WHITE radish cake began in China as humble winter food.
Rice did not grow well in cold, hilly regions, but white radish thrived.
Teochews grated it, mixed it with rice flour slurry and steamed the mixture into cakes that kept well in the cold and were lightly pan-fried, since oil was precious.
When Teochew immigrants arrived in Malaya in the mid-1800s, they adapted the recipe.
White radish did not grow well in the tropics, while rice arrived by the gunny sack from Kedah.
George Town was a port city, full of coolies burning calories by the
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