Yam, also called orh in Hokkien and Keladi in Malay, is a starchy tuber from the genus Colocasia. Despite it being called yam in Malaysia (and Singapore), the name yam actually refers to another type of tuber, of the genus Dioscorea. The tuber that Malaysians call "yam" is actually called "taro" in English. It is related to the Caladium, an ornamental houseplant that gave its name to the Malay word keladi. This confusion over the name of keladi in English has resulted in all the Nyonya dishes with taro being named "yam".

Formerly an overlooked vegetable, the taro has found its way into a multitude of Penang dishes, both the savory and the desserts. Among the Nyonya dishes that make use of taro include ark orh (yam duck) and khau yoke (a Hakka-inspired dish of taro and pork belly). It is also cooked with rice to make orh puoi (yam rice), a popular accompaniment to bak kut teh.

Taro is very tasty when deep fried with thnee koay. Taro also makes its way into Nyonya desserts such as orh nya, and in sweet broths such as pengat.

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About this website

Dear visitor, thank you so much for reading this page. My name is Timothy Tye and my hobby is to find out about places, write about them and share the information with you on this website. I have been writing this site since 5 January 2003. Originally (from 2003 until 2009, the site was called AsiaExplorers. I changed the name to Penang Travel Tips in 2009, even though I describe more than just Penang but everywhere I go (I often need to tell people that "Penang Travel Tips" is not just information about Penang, but information written in Penang), especially places in Malaysia and Singapore, and in all the years since 2003, I have described over 20,000 places.

While I try my best to provide you information as accurate as I can get it to be, I do apologize for any errors and for outdated information which I am unaware. Nevertheless, I hope that what I have described here will be useful to you.