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Homemade Dou Fu Hua – 豆腐花

Home Made Dau Fu Fa with Gelatin – Soybean Pudding

This chilled dessert isn’t the traditional style, but this recipe is simple and is great for serving it cold with a simple ginger syrup.

Ingredients:
3 cups Unsweetened Soy Milk
1 package (1 tbsp) Gelatin
1/4 cup water

This simple recipe takes no time to make, but takes a lot of time to set. First, you boil the soy milk slowly as soy milk boils over really quickly. You do not need it at a full boil either to prevent the soy film.

Once the soy milk boils, prepare the gelatin mixture by dissolving the gelatin with the water. Mix thoroughly and then pour it into the soy milk.

I like to have my dou fu hua in little individual bowl, so I pour the solution into little bowls and place into the fridge for it to set for at least a few hours.

In the mean time while the bowls are setting up in the fridge, I like to make the ginger syrup so I can refrigerate the solution as well.

If you want, you can make this dessert the “traditional” way which can be served hot or cold! Here’s the Dau Fu Fa recipe!

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Homemade Steamed Cheung Fun – 腸粉

Home Made Rice Crepes – Dim Sum

Currently, I’ve been trying to make basic recipes to dim sum such that I can add things to basic recipes to make them better. Vegetarian style cheung fun can become something more when you add goodies in them before you roll up these crepes. This is also gluten-free as it doesn’t use any wheat products. Just be reminding to use a gluten-free soy sauce on the top!

Ingredients:
1 cup Rice Flour
4 tbsp Potato Flour
2 tbsp Cornstarch
2 tbsp oil
1 1/2 cup Water
Pinch of Salt

First, sift all the dry ingredients together. If you don’t have potato flour, I’m sure it’s fine to use tapioca flour. Both flours, you can find either at an Asian grocery store, or sometimes even in the natural section of your grocery store (gluten free flours).

When the dry ingredients is all combined and fine, add the oil and water, plus a pinch of salt. This batter will become a very watery batter which I find it easiest to pour it into a big measuring cup as there is a spout making it easier to pour. Make sure you combine the mixtures well and it becomes smooth.

Once your batter is ready, set up your steaming mechanism – where I use a pot with a rack and a heat proof dish. Pour a thin layer onto this plate – just enough to cover the bottom.

Put the lid on to steam the rice crepes properly and let it steam for at least 7-8 minutes. Once it’s ready take it out of the steamer and let it cool for a little bit and roll it up. Once it’s rolled up nicely, cut it up and enjoy with some condiments.

As you know, there are many variations for this, and some ideas would be to add onions and dried shrimp to the actual batter, so there will be little bits throughout the crepe itself. Or, you can place some goodies at the edge of the crepe before rolling it up as well!

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Homemade Chinese Nian Gao – 年糕

Sweet Sticky Rice Cake – Neen Gow

It’s that that time of year when we’re in our kitchens cooking up a storm and sharing goodies with family and friends. One goodie you’ll always see is the Nian Gao which is a very simple recipe that is very sticky with a hint of sweetness.

Ingredients (makes 1 – 8″ pan)
2 cups of Glutenous Rice Flour
300 mL boiling water
1 cup brown sugar or 5 sticks of peen tong (片糖)

Note: You can add more sugar if you like it sweeter – we like it much more subtle tasting!

Peen tong is basically Chinese Rock Sugar or Chinese Rock Candy and it comes in a pack of “slabs of sugar”. If you don’t want to purchase/use it, or simply can’t find it, a great substitution would be to use brown sugar – which is what I did as it was sold out when I wanted to get it!

First off, boil some water and dissolve the sugar into it. When it becomes a syrup, you’re ready to start making your nian gao! Measure out the glutenous rice flour and pour in your syrup. Caution, this is a boiling water mixture, but make sure it’s hot!!

Mix together until it’s smooth and creamy and pour it into the dish you’d like to steam your nian gao in before it gets cold.

Once the nian gao is ready in it’s dish, put it into the steamer for about 1 hour to an hour and a half. You’ll know it’s ready when you can move the edges and it’s set. If you stick anything into this cake, it’ll stick so the toothpick test is not a good idea in this case.

If you’re enjoying it right away, be sure to allow it to cool and set for at least 15 minutes. It will be really soft and gooey and very sticky at this point – but it’s always nice to eat freshly steamed food. If you like it properly made, once it’s cooled enough, pop it in the fridge for at least 3 hours where you can cut it up and serve.

One of the ways we like to eat nian gao is to pan fry it with an egg. So, we cut the nian gao into pieces and dunk it into a beaten egg before placing it on a fry pan with some oil. It’s very important to do this on low temperatures or the nian gao will melt and stick to your pan. You’ll know these are ready when it’s “soft and gummy”.

Things I’ve heard about nian gao, but I’ve never tried it – I guess you can bake your nian gao instead of steaming it, and you’ll get a crunchier topping and more cake-like. It does however use another recipe but I don’t know it and haven’t tried it yet. But, I’m thinking I should one day! I’ve also heard that nian gao’s are extremely freezable, and when you want to enjoy it again, just steam it back up! It could be handy if you’ve received one too many for New Years!

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Homemade Lo Bak Go – 蘿蔔糕

Turnip Cake Recipe – Luo Bo Gao

Just in time for Chinese New Years, I’ve taken what I know of how to make a Lo Bak Go and tried it! Please note, I like my lo bak go with lots more filling than “go”, so feel free to reduce the amounts of any particular ingredient.

1 large dried scallop (or 2 little ones)
1/2 cup dried shiitake mushrooms
1/4 cup chopped dried shrimp
2 Chinese Sausages (lap cheong)
1 cup of Rice Flour
1 cup of water
1 cup grated lo bak (daikon)

Seasoning (adjust to what you think tastes good)
salt, white pepper, soy sauce

First things first, you have to rehydrate all the dehydrate ingredients, and I like to do soak my shiitake mushrooms, dried shrimp and dried scallop the evening before hand in a bowl with some water.

When I’m ready to start making my lo bak go, I start by grating the lo bak and I place it into a pot of boiling water with some sugar and salt for a few minutes until tender.

While the lo bak is bubbling away, I start by chopping up the Chinese sausage, Shiitake mushrooms and shrimp into little pieces, and shredding the scallop. I heat up a wok and put all the ingredients together to stir fry them until cooked. I also do the seasoning with some white pepper, soy sauce and salt until it’s more flavourful than usual – since the rice flour mixture would add no flavour, it works best this way.

When everything is good and ready, I prepare the rice flour mixture by first starting with 1 cup of water and 1 cup of rice flour. I mix it until it’s dissolved and pour it into the combination of lo bak and all other goodies. I mix thoroughly and judge by the texture how I would like it. If you like your lo bak go firmer, put more rice flour in so that it’s more paste like consistency. The more you mix, the tougher it gets as well. I like my lo bak go soft, so I do minimal mixing. When you figured out how you like it, pour it into a pie pan or something like it and prepare it for steaming.

I steamed my lo bak go for about 45 minutes and I put a toothpick in to check that nothing was sticking to the toothpick. When it was ready, I turned off the heat and put some green onions (scallions) on top for decoration and put the lid on it for about 5 minutes before I took it out and let it cook on a cooling rack. Be careful, the pan and the lo bak go is extremely hot at this point.

Now that it’s cooled down a bit and had some time to set, cut it up and enjoy! I always like to sprinkle extra white pepper, or sweet soy sauce, or even some hot sauce on top of my slices of lo bak go. Sometimes, I do all 3! Now, pick up your chopsticks and enjoy!