Preserving Nyonya family recipes

Lim learnt to cook from her mother and grandmother and continues to go back to Penang to learn heritage dishes from her octogenarian mother. — Photos: ART CHEN/The Star

Growing up in Penang, Nancy Lim, 59, vividly recalls the kitchen being a wonderful place where her mother, Tan Lee Lee, 80, reigned supreme. Although Tan was initially averse to her children “disturbing” her in the kitchen, Lim and her two sisters eventually learnt to cook from watching Tan as well as being allowed to experiment in the kitchen by their indulgent Nyonya grandmother.

“My grandma is a Nyonya and she was a great cook, so when my Chinese mum married into the family, she learnt how to cook Nyonya recipes from my grandmother. And when we were growing up, my grandmother would let us help her stir or cut the ingredients, so that is how we developed an interest in cooking.