In the coming months, the ‘Ma Khin’ restaurant in the Mercado de Colón (Valencia) will undergo a complete remodelling, including the renovation of the space, the redesign of its graphics and the updating of its website.From 23 September, there will also be five special menus, which will include the house classics and very significant dishes from the past, such as Malabari fish with kheer rice. In addition to these changes, there will be a photo exhibition, several showcookings and a grand finale event with friends and family of the house.
There are few celebrations that have relevance in virtually every culture, across the globe, but having a birthday is one of them. In the restaurant business, as in life, it is always a reason to rejoice. In an increasingly fast-moving gastronomic context, where trends are changing rapidly, it is not surprising that Ma Khin wants to celebrate its, no more and no less, ten years of life in a city as fast-paced as Valencia. It will do so by telling the story of the restaurant, which is also the story of its founder, Steve Anderson, through five special menus that will pay tribute to the whole decade. In the coming months, the restaurant will also undertake a complete remodelling of its space, accompanied by a new visual identity and an update of its website.
Let’s move on to the menus: from 23 September, and for ten consecutive weeks, the lunchtime service will allow you to enjoy recipes representative of all the restaurant’s periods. They will change every fortnight, always with three starters to share, a main dish to choose from and a dessert. The idea is to sample some of the house classics, such as vegetable noodles or mango sticky rice, but also to revisit those much-loved dishes from the past, such as Malabari fish with kheer rice, a dish inspired by the cuisine of southern India and made with local ingredients. A good example of what the restaurant defines as ‘Decolonial Food’: because Ma Khin’s recipe book comes from Southeast Asia, but draws from numerous cultures, to the point of creating its own.
The proposal was pioneering in Valencia ten years ago, where there were not so many international cuisines, and it has maintained its discourse until today, when there is a segmented and heterogeneous market for fusion cuisine. However, this is a restaurant that is much more. During this decade, Ma Khin has become a meeting point for different origins, a space where different languages coexist, listening to each other and embracing each other on a daily basis, giving rise to a unique language. Its history is written among recipes and ingredients from faraway places, but also nearby. With all this, Ma Khin has built a culture of its own, based on love and respect for local produce, to adopt and transform dishes from other corners of the world.
Around the world in ten years
A decade gives you plenty of experiences, learnings, memories and anecdotes. There is so much to tell, so many faces to present, and it is not easy to summarise Steve’s photo album. “Opening the box of memories has been quite an experience,” admits the restaurateur and chef: “We wanted to select the most representative dishes, but also to rescue others from the beginning that were forgotten. It has been an interesting exercise to look back and discover recipes that, to tell the truth, we love and can use again”. Among the final selection, there are such unique creations as:
🫐 Plum som tam salad. A typical recipe from Thailand, where it is usually prepared using green papaya. However, bringing this ingredient from Asia is not sustainable, so Ma Khin reinterprets the Thai classic using plums, a local product that maintains the freshness of the dish.
🥦 Broccoli and feta salad. When Ma Khin opened its doors ten years ago, it went through a more Mediterranean phase, with dishes such as this salad, which features the classic Greek feta cheese. Although the restaurant evolved and moved closer and closer to Asian recipes, this dish has endured over time, as it had become a favourite of many customers.
Carrots with homemade kimchi and salted bonito. This is a clear example of the fusion between local ingredients and techniques from faraway places, as it uses tuna, one of the most common fish in the Mediterranean, and kimchi, a famous Korean recipe, which Ma Khin makes with Chinese cabbage grown in Perelló.
🥥 Chicken croquette with lime mayonnaise. If anyone thought that croquettes had no place in a concept like Ma Khin, they were wrong. The restaurant embraces the best of each culture, such as this reinterpreted classic, with a coconut milk béchamel sauce and red curry, for a slightly spicy touch.
🥜 Sichuan cauliflower with cocoa beans. Cauliflower is a local product that Ma Khin constantly uses to prepare curries and stir-fries, taking advantage of every part of it: the stem, the leaves and even the root for pickles. Here he applies the Sichuan technique and a final touch of cacau, a great emblem of Valencia.
These five menus are just the first step in a celebration that will go on for months. The restaurant is planning several events around its tenth anniversary, such as a photographic exhibition to remember those moments and people who have been an essential part of this emotional journey. The restaurant’s photo album, with records from all over the world, is inexhaustible. The archive will hang on the walls of the restaurant in December, once the planned refurbishment has been completed, and when the new graphic image of Ma Khin has been unveiled, whose name will also undergo changes – the ‘Café’ tag disappears. These processes are another way of honouring the past and reinforcing the present legacy, always with an eye to the future.
At the same time, the special dinners with showcooking, led by Steve, which the restaurant has been holding on a recurring basis, will continue. As a unique feature, in the coming months they will revolve around the tenth anniversary: there will be three courses, which can already be booked on the Ma Khin website, in which it will be possible to learn how to cook some of the most representative dishes of the history of this house. You will also be able to delve into different themes, such as the relationship between the Mediterranean vegetable garden and the Asian recipe book, the evolution of gastronomy when we open up to other ways of cooking and eating, or how Ma Khin’s cuisine has been transformed over the last ten years. On 17 December, a final Christmas-themed showcooking is planned, to learn how to cook the classics of ‘Decolonial Food’, and surprise friends and family at festive dinners.
Of course, there is no birthday without a party: the icing on the cake of this anniversary will be a big event with friends and family of the house. Little can be revealed about this event, where Ma Khin will be doing what it always does: bringing people and cultures together, so that all customs can coexist and many different accents can be heard.
Cuisine as a language
Ma Khin’s story is a tale of love and understanding that goes back 150 years. It all began in the town of Moulmein, Burma, where Steve’s great-grandmother, after whom the restaurant is named, was born. After the death of her father, Ma Khin faced financial hardship, which led her to sell cheroots, a kind of Burmese cigar, in the town’s bazaar. There she met William Carr, a young Englishman who had come to Burma – then a British colony – to serve as a judge and was absolutely smitten with the young woman. This chance meeting between two people from different cultures was to found Steve’s family, the foundations of a home and the legacy of what is now Ma Khin.
A living, changing story, open to new people and experiences. A story that uses gastronomy as a connecting vehicle and language between people who speak different languages. “Cuisine evolves, it is not a stagnant thing. What we try to do is to be open to all those influences that can contribute to a positive evolution,” says Steve. Ma Khin’s journey is intended to be a long-distance one. As to what will happen in the years to come, the future is always uncertain, but if there is one thing Steve Anderson is clear about, it is that he would like to consolidate what he has learned and continue to live even longer to incorporate it into his story. After all, as long as there is still a corner of the world to be discovered, there will be Ma Khin.
Report by ‘24/7 Valencia’ team
Article copyright ’24/7 Valencia’
MA KHIN CAFÉ ‘Decolonial Food’
Mercado de Colón
Carrer de Jorge Juan, 19
L’Eixample
46004
València
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