Sibu Tales : Ikan Gonjeng or Hong Boi 凤尾魚

My maternal grandmother was a very frugal house wife from the rubber tapping days of Sibu. She had come from a very poor background in China and was in fact sold off as a child bride for five silver dollars.

Because of her early childhood background, she was very careful with whatever money she had and she worked very hard for herself and for her children. When we went buying fish in the market, she would always remind us to look at the eyes of the fish. The eyes must be glistening and bright.

I can still remember what my grandma would say, "Just like in Dong Shan, where we obtained fresh fish..." and she would steam a good fish for the evening meal.

Sometimes she would deep fry the fish especially if we had bought ikan gongjeng ( if she had extra cooking oil).

At times she would have extra of the fish, she would squirt some soy sauce onto the fish , add a bit of sugar. These little fish would be served at every meal, until they were finished. I remember her eating them lovingly, tail and heads and everything.

She would exclaim, " Even the bones were good for chewing. How clever God was as a Creator...."








My mother  loves to deep fry the gonjeng or Hung Mui Ngii too. the Malays even call this fish Hong Buay which is the Hokkien name because the fish has a red tail.

To have a small plate of deep fried hong buay at dinner table is now a luxury. The fish could hardly find nowadays in the fresh fish market. But when we get them we would always buy for our mother.