Kacang putih – childhood memories are made of these January 13, 2008
Posted by asianpixmen in Culture, Food, India, Malaysia, Places.trackback
If you haven’t tried anyone of these kacang putih, you must be from another planet. As a child, there were times when my very physical survival was dependent on the ubiquitous kacang putih.
I almost want to get down on my knees and thank those people who created kacang putih. These days, of course, a small plastic packet of kacang putih, regardless of variety would fetch a ringgit or two.
Back in those bullock-wheel days, a packet of kacang putih (enough to feed two young mouths) cost a princely sum of 10 sen, or sepuloh kupang (if you are from Perak like I am).
Too commercialised, that’s my verdict on the modern development of kacang putih. In the 60s and 70s, kacang putih was done in somebody’s kitchen. Probably, a housewife who was trying to earn some pocket money was doing it in her spare time to buy her children some much needed school books or uniforms.
In those days, we don’t have computers or the Internet, so everything was hard-earned. Adversity builds character and don’t we know it. Kacang putih occasionally turned out to be almost our staple diet. Ahhh… those were the days when life was like kacang, like they say.
Thank you very much for bringing back old memories. In my time kachang putih was 5 cents a packet or lima kupang in Ipoh. How I remember our Indian kachang putih seller carrying his wares on a wooden tray placed right on top of his head. As a cushion he had rolled a circular band of cloth to avoid the hard wood. Every time he unloads and loads his tray, I still remember how the cushion is removed from his head on unloading, and, before the tray is placed on the head up goes the cushion again. The container for the nuts was a small old newspaper cutting rolled skilfully like a present ice-cream cone. My favourite was fried shelled groundnuts called “malla kotey kachan” in Tamil, a mixture of Malay and Tamil, though in India it goes by the name “kadalai”. Originally all trays were carried on the head, later it was carried on a bicycle and it afforded more sales as you could travel afar. My father, retired, tried selling kachang puteh on a bicycle, in the 60s and learned the trade from his cousin who had gone into the business earlier. My father earned quite a bit, 50% profit of the sales, and gave it up after some time,because of Police harassment, and till today I don’t know why he could not have obtained a license to sell the nuts. Do you know how ground-nuts are fried. As a catalyst, it is mixed with fine sand and fried in a big kwali. Is that the reason the ground-nuts were so tasty.
Thanks aarvidi for filling in some fine details of your dad’s kacang putih days.
Yes, you are right, those groundnuts fried with fine sand in a huge kwali have that special taste. There used to be one guy near my office who used to do that.
His kacang was one of the best.
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