Different than the Latin cultures, in the old Babah Peranakan culture, it is not so comfortable to talk about feelings so openly. That does not mean that we don’t have other ways of showing our love; but our great grandmothers and grandmothers had taught us well to show love through other channels— the best being through food and homecooking.
It is probably safe to say that our most treasured earlier memories that we still hold so closely to our hearts, 90% consist of FOOD – the deliciousness of numerous plates spread across the wide table laid with white lacy tablecloth, prepared for hours and hours in our noisy kitchens, filled with grandmothers, mothers, aunts, and maids, chattering, gossiping, laughing away, sharing recipes, stirring whilst the most amazing aromas seeped out and filled the whole house.
This is why we created Dapur Babah – a link to a most heartwarming love we had always been enveloped in when we were children, the big dining tables of noisiness of eating our favorite food to our hearts’ content, with brothers and sisters, cousins, uncles, aunts, and the greater family, before we were sent to bed with the biggest smiles and the fullest bellies. And despite the lack of romantic poems that our parents had read out loud in public to each other over the years, it is those looks filled with a deeper, knowing love that our fathers still send our mothers’ way when they arrived at the table beaming proudly, presenting her big pot of stew, decades of marriage after, that makes us understand what our grandmothers had taught us about long-lasting love.
In terms of the Babah Peranakan Culture, Dapoer Babah offers you ‘Njonja Oei Cooking Class’
http://www.tuguhotels.com/restaurants/jakarta/dapurbabah/
http://www.tuguhotels.com/restaurants/jakarta/dapurbabah/indonesian-cultural-dining/indonesia-peranakan-dining/djawa-babah-heritage-cooking-class/
