The first time I tried to cook Singaporean food abroad, I made too much.
There was enough rice for six people, though only two of us were eating. I had bought three kinds of chilli because none of them looked quite right, and I had spent far too long comparing bottles of soy sauce in a supermarket aisle where every label seemed familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.
By the time dinner was ready, the kitchen smelled almost like a coffee shop near my old home. Almost.
That word followed me through my first months of cooking abroad, which led to a lot of emotional eating.
The chicken was almost tender enough. The chilli had almost the right sharpness. The rice was close, but not quite as fragrant. Even the cucumber slices looked wrong somehow, too thick and too cold from the refrigerator.
Still, when I sat down to eat, something softened.
Living abroad often makes you aware of how much you once understood without thinking.
In Singapore, I knew where to buy fresh pandan leaves, which stall sold the right kind of tofu, and how a neighbourhood market changed from morning to afternoon. I knew that some ingredients were better bought from the wet market and others from the supermarket. I knew which auntie would choose the ripest limes if I asked nicely.
Outside Singapore, none of that knowledge disappeared, but it stopped being immediately useful.
I wanted the dishes to taste exactly as they had at home. I wanted the first spoonful to return me to a familiar table, with the same heat, fragrance and balance. When it did not, I blamed the ingredients, the weather, the stove and sometimes myself.
But as I’ve learned from Neighbourhood Life, Singaporean food has never been fixed in one place.
It has always carried the marks of movement, trade and adaptation. Recipes changed as families moved between countries, neighbourhoods and generations. Ingredients were adjusted according to what was available. Techniques were taught, forgotten, remembered and altered.
Once I understood this, I became less afraid of cooking the “wrong” version.
I began paying closer attention to what made a dish feel familiar beyond exact ingredients.
Sometimes it was the balance of sweetness and salt.
Sometimes it was the smell of fried shallots added at the end.
Sometimes it was simply the act of eating from bowls placed in the middle of the table, with everyone reaching for a little of everything.
The meals improved when I stopped chasing perfection.
I learned to toast spices longer in the colder kitchen because their aromas opened more slowly. I adjusted fermentation times when the air was dry. I wrote notes beside family recipes, not to correct them, but to record how they behaved in this new place.
Some evenings, the result still tasted noticeably different from home. Yet difference no longer meant disappointment.
Perhaps eating like a local abroad does not mean recreating Singapore perfectly.
It means remembering how Singapore taught you to cook with instinct, resourcefulness and generosity. It means making space for change without losing the heart of the dish. It means inviting new friends to the table and explaining why the chilli is served on the side, why the rice matters, and why you always cook more than you need.
And sometimes, when the kitchen fills with the smell of pandan, garlic or toasted spices, you realise that you do not need every ingredient to be exact.
For a moment, the distance between where you are and where you came from feels much smaller.
