Written by Yu-Jong Peng/Photo by Yu-Jong Peng
The street stands all provide the similar choice in the markets in Yangon. I guess that they all purchased the food from the same reseller or wholesale market. Therefore I decided to visit Thiri Mingalar wholesale market, located along the River of Yangon and in the northwest part of the city.
Thiri Mingalar Market takes a large area and looks very similar to First and Second Wholesale Market of Vegetable in Binjiang Street, Taipei City, Taiwan. The market is very busy. The 10-ton and 20-ton lorries are waiting for discharging the vegetable. We can see the carriers to take the cargo and walk around in the market.
Several big lorries delivering the cabbage are parked at the right side of the gate. The supply of cabbage is very stable even in the hot season (even if the temperature is up to 40℃) because the supple comes from Shan State, located in the high latitude in northeastern part of Myanmar. The texture of Burmese cabbage leaves is very hard, unlike Taiwan cabbage whose texture is much softer. Thanks to the hard texture, the cabbage can be delivered from Shan State to Yangon without much damage. Some betel nut stands are next to the lorry parking and the owner sells the betel nut to the lorry driver.
Burmese Dogfruit
There are many piles of dark brown and green fruit in Thiri Mingalar Market and some peeled ones show the light yellow filling with strong flavor. When I saw it at Hwa-Shin Street, the stand owner told me that it is “dogfruit”. She tried to convince me to buy and said that it is the delicious fruit from Myanmar. Now seeing is believing. When I see many piles of dogfruit in the market, I realize how popular it is in Myanmar.
The dogfruit in Myanmar is different from the one in southern Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. The buah petai in Southeast Asia is in the fabaceae family, the fruit of petai in the parkia speciosa family. People tend to fry the buah petai with shrimp, shacha sauce, chili pepper and pork. Or simply bake it to dip the shrimp paste and tamarind juice. The Burmese tend to eat the archidendron pauciflorum . They call it “Da-Nyin-Dhee” in Burmese and jengkol, dogfruit and jering in English. The archidendron pauciflorum is in the pea family. The flavor is quite strong. The shell is dark brown and after peeling the shell, there is dark yellow bean. Please check the article “dogdruit dogfruit” for the receipt.
午後的市場裡，小睡午覺的攤販們
Republic of Mango/h1>
According to the statistic of Ministry of Agricultural Affairs in Myanmar, the cultivation surface of mango is more than 60,000 acres and the annual production volume is more than 350,000 tons. According to the statistic of Ministry of Commercial Affairs in Myanmar, the export amount of Myanmar mango is more than US$10 million. The most popular variety is Sen Da Lon. (The direct translation from the Burmese means “a piece of diamond”. It was served as the tribute for the royal family in the past.) If mango is the king of fruit, Sen Da Lon will be the king of the fruit king.
Yang Han, graduated from Chia-Yi University , Taiwan and worked in the farm in Taiwan, returned to his hometown Myanmar. He mentioned that most of Sen Da Lon come from the department of Mandalay, central region of Myanmar. Myin Mu, Mattaya, and Kyauk-se are the major towns to produce Sen Da Lon. The local farmers adapt the extensive agriculture methodology and do not take any fruit thinning and bush type cultivation. Some farmers might use the fruit bag but it has not yet been adapted commonly. There is no threaten from Bactrocera dorsalis Hendel and the rainfall is not too much in the central region of Myanmar (the annual rainfall in Mandalay is around 800mm). The fruit does not have any cracks and the tree can grow very well. The weight of the big fruit is up to 600g. The shape is round and the peel is golden. The fruit has the rich soluble solids content. The smell is elegant. Good balance of sweetness and sourness and less fibers. The taste is excellent and the flavor is rich, much better than Taiwan Irwin mango that has been too sweet after improvement. No wonder that Chinese and Sigaporean traders purchase a lot of Burmese mango every year.
When we were in Myanmar during the hot season in 2013, the price of Sen Da Lon in the retail market is around US$3-6 for 10 pieces. This pricing is affordable for the foreigners.
Besides the famous Sen Da Lon, there are so many mango varieties in Myanmar. The flavour is special and the name, just like Sen Da Lon, delivers some poetic romance. Shwe-Hin-Thar mango is a good example. It is popular in the export market and the rear bends upwards. The “Shwe-Hin-Thar” comes from a golden bird in the Burmese legend. (“Hin-Thar” means bird.)
The fruit of Ma Chid Su mango is bigger and eatable even if the fruit is green. “Ma Chid Su” means “the girl with lots of love”. And Yin Kwe mango has an obvious deep scar in the middle of the fruit. “Yin Kwe” means “cut the chest ”, “cut the heart” or “broken heart”. While mentioning Yin Kwe, everyone makes the gesture of cutting the chest, stares at me and then laughs from embarrassment.
During the hot season, we can also see Aung Tin mango, small kidney-shaped fruit that looks like Taiwan local mango. The pulp is not much but the flavour is unique. There are still lots of mango varieties such as Thone Lone Ta Taung, Mya Kyauk, Ma Thi, Sein-Sar and so on. Different mango varieties make the visitors impressed while strolling around the market in Mandalay and around Inlay Lake in the hot season.
