Food-lovers rejoice as  Kita Food Festival returns to Malaysia and Singapore for its fourth instalment, kicking off in Kuala Lumpur from September 4 – 8, then Singapore from January to March 2025. This annual celebration of Southeast Asia’s growing culinary culture will see the finest chefs and industry pioneers from across the region gather for a series of Four Hand Dinners and Kitchen Takeovers, culminating in a Big Sunday Barbecue and F&B industry thought leadership events.

This year, the Kuala Lumpur Weekender will introduce A Food Affair on September 7, which is an evolution of its Kita Conversations symposium on innovation and authority in food. The full day event will include keynote speakers and fireside talks by food experts from around the region; a series of interactive masterclasses in both food, wine and beverages; as well as a vibrant marketplace with artisan food and produce from local farms and producers.

In Singapore, Kita Conversations will partner with Synthesis, a creative data house that uses Open Source Intelligence to map what the world will be eating in decades to come. One of Synthesis’ most recent reports, “Menu 2033: The Future of Food”, uses computer modelling and analytical techniques to develop simulations of plausible futures of food, which they then cook and present to diners. Kita Conversations will kick off with three seminars in January and February, exploring topics such as how we source food in a resource-challenged world, how we stretch the food that we have to feed the world, and how we find alternative food crops. This seminar series will lead into a large symposium aimed at gathering 350 – 400 F&B professionals, educators and enthusiasts for a full day of keynote presentations and industry sharing sessions.

Kita Food Festival is the brainchild of Darren Teoh, chef patron of Malaysia’s only two-Michelin star restaurant, Dewakan; Leisa Tyler, food journalist and owner of Singapore-based farm to table company, Weeds & More; and Adrian Yap, whose companies, Tiffin Culinary and Freeform, lead the way for Malaysia-based F&B-centric pop-up, arts and music events. Kita Food Festival’s goal is to highlight Southeast Asia’s emerging culinary scene as well as inspire a new generation of talents by exposing them to a community of chefs, producers, and game changers in the industry.

Since its debut in 2021, Kita Food Festival has hosted events in multiple Malaysian destinations –Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Langkawi and Kuching – as well as Singapore. Each year, Kita Food Festival reinforces its commitment to community and collective growth, embodying its name ‘Kita’ – meaning ‘Us’ or ‘We’ in Malay – by uniting food enthusiasts in a celebration of diversity and empowering the exchange of knowledge on sustainable food practices.Through its passion for the industry and dedication to innovation, Kita Food Festival is not just an event; it’s the vanguard of a movement towards a more connected and sustainable future for food and beverage in Southeast Asia.

“For Kita’s next chapter, we aim to dig deeper into the narratives of local, innovation and sustainability. Malaysia will host guest chefs from across the Asian region, with dinners focusing on true farm to table relationships, or modernisations of a local cuisine, and masterclasses and talks exploring topics such as ancient fermentation techniques. The Singapore leg will be centred around the future of food globally, a nod to its growing status as an international city, but with its roots still very much in Southeast Asia,” commented Leisa Tyler, co-founder of Kita Food Festival, on this year’s festival.

The Malaysian dining series will include a lot of storytelling and strong narrative events, including Mystery Box menus that highlight local producers and terroir, to exploring the depths of cuisine of different cultures. The full list of dinners will be revealed in late July. A snapshot of what will be on offer include:

• Prin Polsuk of one-Michelin star restaurant and #29 on Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants 2024, Samrub Samrub Thai(Bangkok, Thailand) will be bringing Southern Thai Fisherman cuisine to Raw Kitchen Hall, promising a unique casual dinner that reflects the food security, diversity, and community-driven cuisine of the Island natives of the Southern Thai gulf.
• Ben Devlin of Pipit in Pottsville, recognised as a Regional Restaurant of the Year finalist in Sydney Morning Herald’s Good Food Guide 2023 (New South Wales, Australia), will run a Kitchen Takeover at Yellow Fin Horse, featuring native Australian bush foods cooked with Malaysian-grown vegetables, native fruits and proteins.
• Hans Christian of August (Jakarta, Indonesia), #46 on Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants, returns to Kita Food Festival to spotlight the emerging trend of New Nusantara cuisine at Akâr Dining alongside Aidan Low.
• A Food Affair will make its debut with keynote talks and masterclasses from the likes of Vanika Choudhary ofNoon (Mumbai, India) and Ben Devlin of Pipit (New South Wales, Australia).
• As part of the Kita Food Festival tradition, the Big Sunday Barbecue will wrap up the KL Weekender with names like Pete Smit of Dirty Supper (Singapore), 2-Michelin star Dewakan (Malaysia) and home cook internet sensation Anis Nabilah (Malaysia).

Else Retreats a trendy lifestyle property in Kuala Lumpur’s Chinatown district will serve as the chef hub for the KL Weekender, being home to two dinners and other pre-festival other activations and special staycation packages which will be revealed at the end of July.

The festival has also brought back its young chef mentoring programme, Kita Horizons, for its third year, this time on a larger scale. Partnering with Danish dairy company, Arla Foods, Kita Horizons sees fifteen young, motivated chefs experience parts of the industry that they would otherwise not gain access to. Back in May, the young chefs took part in a full-day of masterclasses led by their mentors – Jack Weldie of Chipta 11A, Lim Heng Kit of LI Restaurant and LOCUS, and Yavhin Siriwardhana of Nadodi – followed by a special presentation by Chef Grzegorz Odolak, Executive Chef of Grand Hyatt Kuala Lumpur and an exclusive tour of the hotel’s kitchens and farm. The next day, the fifteen young chefs set out on an excursion to Natural Tropical Farm, Chocolate Concierge and A Little Farm On The Hill to learn about different farming methods. Equipped with this new-found knowledge, the participants are now gearing up for a series of dining events which will require them to integrate dairy products with local Southeast Asian flavours and produce. Their journey will culminate on September 8 at the invite-only Thank You Dinner, where they will cook with grade two vegetables and what are often considered secondary cuts of meat.

This year’s Horizons programme continues to drive its vision of inspiring the next generation of ‘proudly Malaysian’ chefs. Furthermore, the programme hopes to inspire an appreciation for producers and manufacturers who play an integral role in the food chain.

Director and co-founder of Kita Food Festival, Darren Teoh commented: “Kita Horizons stands as a beacon of change within our industry. The programme addresses critical disparities between emerging cooks and their culinary roots by fostering a deeper appreciation for food sourcing and cultivation.”