Friday, May 26, 2006

Sup Tulang at Adam Road Hawker Centre

C says:

A has certainly come a long way since we got married. Back then, it was inconceivable that he would even consider eating something as exotic as Sup Tulang. But after 2 and a half years of marriage and intensive training on my part (heh), he is slowly but surely getting more adventurous food-wise.

After reading a recent post in another food blog, we decided to try Sup Tulang, albeit at Adam Road rather than at Golden Mile Food Centre which was recommended in the blog. I can’t believe that I’ve never tried Tulang before. Me, someone who eats innards on a regular basis and even used to eat brain! (in the good ol’ days when my grandmother used to make it. She now says she doesn’t buy it because we’re all too health conscious, sigh)

I’m sure everyone who reads this blog knows what Tulang is, so I won’t bother going into a lengthy explanation. It’s basically large pieces of mutton bone, with some meat still on it, and the highlight and whole point of the dish is the wobbly bone marrow. The bones are cooked in an extremely red sauce that’s mostly sweet and tomato-ey. I think the standard way to eat this is with pieces of bread to mop up the sauce, but A and I had ordered stingray and rice so we didn’t want any more carbs.

The dish arrived piled high and STEAMING. We probably had to wait 5 minutes before being able to pick up the first bone comfortably. The meat was surprisingly tender, and there was also a surprisingly substantial amount of meat left on the bone. A lot more than expected, considering that the marrow is the main part of the dish.

It was a good thing we had read the food blog, because it explained the best way to get the marrow out of the bones – carefully shake the bone until the marrow is dislodged and slides out, looking like an extremely gross worm or slug. Sometimes only half the marrow comes out that way, in which case you need to insert the handle of your spoon into the hollow, wiggle it around a little, and that should help the rest of the marrow to slide out after another good shake or two.

The marrow was utterly heavenly. Rich, creamy, buttery. Almost like molten fat. Even A didn’t recoil, and had almost the same number of bones as I did. This dish gets gelak after a while because it’s so rich, so it’s definitely not something you can have very often. Once in 2 or 3 months, I would say.

It was REALLY messy though, and of all the days to forget to refill my supply of tissue paper… We had one measly piece to share between the two of us, but luckily I had a full pack of wet tissues. I think this dish is probably THE worst first date dish ever. It was definitely an experience, and a good one at that, and one that I’ll have again in the foreseeable future.

A says:

The other food blog was Travelling Hungryboy’s. Props where props is due, yo!

While I much prefer the seafood BBQ stingray we also had, I must admit that the Tulang was perfectly edible (aside from its messiness). It’s now almost 24 hours later and my fingers still show faint red stains from eating like a barbarian. “Out, damned spot! Out, I say!”

Alas, as the long-suffering husband of a foodie, I guess I’ll be continuously subjected to eating weird shit.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

No, no, no! You don't shake gently to dislodge the marrow. You hold the bone and bang it on the table to knock it out! That's the fun of eating tulang.

*bang* *bang* *bang*

Melven said...

Hey , meet you guys at adam next month, Woo Hoo!