Here’s just a brief background of seven of these Malaysians who have made our food known abroad.

Kyo Pang: The pull of pulled tea

Pang, 31, is a third-generation nonya whose family still lives in Penang, where her grandfather ran a kopitiam, which her father skilfully turned into a legit restaurant.

Pang established Kopitiam in October last year, wanting to keep alive the traditional nonya cuisine, as well as introducing it to the rest of the world. Kopitiam’s nasi lemak, pulut inti, kaya butter toast and other delectable nonya dishes have received rave reviews, and the outlet even got a mention on The New York Times Critics’ Pick.

Simpson Wong: A chef to celebrities

Can you imagine Meryl Streep eating char kway teow? Well, she may just order that dish when she dines at Simpson Wong’s Cafe Asean. The Oscar winner is one of the many A-listers who frequent the restaurant that serves Vietnamese, Thai and Malaysian cuisines.

Wong, who hails from Tanjung Malim, Perak also established Jefferson that got its own 15 minutes of fame after being featured in Sex And The City. However, it had to be closed down after Wong suffered a heart attack in 2005. The chef got back on his feet and eventually opened his namesake Wong, before moving on to Chomp Chomp in New York City. Although its menu – which features carrot cake, Nonya chap chye, assam fish and goreng pisang – is labelled as Singaporean cuisine, it has Malaysia written all over it. Seriously, there is no way anyone can believe that his Sarawak Laksa is Singaporean.

Ping Coombes: A master chef of her own

She put Malaysia on the food map after winning the 2014 UK MasterChef competition with her take on nasi lemak and wonton soup, and she hasn’t looked back since. Although Coombes has lived in Britain for over 15 years, she still looks to her hometown in Ipoh for inspiration in her cooking. Her first cookbook, Malaysia: Recipes From A Family Kitchen will hit the shelves in May, and features recipes for Malaysian food inspired by her childhood. Coombes also keeps busy by partnering with eateries in London, where she prepares Malaysian dishes for the customers. She recently concluded two Laksa Monday sessions at a restaurant in Lower Bristol Road, where she showcased her signature Prawn and Chicken Laksa (that was featured on UK MasterChef 2014).

Azalina Eusope: Answering her life’s calling

The last thing Azalina Eusope set out to do in life was to become a street vendor, like her folks four generations before her. She didn’t want to become a noodle seller like her father in Penang, and escaped to apprentice in a kitchen in Singapore. She eventually worked in Sydney, Hong Kong and Bangkok before finally accepting her fate in the United States. Azalina sold crepes and kaya-glazed banana fritters at a weekly farmer’s market in San Francisco to make ends meet. Her food was good, and she unofficially became the spokeswoman for Malaysian cuisine in the Bay Area. However, her talent couldn’t be contained within the confines of a pushcart. Azalina opened a new restaurant called Azalina’s at Market Street – oh, and it just happens to be on the ground floor of San Francisco’s Twitter building! Here she offers dishes like pineapple tea salad, nasi lemak, hokkien mee and other Malaysian fare.

Norman Musa: Malaysian cuisine ambassador

His recipes are featured in The Sunday Times UK, and in his latest entry, Norman Musa writes of his yearning for Malaysian food. The Penang-born chef has been living in Britain for 21 years, and it was during the first few months as a student at the University of Portsmouth that he learned how to cook Malaysian dishes – over the telephone. His late mother taught him everything he needed to know about making curries and rendangs, which he now features in his restaurant, Ning. In 2007, Norman launched his Malaysian cookery classes through which he promotes Malaysian food to the Brits, teaching them how to make rendang, gulai, murtabak and more. Norman is also a familiar face at food festivals and on television, after hosting a 13-episode cooking series and having a stint as a celebrity chef on MasterChef Malaysia in 2011. After the success of his first cookbook Malaysian Food: A Collection Of My Favourite Dishes And The Inspiration Behind Them, Norman released his second book Amazing Malaysian: Recipes For Vibrant Malaysian Home-Cooking this year.

Christina Arokiasamy: The spice merchant’s daughter

She was known as “the girl with yellow hands” at school, but that didn’t stop Christina Arokiasamy from helping her mother prepare spices for grinding at their mill. She is a fifth generation descendant of a family who traded spices, and she was exposed to the world of spices throughout her childhood.

Christina may have left Kuala Lumpur behind to pursue a different life in the United States, but she always held on to the great memories and food created in her kitchen back home.

She started by teaching her American friends how to prepare South-East Asian dishes, and her small classes turned into cooking demonstrations that took her across the country. Christina is now one of the most recognised teaching chefs in America, known for her unique take on South-East Asian flavours, which she also presented in her cookbook The Spice Merchant’s Daughter. But her biggest achievement so far has to be the day she was elected as Malaysia’s official Food Ambassador to the United States in 2014.

