I have been dreaming of eating Shan noodles recently and realises nearly 5 years have passed since we were in Nyaung Shwe. It is time to recreate that memorable dish of noodles in chicken soup and tangy mustard greens. A great winter warmer.

As the name suggests, this dish of rice noodles and fish soup packs a punch. A perfect way to warm your cockles during the winter. It makes me think of mohingar as there are similarities, yet it has its own distinct taste. This dish comes from Rakhine state on the west coast of Burma.

When it comes to comfort food, mohingar is top of my list. It brings back fond memories of early morning visits to Shwedagon Pagoda which started with breakfast at a mohingar stall nearby.

Christopher and I are back in KL, Malaysia. When we were here in 2006, we soon discovered that there was a wealth of unknown cuisines that we wanted to explore. My great grandfather’s descendants are here and I tap into their knowledge of local food. Fish head noodle soup is one of these serendipity.

This is a recipe that my mother recalls eating during the nine days of the vegetarian festival. Each year on the first day of the ninth lunar month of the Chinese calendar, usually late September or early October, it was a tradition that the Chinese descendants followed in order to gain merit.