Malaysian man creatively replates quarantine meals
Malaysia has recently been seeing better days in the RMCO. All businesses are now allowed to resume and grounded flights have been taking off, so we can make the most of rediscovering local food and lepak spots in our own backyard.
But with COVID-19 still a cause of concern, mandatory 14-day quarantines at hotels for all Malaysians returning from abroad have made a comeback – and so have hotel room service meals. While quarantined returnees have had mixed reactions to their packed lunches and dinners, a creative quarantined Malaysian, Terry K, has been replating quarantine meals into restaurant-ready dishes to make the most of his time spent indoors.
From quarantine meals to restaurant-ready dishes
A YouTube video of what Terry K had been up to while undergoing mandatory quarantine at an Ibis Hotel in Kuala Lumpur was shared by a member of the Malaysia Quarantine Centre Support Group on Facebook. The post has since racked up over 340 reactions at the time of writing.
A hotel quarantine meal before and after plating
Image adapted from: YouTube / TerryCooks
In the video, Terry K can be seen receiving familiar Malaysian meals of nasi lemak and chicken rice in plastic containers from hotel staff. But instead of simply eating his meals that get served at designated hours in the day, he takes his time to carefully replate the food by cutting it up and rearranging the ingredients.
He can be seen using plastic containers and bottles that he had cut up by a knife to mould the rice into restaurant-ready shapes and hold creative food displays of sliced carrots and radishes together. Like any food prep, his replating starts off messy, but the outcome is pretty impressive and far from his meals’ original tapau-ed forms.
Image adapted from: YouTube / TerryCooks
He doesn’t skimp out on any meals either, going for restaurant-ready savoury mains to a dessert plate. His dessert plate consisted of bread, an apple, chocolate cookies, a banana, and a drizzling of honey. If not for the plastic lid the dish is presented on, it’s easy to imagine it on a porcelain restaurant platter.
If you’re wondering how he’s been getting ingredients you probably won’t find with regular hotel room service – such as fresh carrots and radishes and bottles of honey and peanut butter – he shared with The Smart Local Malaysia that they had been sent to him by his family members as his hotel accepts care packages for quarantined guests.
Dessert plate made up of only a few ingredients
Image adapted from: YouTube / TerryCooks
Terry K also shared that he started this whole thing as a way to entertain himself and his friends after having returned home from Australia. With many other quarantined guests bored and in the same boat as he was, he also started sharing videos of his “Gourmet on a Budget” meals to a Whatsapp group to bring more smiles to fellow Malaysians.
Netizens applaud creative M’sian in quarantine
Netizens came out to the Facebook post to applaud the creative sight and Terry K’s can-do attitude. This included Elizabeth Voon, who commented, “When given lemon[s], [he made] lemonade. And he did [so] successfully!!”
Image adapted from: Elizabeth Voon
With how creative the whole thing looks, netizen Kara Newman added that his video resembled an episode of US reality show TopChef in which chefs had to create meals out of vending machine food ingredients.
Image credit: Kara Newman
Others were just as impressed as we were with the atas-looking meals, with Kylie Lim commenting “Presentation makes the food looks like gourmet.”
Image credit: Kylie Lim
Malaysian man in quarantine gets creative with his meals
While quarantine hotel meals are humble, creative people like Terry K can whip them up into something new with an eye for rearranging ingredients. It also goes to show that Malaysia is brimming with talents in every corner – and we are always more than impressed with them.
Read about more creative Malaysians here:
- M’sian TikToker shares cleaning hack for sambal containers
- M’sian woman transformed her MYVI into a cosy campervan
- M’sian artist creates futuristic Penang for Overwatch contest
Image adapted from: YouTube / TerryCooks