My gastronomic heritage began while I was growing up in Malaysia. Watching my late grandma (whom we called Periama) grinding the soaked rice–lentil mixture for Sunday’s breakfast, picking kari leaves for my late ma’s aromatic crab curry, and listening to my late cha’s (father’s) food adventures during meals, all created in me a passion for food, spices, and cultures. For mom, cooking was a creative process— every day there had to be something new and different on the table. She never hurried her cooking and never settled for less than the best in her choice of spices and ingredients. I observed and learned her pride in creating the ultimate flavor and absorbed her approach to freshness, flavor, and healthy eating. For cha, food had no boundaries. It surpassed all cultures and religions. He taught me to explore and try all foods and flavors available in Malaysia, whether Malay, Chinese, Indian, Indonesian, Thai, or Western. His adventure for unique flavors and his cultural experiences from his travels around the world provided me the beginnings to understand the many global foods. Mom’s endless search for the ultimate flavor profiles and her zest for cooking, and cha’s enthusiasm and appreciation of all ethnic cuisines gave me an appetite for adventurous eating and a curiosity about new flavors.