KUALA LUMPUR, Jan. 22 -- Last year, a friend took me to try a Keralan sadya for the first time.

We had the meal as part of Onam, the annual harvest festival that is a significant part of Keralan culture and, in Malaysia, is celebrated largely by the Malayali diaspora.

Until then, the ignorance fuelled by my English-speaking-Chinese-upbringing all but guaranteed that the existence of this festival, and the distinction between the broader canon of Keralan cuisine and our Malaysian-ised, remixed and heavily edited interpretation, "banana leaf", remained completely foreign to me.

But somewhere between the first hit of tangy injipuli (a spicy and sour pickle made with ginger, tamarind and jaggery) and the sweet, glassy bite of sharkara uppe...