The Gallery of Fruit
The durian and jackfruit, commonly seen in every Southeast Asia country, are also available in the Burmese market. . Both the crunch texture and the soft texture are available in Myanmar and the Burmese prefer the crunch texture. The rambutan and purple mangosteen (in Burmese “May Go Te”), prohibited from importing to Taiwan, are cheap and available everywhere in Myanmar, just like Thailand. I always eat lots of tropical fruit in Myanmar because I might not be able to see them when I go back to Taiwan.
There is an area specialized in banana in the rear of Thiri Mingalar Market. People piled up the banana stock up to the roof. We might call it “Banana Wall”. The golden banana is “Shin-Na-Bian”, the dark red banana is “ra-khai” ( people said that it comes from the department of Ra-Khai), the banana with sour taste is “Pi-gan” and many other varieties that I am not aware of the name.
Fish (Pungent) Paste on the Ground
Another area in the rear of Thiri Mingalar Market shows the other unique feature of Myanmar- the abundant sea food resources from Andaman Sea. The feature of this area is that people can “smell” it even if they are still very far away from it. The fishy smell of dry fish mixes together with the rich smell of dry shrimp and minced shrimp. We cannot tell whether this smell comes from the rotten or dry-aged sea food. All the smells mix together in the market in the afternoon under the temperature 42℃.
The different shape dry fish and dry shrimp are all available here. The further we go in the rear, the stronger smell it is. At this moment, the friend who guided me to visit the market has a strange smile and asked me, “do you want to know how we make the ngapi that we use to dip the steamed vegetable and salad?” I am really in dilemma. There is lots of delicious food in this world but you never want to know how it has been made. I think about it and finally tell myself go ahead. As we Taiwanese get used to the food quality of street stands in Taiwan, what stuff can make us scared? After all, our iron stomach has been experienced the threaten from plasticizer, fake oil, maleic acid and sodium copper chlorophyllin for a long time.
We hold the breath and go through the blue buckles of gray-black stinky fishes. Two youngsters sit on the floor to brush the thick paste stuff, turn around and smile to us. It seems that they tell us “hey, now you know how we make the ngapi?” After seeing the production process, I have never touched the ngapi on the table in my journey later on. Taiwanese iron stomach sometimes need to face the reality.
But on the other hand, how many foreigners can enjoy stinky tofu and preserved egg after they know how we make them? I guess that not so many dare to try.
Taiwan Corn, Great!
Not so many Burmese heard of Taiwan as a country but the reputation of Taiwanese agricultural variety is very good for the Burmese farmers. General Manager of Known-You Burmese subsidiary Kuan-Shi Kuo has 17-year experience in Myanmar explained that in Burmese market, more than 80% papaya, watermelon and melon variety are from Taiwan Known-You. The popular varieties are Hwa-Fong watermelon and Red Lady papaya. The GM’s special assistant of Known-You Burmese subsidiary Mr. Chang guided us to visit Thiri Mingalar Market and we can see Red Lady papaya andHwa-Fong watermelon everywhere during the hot season and we can sometimes see the dark jade watermelon with yellow pulp and 855 watermelon with dark strike peel.
The street stands sell the corn and boiled corn (水煮玉米) everywhere in Myanmar. The variety is different. Some are sweet corn and some are waxy corn. The interesting thing is that the street stand owners always said that the corn is “Taiwan Bion Pu” and emphasized that it is delicious. Han Yang, an overseas Chinese studied in Taiwan and went back to Myanmar for more career chances, explained that it is because the corn variety from Known-You has good quality and taste delicious. Taiwanese corn gets therefore the reputation gradually in Myanmar. The seeds from Thailand now are getting popular. The choices of corn variety are various and the corn variety in the market does not really come from Taiwan Known-You, but the local farmers still like “Taiwan Bion Pu”. Besides the corn, Taiwanese also introduced the good date variety (CiDi). Burmese farmers call it “Taiwan CiDi”.
Red tomato, Green Tomato and Sour Tomato
The tomato is another agricultural product that attracts our attention. In May, there are three tomato varieties in Thiri Mingalar market- round-shaped red tomato, green tomato and sour tomato whose flavour is sour and surface gets the scar. It looks like the smaller version of western pumpkin and the shape is like the tire. Red tomato comes from Monywa in the central of Myanmar, green tomato comes from Inlay Lake in the northeast mountain area. All the tomato cartons have been stored in the wooden case and piled in the corner of the wholesale market.
According to 《Myanmar Daily》report, due to the strange weather in 2013, the tomato production is only 25% of the production volume in 2012 and the pricing is much more expensive. During 1-month journey from the end-user market to the production area, I gradually realize that the reason behind less tomato production is not only the strange weather but also related to the demise of a beautiful lake and Myanmar minority ethnic group Intha’s daily life. This is another story. (Please read the article “The sadness of hydroponics tomato on Inlay Lake”.)
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