Foreigners will cook no more in Penang

Penang CM has banned foreigners from cooking at hawker stalls.

PETALING JAYA: Penang chief minister Lim Guan Eng has put months of speculation to rest with the official announcement that foreigners will be banned from cooking at all roadside hawker stalls on the island.

He said the main reasons for the ban was to “safeguard” the Penang food heritage and to “maintain the flavours” of Penang cuisine for the sake of both locals and tourists.

Lim also explained that foreign cooks would be banned from not just roadside hawker stalls but council and private food courts in shopping malls as well.

Saying failure to adhere to the new ruling would result in the revoking of licences, Lim added that hawkers had a year’s grace period to get their businesses in order. The grace period will begin next year.

Addressing fears that foreigners would not be able to work in eating establishments at all, Lim clarified that the ban only referred to cooking and not the cleaning up of premises or preparation of ingredients. Foreigners would also still be allowed to serve customers.

Lim explained that restaurants and food outlets with centralised kitchens were allowed to employ foreign cooks if they so wished as they were not subject to the ban.

The authorities also plan to issue stickers stating that the food on sale was authentic Penang cuisine prepared by locals.

In prior months, there were debates aplenty by both political leaders and the public regarding the ban on foreign cooks.

However the CM said that the ban was imposed only after a survey involving over 14,000 people showed that the majority wanted Penang cuisine to be kept authentic and therefore cooked only by locals.