Thanks to ISKL staff member Jin Wen Phung for sharing this slice of life in Sarawak with us …
Durian, in Malaysia, is the most exotic of fruits – we love them! But did you know, the flowers from a durian tree are edible as well? In my hometown, Kuching Sarawak, the durian flower is a special and unique dish. Most people in Kuching look forward all year to the durian tree flowering. Unfortunately, not all durian trees flower so it can be frustrating!
During the blooming season (no durian fruit at this time), my mom and I would head to her uncle’s house, to pick some durian flowers to bring home. The tree would typically flower for two weeks. My grand uncle would lay down a piece of canvas on the ground at night, and if it doesn’t rain in the morning, we would start picking the flowers that had fallen onto the ground at around 6 am the next morning. You must pick it super early in the morning, or else when the weather gets hot, these flowers will not be fresh anymore. If it rains, these flowers are good to use as fertilizers as they tend to go sticky and are hard to clean.
Here’s a picture of my mom, grand uncle and grand aunt picking durian flowers off the canvas. We’re wearing long sleeves and pants not because it’s cold, we’re just constantly being attacked by mosquitos!
We usually ended up with three big plastic bags of durian flowers. One handful of durian flowers sell for between RM5 – RM10 at the wet market. You’d probably need at least three or four handfuls of these to serve a proper plate on your dining table. Definitely one of the more expensive vegetables to buy!
We throw away the hard flower case and its sticky stamen and keep only the soft petal and the filament for eating.
There are so many ways to cook durian flowers. One of the most famous methods is to pan fry it with belacan (shrimp paste), bird eye chilli (cili padi), red onion (bawang merah), garlic (bawang putih). Similar to many malaysian veggie goreng belacan dishes. Or, you can always make it into a salad – similar to the Thai som tam recipe.
Here’s a dish I made by boiling the flowers for a while, and mix it up with cucumber (timun) shreds, lime (limau), chilli (cili) and some seasoning.
Next time, if you stumble upon a durian tree that flowers, know that in Sarawak, we often said that you’ve stumbled upon a gold mine!
