Golden Agar Jelly

Each Chinese New Year, I looked forward to visiting kohpoh Beng Neo, not least because she served this crunchy golden jelly. I associate this jelly with sarong-kebaya clad matriarchs because they seem to be the only ones who make them best of all.

Kohpoh’s secret in the early days was apparently to use rainwater collected in large dragon pots. She said that rainwater produced the clearest and hence most exquisite jelly. Sometimes, crushed egg shells would be added w