Rice appreciation: Pondering the value as price rises

No rice, noodles and bread for a week? No way!
Maureen Koh, New Paper 7 Apr 08;

THE editor's suggestion seemed simple: See if you and your family can do without rice for a week.

Then he threw in the real challenge: By the way, skip the wheat. That meant noodles and bread.

But my husband - the Survivor wannabe - was game.

So were the children, despite their initial confusion.

Aloysius, 9, asked: 'Then what does that leave us with? And I don't really like noodles.'

But hey, this is the boy that friends and relatives all say is quite cheap to feed.

He polishes off any rice variation - plain rice, nasi lemak or chicken rice (minus the chicken).

I'd just add some slices of luncheon meat and an egg or two - until the price for a tin of luncheon meat went up two-fold, and later, three times higher.

His favourite luncheon meat brand has disappeared from the supermarket shelves.

And now, rice.

It was relatively easier for my girl, 8. She enjoys food so much that she eats anything and everything.

Except rice. Given her way, Nicolette will probably impose a high premium on rice so that she does not have to be told: Finish every grain.

Ahh, but the 'no noodles' condition got her really worried.

She protested: 'I think I'd die, you know.'

True enough, both children did not make it past the first day.

That night after I got home from work, they happily ticked off their menu for the next day: Bread for breakfast and rice for lunch.

Aloysius had his regular rice and sunny-side up for his recess, while Nicolette stuck to her favourite 'mee hoon kueh' (flat noodles).

Sigh. And you would think it was only the children.

Despite my lofty weight-reducing plans, I am very much a rice woman.

Give me rice any time over the delectable oil-dripped French fries. Or butter-splattered potatoes.

As you have guessed it, I never made it to the finishing line.

By the third night, as the waiter heaped scoops of rice onto the plates of my dinner mates, I caved in, pointed to mine and said: 'Here, me too. Please. And a little more. Thank you.'

The only one who soldiered on was my husband.

His week's menu was made up of yong tau fu, fish soup, meat dishes, vegetables and masala prawns - all without the accompanying rice or noodles.

Easy does it, announced the victorious man, five days later.

Then he added: 'But I think it'll be difficult for me to sustain it longer.'

Then Aloysius saved the day.

'Oh, what's there to worry? There's enough rice for everyone in Singapore,' he said, pointing to a report in The New Paper.

Remembering the value of the humble grain of rice
For a generation that has never experienced food scarcity, what do soaring prices mean?
Debbie Yong, Straits Times 7 Apr 08;

FINISH your rice, my grandparents used to tell me when I was younger.

There were tactics to deal with the wasteful child: horror stories about growing up with pockmarked faces if we did not; putting out pretty plates with graphics that were only visible if we licked up every last grain.

Then came the teenage years, and the tactics changed with my family's growing financial security.

As I shoved most of my share onto my brother's plate - in keeping with whatever fad diet I had adopted - my grandmother gradually relented.

Never mind the rice, she eventually said, as long as you eat the liao (Hokkien for 'ingredients').

Last week's spotlight on the worldwide shortage of rice and its climbing prices in the region made me recall these anecdotes.

Modern life and rising incomes have increasingly shoved rice off our plates as well as our consciousness. It seems like the more we substituted it for naan, pasta, tacos and the like, or avoided it for protein and low glycemic bites, the more irrelevant rice became to our lives.

Fact is, it has been consumed in remembrance of great events in history, offered up to the gods in hopes of better times ahead.

It has been ritual, tradition, religion and ideology - a symbol of blood, sweat and tears. It has been sustenance, comfort and a reassurance that one would never go hungry and no evil would befall him.

As we brace ourselves for more hefty price tags on our rice sacks soon, perhaps it is time to revisit the value of rice and give it back the respect it deserves.

Maybe trips to rice paddies in neighbouring countries to see all the toil and trouble that goes into every plate would inspire a newfound appreciation for the grain.

Perhaps a day or a week of rice rationing exercises - as with water before - would shake up a complacent younger generation that has never gone through war and hardships.

In the long run, more expensive grain could also make us think twice about our use-and-throw lifestyle and our excesses.

As a start, sometimes it is as simple as remembering a grandmother's nag to clean up every last grain, for you never know when you may run out.

Make 'Eat Less' our mantra
Sylvia Toh Paik Choo, New Paper 7 Apr 08;

CALL it prescient.

When Singapore film director Kelvin Tong made his first movie, he titled it 'Eating Air'. How could he have known - in 1999 - that'd be the future we're facing?

Okay, I exaggerate, movie buffs tend to; and there was that reassuring front-page picture of how much rice Singapore has in stockpile (three warehouses full, three months' worth of grain).

But it's not so much about how much there is, but what it's going to cost you and me tomorrow, and will we be able to continue to afford it?

The prices of goods and services - and just about everything else - are mounting, climbing, soaring, as the cabby said: 'Only the rain is coming down.'

The generation of our parents remembers the campaign 'Eat More Wheat'. (Also 'This is a drop of water, water is precious'; boy, is it ever more so now.)

The world Al Gore warned of has come up to speed with the archaic 'Eat More Wheat' campaign, because we can't afford that either, what with the cost of grains today.

So, caught between a rock and a hard place (Singapore grows nothing of its own except human resource), what is a working stiff left with? First, consider your position. Then turn on the news. Do you see the hungry and the homeless, the malnourished, the bloated, the dehydrated, the daily reportage of starving Africans crowding for water and queuing for any gruel?

You are one of the lucky ones, because you have a choice still, to buy the gourmet label or the no-frills brand. 'You've got vote', with your feet and your pocket.

By the way, are you eating out today, being Sunday, being the maid's day off? Remind your family not to waste food, make 'You Waste, Others Want', a personal campaign.

Tell your kid, 'You think oranges grow on trees? Half a glass enough!' It's never too early to teach the philosophy of half-full-or-half-empty.

Meanwhile, there are measures, which enforced, will create a buffer zone between you and the rising cost of living, at least until the universe repairs itself.

From today, never go anywhere without Ziploc bags (any old plastic will do). And don't be shy either. Slide whatever unfinished grub into the Ziploc and it'll do for the next meal. The stranger I shared a table with was rather miffed when I also bagged her leftovers.

In Hollywood, women pay trainers and nutritionists squillions to keep them stick-insect thin. This is a fine time to tackle Singapore's obesity problem. Let 'Eat Less' be the nation's mantra.

Hotels can do their part by offering cheaper buffets because of the reduced food selection.

Learn to fish. No wiser words, that adage about teaching a man to fish and he'll eat forever. Or become a cowboy, he who is content to just sit in the open and eat from a tin of beans. One can of beans too many and you understand why he has to stay in the open.

Not recommended, but it's a thought, go to jail. Free board and lodging, sometimes for life, rather like an annuity, you know.

I am from that generation whose Mother wanted us to marry either a doctor (illness) or lawyer (litigation) or a millionaire.

Today, I'd encourage working in the hospitality industry (at least one free meal a shift in hotel staff canteen), for food manufacturers and suppliers (can buy at staff discount) or a company like P&G (Procter & Gamble). It has such a stable of products that from its sample sizes alone, you will remain young (Olay), beautiful (SK-II), shiny (Pantene) and clean (detergents).

And then the millionaires will come running and you'll be in Basmati for ever.