Poh Ling Yeow: Recreating connections with home

When she moved from Kuala Lumpur to Adelaide at nine, Poh Ling Yeow left most of her culture behind. But food has enabled her to keep that vital link to her Malaysian family heritage, and a drive to have something to pass down to her family in Australia. Poh entered the first season of MasterChef Australia, and emerged first runner-up. Although she didn’t win the title, she was nonetheless introduced to a world of opportunities – including her own cooking shows and writing cookbooks. Same Same But Different was published in 2014 and features Chinese and Aussie favourites such as noodles, dumplings, bagels, salads, puddings, pasta and cakes. In 2014, she also collaborated with Malaysia Airlines to introduce her signature Nonya Chicken Curry dish on their Australia and New Zealand flights.

In an interview with the media, Colin Willett, the US Department of State’s deputy assistant secretary in the East Asia and Pacific Bureau, said that the US-led initiative puts together a “whole of government” approach to economic engagement for businesses from both sides.

“This will give US businesses more centralised information about Asean and provide them access to US assistance to Asean.

Willett was in the country for meetings with Brunei’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MoFAT) to discuss various issues.

She said that the US-Asean Connect initiative, which was launched in February 2016 during the Special US-Asean Summit in California, is also another channel for Asean to interact with the US government which had been actively involved in the developments of regional economic integration.

She added that a ‘connect centre’ has been set up in Jakarta followed by more centres in Singapore and Bangkok.

In terms of trade, Willett said that there has been a lot of interest coming from US businesses to come into Southeast Asia due to the potential benefits of having a connected regional economy under the AEC.

However, she said more work needs to be done to show how it would affect businesses.

“I think there are still some questions on what the AEC means for international investors and I think that people are still looking at what the AEC means for them.”

Willett said that the interest is also partly because of the TPP, a trade deal among 12 Pacifc Rim countries of which Asean states Brunei, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam are members of.

“When it comes to TPP implementation, we’re also taking cues from Asean and finding out what the next steps are in regional economic integration.”

Willett said that discussions have been held on how the US can help Asean through workshops and training to take the AEC forward.

Engagements between the US and Asean in the last five years have helped drive the importance ofAsean to US businesses, the US official said.

US exports to Asean totalled US$91.9billion in 2012/13 while imports to the region amounted to US$108 billion, according to information from the US-Asean Business Council website.

Asean is the US’ fourth largest export market creating and supporting over 472,000 jobs in the US.

The average Asean consumer also purchases nearly 1.75 times as many US goods per capita as the Chinese consumer and about nine times as many as the average Indian consumer, said the council.

It is believed he was pressured to sell as his private bank did not want to handle an auction sale.

A 678 sq ft studio apartment at The Sail @ Marina Bay went for S$1,475 psf in late February, a price not seen at the project in over five years.

Some owners are selling due to business problems or job losses, experts noted. Others may fear the outlook could deteriorate further.

Said Suzie Mok, senior director of investment sales at Savills Singapore: “Many of the apartments are vacant and it is quite difficult to get leases renewed at a good rate. The returns are not that great and if owners have made capital gains, it may be time to recycle (the asset).”

While not all sellers would have lost money – The Sail @ Marina Bay was launched in 2004 at prices from about S$900 psf, for example – more sellers are booking losses.

Across the Core Central Region (CCR) – which includes the traditional prime Districts 9 to 11, the downtown core planning area and Sentosa Cove – 63 secondary market sales of condos lost money in the first quarter, according to SRX Property.

This is up from 35 of such sales a year earlier and 60 in the fourth quarter last year.

At Orange Grove Residences, for example, all three transactions this year have each involved losses of close to S$1 million.

The rental market is the key culprit as it struggles with weakened demand and ramped-up supply.

Expatriates arriving these days tend to be at the middle-management or executive level, with far less generous housing budgets than in the past, said Desmond Sim, CBRE head of research for Singapore and Southeast Asia.

There is no longer demand for the large luxury units that are common to the CCR, he noted.

And while the Urban Redevelopment Authority’s rental index for non-landed homes in the CCR has fallen just 7.9 per cent from its peak in the third quarter of 2013 to the end of last year, rents on a quantum basis have probably corrected more than that, Sim added.

This is because shrinking unit sizes over time would have helped prop up rents on a psf basis.

At Draycott Eight, for example, recent contracts signed for four-bedders have fallen to as low as S$13,000 a month, well under the S$15,000 to S$20,000 they used to command.

Luxury homebuyers today tend to be Singaporeans purchasing for their own use, usually as holiday homes or gifts to their children, said DTZ regional head (SEA) of research Lee Nai Jia.

“Hence they are not concerned about the rental yield. Some are entering the market at this point as the prices are relatively cheap, compared to when the property was launched or sold three or four years ago.”

Other buyers feel the Additional Buyers’ Stamp Duty will probably not be tweaked in the short term and do not wish to wait longer.

Foreign buyers, who are still in the minority, are mainly Malaysian and Indonesian permanent residents purchasing homes in Singapore as their children are studying here, Dr Lee added.

At the same time, funds continue to be on the hunt for unsold units from developers.

A fund run by Evia Capital Partners is said to have recently bought 20 units at Starlight Suites in River Valley from developer TA Corporation. Evia Real Estate managing director Vincent Ong said on Thursday that he could neither confirm nor deny the purchase. TA Corporation declined to comment.

“These funds feel commercial values have not come off enough, but residential is cheap,” an agent said.

(US$1 = S$1.36)