Since my posting on the Lui Cha yesterday, I had received further information on it via email on this dish from an old schoolmate now residing overseas (whom I’d not met in over 30 years and whom I cannot recall! Sorry Angelia!) and whose friend has emailed her to ‘correct’ the misinformation I had given on the authenticity of the revered Lui Cha. Her friend was positively peeved with me! Sorry lah, but I’m attempting to redress this now ok?

The ‘version’ that is being served nowadays is an adulterated modern version! As in most things that are modern I suppose. This dish historically belongs to the hakka monks who lived in the hillsides in China and are normally eaten only in August/September. No reasons are given for this.

From this lady’s childhood recollection, the dish is never that green in colour and the bitterness comes from the black tea that is boiled with just another ingredient. Herbs, I suppose? There should be 10 different chopped vegetables and crushed peanuts. The minimum number of different vegetables should be 7. There is significance to this but which I’m ignorant about. This lady’s mum gets hysterical if there are less than 7 kinds of vegetables (!) so there must had been some significance to it!

It’s sacrilegious to add tauhu (bean curd) and you’ll get thrown off the hill slopes too for adding ikan bilis (dried anchovies) to the soup! These monks are vegetarians remember and it would also be hard to find stuffs like these up on the hills.

There is also a ‘proper’ way to eat this dish! A bow of white rice, pile on the various chopped vegetables and then pour in the soup with the peanuts being added last.

Now I feel positively like a peasant for not fully appreciating the historical background of this dish and I hope this post goes a little way in redeeming me in this regards. Irregardless, I’m going back to Jalan Intan to savor the modern version on a regular basis (not just August or September) but I'll remember and am appreciative of the legacy of the hillside monks while doing so! But unlike Angelia's hakka friend, I this hainanese glutton positively LOVE Lui Cha. Happy Eating!

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