About Us
How We Began
Our movement was founded in 2016 by a group of friends who love food, culture and Malaysia. We noticed the rise of mediocre food, deteriorating relationships and lamented and reminisced on how good it was back then – how not just wonderful recipes and dishes but also types of gatherings are disappearing.
How and what we eat are changing and not always for the better. Where was the food that warmed our hearts as well as tummy, that made us smile and brought people together?
Then the idea struck! Why not make it happen? And so, we got together and created Butterkicap.
What Does Our Name Mean?
Butterkicap is the delightful and delectable combination of butter and soy sauce.
Golden butter – an ingredient so magical, that it not only tastes divine, it brings out the best in everything it touches, elevating both simple and complex ingredients. At once rich and luxurious, yet basic and comforting, many believe ‘everything is better with butter’.
If butter had a BFF though, it would be kicap – particularly the variety that Malaysia has the privilege to indulge in, from Kicap Pekat Manis all the way to Kikkoman.
The combination is at once salty, savoury, a little sweet and umami. And it is the perfect representation of Malaysia’s diversity and culturally rich history, a marriage of two different worlds made better once joined.
What do we do?
We are a new kind of food platform that is dedicated to creating a positive impact on people’s lives and sharing the power of good Malaysian food to unite and bring the best of everyone together.
We hope to inspire and encourage people to live as how our grandparents did – with open hearts and open homes – where neighbors, friends and families would always gather together over food and connect, and where the flavors of our different cultures blended beautifully and constantly evolved.
This is why our tagline is “Bringing People and Flavors Home”. It is an extension of our vision – spreading happiness and building friendships through the power of Malaysian food. We hope to achieve this by empowering people with the information and tools they need to make this happen, we do this via the four pillars of our website:
The unique art of Malaysian hospitality is fading fast with social media being flooded with too many comments that encourage division rather than unity. One of the key reasons driving this divide is the lack of information to dispel unfounded fears, we need to value common courtesy and focus on the things that can unite us rather than divide us. The Open House segment will document, teach and share how our different cultures entertain at home. Anyone can learn to win the hearts of their guests/host with knowledge and tips that will make them as good as any culturally savvy ambassador. Deep down, we believe that we would all rather be friends than enemies and we’d all rather have access to a larger variety of food, than just one type of food.
We believe that we should all get to know Malaysia again by taking a journey to where our greatest food stories began: the birthplace of Gula Melaka, Keropok Lekor, Nasi Kandar, Tau Sah Piah, or Cincaluk, as well as the sources our best seafood, herbs, poultry, rice and vegetables by giving voice to the people who produce them. The Food Journey segment aims to encourage road trips out of Klang Valley to get people to meet the makciks and pakciks, and the small business owners and farmers who still make food as good as we remembered. This also helps our international guests to view and experience Malaysia as she truly is.
We see a rise of young entrepreneurs entering the food market but they do not necessarily know how to navigate the challenges that exist within our unique Malaysian landscape. The Bisnes Makan segment breaks it down and simplifies it with easy to follow guides, tools and information to help food businesses prosper. We are working hard to compile the data on food market trends, to get food entrepreneurs themselves to share how they navigated the landscape and what they hope to achieve for Malaysia. Better food businesses means better food experiences for all.
One of our biggest concerns is the rapid of loss of our heritage and vintage recipes because the younger generation haven’t quite picked up and learnt the recipes of our grandparents. We want to document the recipes to create something like a national recipe archive for all. Our team will work on taking the “agak-agak” out of our mother’s and grandmother’s recipes and make it available for all in the Kitchen Lab segment. You can also expect new Malaysian recipes within this segment. We hope to crowdsource these recipes and build a community that’s passionate about preserving and developing/evolving these recipes. Imagine having these recipes immortalized forever in the digital space: this would allow any Malaysians of all generations (locally or abroad) to recreate their favorite foods anytime they like.
Beyond just sharing information on the website, we hope to create an active digital community and humbly invite all Malaysians to hashtag us at #butterkicap on Instagram show the world just how amazing our food and way of life can be.
Now that you’re up to date with Butterkicap – for the moment. If you have an idea, suggestion or a proposal for a collaboration, reach out to us at sembang@butterkicap.com. We’re always ready to find new ways to serve you better.