Malaysia Food Heritage - Bubur Sumsum

Bubur sum-sum also known as Indonesian Rice Pudding, one kind of Asia 

foods that came from Bali which located at Indonesia. For sure, it will be one of the 

foods of India generations in Malaysia as it is one of the national heritages in Malaysia. 

Although it is an Indian style food, yet it also have several types of ways to prepare this 

bubur sum-sum from different aspects. I interviewed a cook named Tan Cheng Lock 

from a “kopitiam” which located at Kajang area, it is an old style cafe shop so it wasn’t 

well-known which will be check or search easily on Internet, but the foods that sell from 

that cafe shop are memorable. Bubur sum-sum will be one of the delectable foods. 

Step-by-Step Procedure to Prepare a current Bubur Sumsum

Here will be the steps on how to prepare a bubur sumsum using a current recipe. 

Step 1. There are few ingredients that need to prepare before start to cook bubur sumsum. 

1/2 liters of coconut milk 

100g of rice flour 

Half scoop/spoon of salt 

One big scoop of brown sugar (dissolved) 

2-3 screw-pine leaf 

One glass of water 

Step 2. First of all, pour the coconut milk into a pot. 

Step 3. Next, pour the half scoop of salt into the pot. 

Step 4. Later, put the screw-pine leaf inside the pot too. 

Once mixed up, cook it until it boil on a low heat.

It will take about around 15-20 minutes. 

Step 5. While waiting the pot of coconut milk has boiled. 

Pour the glass of water little by little to the rice flour that prepared. 

Stir it until the flour has dissolved and become milky. 

Step 6. After 15-20 minutes, pour the flour that dissolved into the 
pot of coconut milk. 

Step 7. Then, stir it for a few minutes until the milk has dissolved 
with the rice flour.

Step 8. Last but not least, scoop some in a serving bowl. 

Step 9. At last, serve it by pouring some brown sugar that already 
dissolved under room temperature. Add some vegetables or even fried 
salted fish as kind of healthy breakfast.

Comparison between the Existing online recipe and the one I have Interviewed

As mentioned earlier, bubur sumsum also been recognized as Indonesian Rice Pudding. 

Well, it also named as Gruel. When it became one of the traditional or national food heritage

in Malaysia, it will pop out several types of keys or aspects to compare the preparation part of 

Indonesian style which is using online recipe with Malaysian Style of bubur sumsumwhich prepared 

by uncle Cheng Lock, the person I have interviewed.



Cultures. First and foremost, different cultures having different types of way when 

preparing bubur sumsum. Indonesian will prepare by the combine up three main ingredients 

which are palm sugar, coconut milk and boiled water and serve it using a bowl. They will use 

seasonal fruits, yam or sweet potatoes as topping too. Whereas, for the Chinese in Malaysia 

such as uncle Cheng Lock, will mix all the ingredients into a pot, bring to boil, keep stirring 

until thickened like thick cream. Next, uncle Cheng Lock will use brown sugar to be the sources. 

After that, combined all ingredients into a pot, bring to boil and stir well until the coconut 

milk and melted rice flour dissolved. Besides, scoop some in a serving bowl and pour over brown 

sugar as sources. They serve chilled or room temperature. However, for the Malays in Malaysia, 

they will add up screwpine leaf as a spoon and serves it in glasses. In this case, their main purpose 

it to make it become one of the decoration in their house when put it on the table.




Availability of Ingredients. Next, let's look at the availability of the ingredients 

between the existing online recipe and uncle Cheng Lock’s recipe. It has a few 

differences in the ingredients used. For Indonesian, they use palm sugar as the sources are called 

it as syrup whereas dissolved brown sugar used by uncle Cheng Lock when serve it to 

his customers.




Time Constraints. Besides, according to uncle Cheng Lock, he mentioned that around 

30 minutes needed to prepare bubur sumsum as 15 to 20 minutes already needed to wait 

for the coconut milk boiled. Yet, after checking the online recipe, Indonesian need around 15 to 

20 minutes. There is a small different of these two recipes from time constraints.




Meals. From another perspective, most of the time the Indonesian will take bubur sumsum 

as a desserts or snack. It is because bubur sumsum from Indonesia, made from rice flour and 

served with some topping such as sweet potatoes, mangoes, yam or even seasonal fruits. On 

the other hand, uncle Cheng Lock serves bubur sumsum to his customers as a breakfast, it's 

made from rice flour boiled with coconut milk then served with brown sugar sauce. As he will 

mix with various vegetables or fried salted fish and chili sauce by following the customer's 

requirement.




Culinary Creations. Not only that, nowadays, bubur sumsum is the basis for many 

culinary creations for Chinese generations in Malaysia like the one with scraped young coconut. 

Wherein one case of being one of the culinary creations of the cook of the cafe shop at Kajang 

area, uncle Cheng Lock uses white glutinous rice flour, which is also made into bubur, in this 

case need to shape the flour into marblesized balls before boiled. By using the same methods, 

he mashes and form steamed red sweet potatoes into balls shape too. It is mashed while hot 

and tapioca or corn flour measuring two-thirds the weight of the mashed sweet potato is added 

to give the balls a chewy texture. Yet, this kind of culinary creations could not find it in Indonesia.




In conclusion, there are some differences between Indonesian Style and Malaysian Style. Yet, 

there is one similarity too. The Indonesian and Malaysian will call porridge or rice pudding as bubur.