and Petra Jaya, as well as certain zones in downtown Kuching.

MBKS officially launched its version of the food fair under its auspices in August 1988.

This year’s 40th anniversary edition hosts 29 events, which go beyond just culinary delights and gastronomy features.

They come under the bigger umbrella of the Kuching Festival.

To be truthful, I have not attended the Kuching Festival Food Fair in the last few years, as there are three major negatives to doing so.

Firstly, it is impossible to find a parking spot within a reasonable walking distance – unless you are prepared to walk at least 15 minutes to reach the food fair’s site.

Secondly, the selection and varieties of food on offer have been about the same for the past many years.

There is no longer any ‘especially unique’ food on offer, or dishes usually not found in a normal eatery (I recall the unique Bavarian homemade sausages).

Thirdly, the pricing of everything is usually 50 per cent or even double of what is normally asked for in the eateries in Kuching.

This obviously has to be the case as the rental for these stalls have increased exponentially through the years.

In our own case on Thursday night, the fried oyster omelette was rubbery and full of starch rather than oysters.

The meat on the satays, although well grilled, was as tough as leather.

The ‘kuih pie tie’ filling was simply some sliced ‘sengkuang’ (jicama) with diced carrots, and was quite inedible.

At least the barbequed pork was delicious.

I had noticed that again there were very few large garbage bins available throughout the thoroughfare area – maybe they were all hidden behind the stalls?

Yes, there were people cleaning up tables as soon as they were vacated; and the drink vendors were actively canvassing for sales.

While walking to the festival ground from around Jalan Datuk Goh Meng Teck, I had to walk into the MBKS Garden area, which was rather pleasant, it was clean and quite beautiful.

However, it was a pity that although I did see some lamp posts with light fittings and all, they were not switched on.

So the area was rather dark, and it felt unsafe.

One would expect that a place offering so much for the public would be better catered for – at least brighten up the place and allow for even more locals to use and take advantage of the facilities available.

I would certainly tag Mayor Dato Wee Hong Seng regarding this matter!

Overall, though, it was a pleasant evening spent with old friends just sitting around, having a few beers, enjoying the ‘finger foods’, and just shooting the breeze as we watched people walking by.

The last time I was here with some expat friends, we were at the Tiger Beer tent when the beers were just RM5 per can; and for less than RM30 per head, you could be pretty satiated with all sorts of good food.

Then again, one must remember too that the stall rental has gone up from around RM500 back then, to more than RM3,000 for a premium stall.

Still, come August every year, like clockwork, everything falls back into place once again and the next edition of the food fair will again be ‘the place to go to!’

Happy 40th anniversary Kuching Festival Food Fair!