Cool Shavings

Gosh the weather is seriously hot these days. Horrid for everything except for two things – drying the laundry, and eating shaved ice. Fortunately, our country is not only blessed with unending sunshine and rain, it’s also undying in its love affair with these cool treats.

Whether it’s ang tao peng (红豆冰, aka ais kacang) or cendol or sai mai lo (西米露), shaved iced desserts come in various incarnations with different toppings (or “bottomings”, as may be the case) and different flavourings. My favourite would still be the ang tao peng or cendol. Frankly I don’t really care whether or not there’s red bean or attap seeds or sweet corn in it, what I’m really after is the shaved ice itself, liberally drizzled with evaporated milk and palm sugar syrup.

What with the heatwave and everyone generally agreeable to indulging in icy goodness anytime of day, I’ve found that just as there are different types of shaved ice desserts, there are as many different ways they are savoured. Some like to mix it up and melt it quickly, some slowly scrape away at the ice, and some like digging into the mound.

I guess I’m one of those diggers, except instead of digging a hole from the top down, I love tunnelling through the bottom, eating my way through while trying my best not to have the little ice mountain collapse on my miniature engineering project. Yeah, I’ve always been an imaginative kid and this was how I kept myself entertained while enjoying a supper treat with my family when the nights get too warm to stay indoors.

So, which shaved ice treat do you like, and how do you eat it?