Unsettling news from the town of Teluk Intan, Perak, two hours outside Kuala Lumpur: Three individuals – a cook and his two assistants – were arrested yesterday, after several customers complained of fatigue and hallucinations after eating their nasi kandar.
For the uninitiated: nasi kandar is a dish originally from Penang, made popular across the country by Indian Muslim traders. Take a plate of aromatic rice, throw on several curried meats, fish, or – if you can afford it – prawns, add vegetable sides onto that very same plate, and watch as it gets doused with a concoction of curry sauces on top. It’s messy. It’s delicious. It’s also increasingly more expensive, but that’s another matter altogether.
For a few customers at Sultana Nasi Kandar eatery, this heady mix of rice, curry, sides and sauces consumed on Sunday resulted in some rather (alleged!) unpleasant after-effects. After several complaints were lodged, police went to investigate, and found that the trio behind the stew pots all tested positive for opiates. Aged between 30 and 70 [Ed. Note: Stay trippy for life!], they have since been arrested while police look into whether or not there was dish tampering.
Several foods were seized, including – but not limited to – coconut sambal, mutton curry, fried chicken, bean sprouts, and plain rice. Each will be tested by the police Chemistry Department.
Also of interest? A small, clear plastic packet containing kas-kas (poppy seeds). The seeds contain morphine, an opioid … just like heroin.
But how many seeds do I have to eat to get high, Coconuts KL?
Well, to get a 10mg dose of morphine – on the lower end of a standard dose – and eating the most potent of all seeds, the Spanish poppy seeds – you’d need to eat about 40 mg of poppy seeds to get you trippin’.
And HOW Coconuts KL … HOW can we get that much poppy seed into our lives? We mean out! OUT.
Let’s just say that our Hungarian nagymama (grandma, but she was more like an auntie) made a particularly enticing mákos rétes – poppy seed strudel.
She lived into her 90s, and not for nothing – that was her favorite dessert. But yeah — probably avoid that if you’re worried.
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