I met a couple of friends I know from Hong Kong in Malaysia last week. One of the highlights was us polishing off two really good durians in Petaling Jaya, the city next to Kuala Lumpur.
Well, it was a highlight for the two Malaysians and one Singaporean in our group. Our long-suffering Australian friend had no choice but to endure the fruit’s distinctive odour, his affronted senses assuaged only by an inadequate coconut.
Growing up in the 1970s and ’80s, I recall that there was only a single season, around the middle of the year, when one could enjoy durians. Now, with new cultivation techniques, durians are available almost every other month.
Also, there were not so many varieties back then. Among Singaporeans at the time, Thai durians were considered superior to, and were more expensive than, Malaysian ones. I remember one Thai cultivar called Mon Thong (“golden pillow”) that was a rare treat.
Then, something wonderful happened to durian farmers in Malaysia. I don’t know what experiments in crossbreeding or cross-pollination they did, but the results were nothing short of life-changing for connoisseurs of durians, and the people who planted them.
The first Malaysian durian with a name that I remember was the D24, also known as the Sultan durian. The popularity of D24 in the 1990s sowed the seeds for the domination of multiple Malaysian cultivars in the Malaysian and Singaporean durian markets in the years to come.
Today, the most famous and prestigious Malaysian cultivar is the Musang King, known as Mao Shan Wang in Mandarin. It is famous even in faraway Hong Kong and mainland China. It was one of the two durians my friends from Hong Kong and I enjoyed. The other one was a new cultivar called Kunyit Emas (“golden turmeric”), which was even more delicious (and expensive) than the Musang King.
Ma Huan, a Chinese Muslim and interpreter who followed Zheng He (1371-1433), a fleet admiral and explorer, on his voyages, describes a durian that he encountered in Sumatra, part of modern-day Indonesia, in his book The Overall Survey of the Ocean’s Shores, which was published in 1451.
“There is a particularly pungent fruit,” Ma wrote, “known by the foreign name du er yan … measuring eight to nine cun [around 27-31 cm] in length, with a skin covered in sharp thorns. When ripe, it splits into five or six sections, releasing an odour akin to that of putrid beef. Inside, it contains 14 to 15 creamy white segments, about the size of chestnuts, which are exceptionally sweet and delicious.”
It is not true that all Southeast Asians like durian. I know many Malaysians and Singaporeans who cannot tahan (“tolerate”) the smell. A good friend of mine has to eat them outside on her balcony because the odour makes her Malaysian husband retch.
A combination of cultural influence, personal preference and genetics is probably why the durian, in particular its smell, is so polarising. It is similar to many people’s predilections for odoriferous foods such as stinky tofu, blue cheese and surströmming, that tinned fermented herring from Sweden that has found fame recently on social media.
“Don’t knock it until you try it” – that is my mantra for all foods, however they smell or look, unless it involves cruelty or endangered species of plants and animals. You may like it or you may not, but at least your decision is an informed one.
