Celebrity chef Maria Cordero keen to prepare Malaysian cuisine

PETALING JAYA:  Celebrity chef Maria Cordero wants to try her hand at Malaysian cuisine and put her own spin on local delicacies such as nasi lemak.

"I hope to visit Malaysia's wet markets and attempt to use some of the local produce here, as well as give my own modern interpretation of local food such as nasi lemak," said the host of Hong Kong's cooking programme Good Cheap Eats.

The programme features Cordero along with her co-host Luk Ho Ming visiting wet markets in search of the best ingredients, before demonstrating how to cook them in the simplest and most cost-friendly way.

The first season of Good Cheap Eats is already airing on dimsum, a video-on-demand service in Malaysia.

The second and third season are expected to be made available this Thursday.

On living in Hong Kong, Cordero said that buying ingredients and cooking in Hong Kong is no longer challenging, and added that she wants to come up with new and modern ways of cooking traditional dishes that usually take hours to prepare.

"I admit, I'm not patient when it comes to cooking and the bulk of my recipes can be prepared only by using an electric rice cooker," she said during a press conference at the 988 radio station on Monday.

She was interviewed live by 988 deejays Cheryl Lee and Jason Poon.

Cordero was in Malaysia to speak at the WOW - Women do Wonders Talks and Bazaar - at SEGi University Kota Damansara on Sunday.