When I first moved to The Netherlands I was highly amused by the fact that bean sprouts are called Tauge here. Tau-ge, which most of us knows as bean sprouts, is actually the Malay word for it. So you can see how the Dutch have imported words from their ex-colonies for food which the they never had locally.

But here is another thing. Why don't they import all of it? Kueh Lapis, which is a layer cake from Indonesia is called Spekkoek. Spekkoek is bacon in Dutch. I get that there are some similarities. Kueh Lapis has layers of white and brown stripes when you cut through the cake, just like bacon. But is it so difficult to import the word Kueh Lapis?

Anyhow, Kueh Lapis (sometimes spelled as Kue) is one of the more difficult cakes to make because it is grilled layer by layer. The thinness and eveness of each layer defines the difficulty of the skill and hence more expensive. We usually only have it for Chinese New Year or Hari Raya back home and is sometimes given as gifts during these festive holidays. There is also a very strong cinnamon and chinese five spice taste. So it is not everyone's cup of tea but definitely worth a try.

If you are interested to see how the layers are grilled, check out this video.