Ulam or Salad, my family enjoy!

My mini garden-daun cekur.(Capture this photo with morning dew on the leaves)

Ulam is a name given for an herb plants that we can eat raw or dip in boiled water before eating with rice. Daun cekur, daun kaduk, daun kesom, daun pegaga, daun pudina (mint leaf), buah petai are some of the many traditional ulam.

Ulam usually are mix together with budu (pickled tiny fish), cencaluk (pickled tiny shrimp) or sambal belacan (chili with shrimp paste) before it goes with rice.

Two plots of daun cekur just pluck and eat.

Ulam is very popular dish that is serving daily among the Malay community in the kampung. Ulam is taken from various parts of a plant that can be eaten. The various parts are the roots, leaves, seed and fruit.

Vegetables normally is consider ulam, if it’s eaten raw. Vegetables that are consider ulam are cucumber, cabbage and eggplant. Traditional ulam as mention above are ones that needed for the preparation of nasi ulam or nasi kerabu (buffalo rice).

Ulam had being claimed to be good for diabetes and high blood pressure. I don’t know how true this is? Perhaps more research could be done to prove it has many beneficial health properties.

My family have been eating ulam since my grandma days until today.(except my kids) This is because of the family background; my grandma is of nyonya heritage and we just follow the eating habits of the family until became a norm to all of us.