Malaysian breakfast nominated as UNESCO intangible heritage

Khairul Firdaus Akbar Khan, deputy minister of Malaysia’s Tourism, Arts and Culture, said the nomination highlighted the country’s iconic breakfast food such as nasi lemak (fragrant rice cooked in coconut milk and pandan leaf), roti canai (flatbread), and teh Tarik (hot milk tea), according to Bernama newspaper.

“If this nomination is successful, it will help boost Malaysia’s reputation as a tourist destination with a wide variety of heritage food,” he said.

Last year, international food magazine TasteAtlas ranked Malaysian food the 39th best in the world.

Intangible cultural heritage is a practice, representation, expression, knowledge, or skill, as well as instruments, objects, artifacts, and cultural spaces considered by UNESCO to be part of a place’s cultural heritage.

In 2022, Vietnam was elected to the UNESCO committee for intangible cultural heritage.