08/04/2026
Every Singaporean and Malaysian who can try this, should try this. It’s one of the oldest dishes from a culture that came into existence on this very land we call home!
500 years of heritage that we are on the brink of losing. If it is lost at this point, so many of us would be ignorantly blissful, unaware it even is a thing.
I see queues 50, 80, even over 100 meters long for pasta, smash burgers, K BBQ and others, which is fine, but who will protect and preserve our own?
It saddens me that we now have a virtual library in our pockets and so many of us won’t use it to learn about our own heritage.
All this wouldn’t matter if the dish was just “meh” at best, but it’s not! I would say an objective standard has been set by those who have discovered how yummy it is. Its uniqueness surprises many!
To me, it is a creation of beauty. A dish that can be so addictive without the use of fermented sauces or flavour enhancers. The very feature that makes it difficult to get right.
In this day and age, when so many are relying on heavy hitting ingredients like shio koji, MSG, mentaiko, salted egg, truffle and so on, it’s hard to imagine any chef will come up with something as pure as Debal.
Don’t get me wrong, I love pasta and burgers too! But if we don’t preserve our Kristang cuisine, there is no other place in the world we can go to experience it!
PLEASE DON’T MISS THE CHANCE TO TRY!!!