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By Mihar Dias
(C) Copyright January 2023
Yee Sang in Chinese New Year celebration proves that it is more cultural than a religious occasion.
You could try enjoying the dish together with close friends and it will show you that many overzealous fanatics are dead wrong about the tradition being a religious event.
If you wanted to see more Malays than any other ethnic group enjoying Yee Sang, visit the Royal Lake Club in the days leading up to the Chinese Lunar New Year or even weeks after.
I was pleasantly surprised when I walked into the Bunga Raya Chinese Restaurant of the Royal Lake Club recently to see tables filled with Malays enjoying the dish with abandon.
This complete lack of inhibition or restraint was well displayed by an all-Malay table with fifty-something high society ladies in their best baju kurung, heads covered in turban-like hand crafted wrappings held in place by fancy hair pins, tossing the Yee Sang and shouting at the top of their voices in unison, the classic wishes of “Gong Xi Fa Cai” (may you be rich and wealthy).
One of the reasons why Malays choose to participate so enthusiastically in eating Yee Sang is that it is free from pork or non-halal ingredients.
Watching them consume the dish convinces me that if it is not for the pork the two ethnic groups would even be closer in their relationship.
In fact, the Chinese restaurant at the Lake Club is one of the few successful Chinese restaurants in Kuala Lumpur that serves halal food. It is always full of Malays for lunch and dinner all year long.
Anyway, besides the exclusion of pork, this raw fish traditional dish invented in Seremban is as local as all the Mak Cik gathered at a dinner table in the Lake Club that evening.
Yee Sang was created in Seremban by a certain Mr. Loke Ching Fatt, a Cantonese immigrant, in the 1940s.
Loke owned a small catering business called Loke Ching Kee in the sleepy town of Seremban and was struggling to make ends meet.
"As Malaya was going through recovery from World War II, Loke decided to pivot his business by creating the Lo Hei Yee Sang, a dish that was inspired by the Chinese celebration of Ren Ri (人日), the 7th day of the Chinese New Year, where humanity was created according to myth."
Yee sang is a Cantonese-style raw fish salad, usually made with strips of uncooked salmon or jellyfish, mixed with shredded vegetables and a variety of sauces and condiments. I have eaten tiny strips of sugar-coated nutmegs in some Yee Sang which gives an added flavor to the dish.
The dish is meant to be participatory where everyone around the dining table is required to stand up with chopsticks in hand to toss the ingredients together and wish each other prosperity and good fortune for the coming year.
I do not know of any culture that is able to gather a group of people together to kick up a storm around a table as Yee Sang salad.
In other words, the dish is intentionally planned to be ritualistic, ensuring that the flavor and colors are well mixed for the auspicious new year. It also makes sure that everyone around the table enjoys doing it.
In the past, chefs used Grass Carp (waan jyu) for the dish. The fish is starved for a few days to ensure all impurities are dispensed before it is sliced thinly and served uncooked.
But these days salmon is most commonly used by many restaurants in town, including Bunga Raya at the Lake Club.
It is indeed a far cry from the humble fish first used by Mr. Loke in post-war Malaya where not many in the community ever heard of salmon much less afford the pricey imported fish.
Next time, if you are around Yee Sang table wishing each other “Gong Xi Fa Cai” (may you be rich and wealthy), “Wan Shi Ru Yi” (may everything be as you wish), and “Lou Hei” (move upwards) remember that the dish is as local as you are and was planned to bring all Malaysians together during this joyous occasion.
Also, you can tell the fanatics that there is nothing religious or sacrilegious about eating fish salad with friends irrespective of their ethnic backgrounds.
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