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Homemade Chinese Nian Gao – ๅนด็ณ•

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 (็‰‡็ณ–)

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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Karma Fine Indian Cuisine – Calgary, Alberta

When the weather is cold outside, and after being what seems to be stuck at home, spice is always something I crave. Whether it’s Thai curry, Indian Curry, Szechuan spices or whatever, I need the heat of the spice! This time, I went for Indian Curry not too far from home off 130th Ave Southeast to Karma Fine Indian Cuisine. The location of Karma is just off Deerfoot Trail and 130th Eastbound – and you turn in towards Canadian Tire and Superstore.

I was going to enjoy a nice hot cup of Chai Tea, but opted out for something a tad different. I had a glass of Mango Lassi which is a very common Indian and Pakistani drink which is yoghurt based (lassi). Basically it’s made of pureed mango, yoghurt and water – and depending on how much water/ice they put it would depend on how thick it is. Sometimes, some places have it so thick that you suck so hard to only get a little drop. The consistency here was really good, as it was thinner than a milkshake, but definitely thicker of a drink. One thing I like about this drink from Karma is the fact they don’t use ice! It never separated which is something I like about my drinks!

This visit to Indian food, I really wanted to try different things, and so, instead of the usual suspect of coconut rice, this time, we got Saffron Rice which looked like a bowl of Christmas rice! It was beautiful! It didn’t have as much flavour on it’s own like coconut rice, but it was very fragrant!

Staying on the different track, I wanted to have lamb with my curry, so we ordered a Lamb Boona which they described as a Karma special made with traditional curry cooked with herbs and spices. This sounded like a wonderful choice as it’s like their “house special” and to me, those are always good! The lamb was really tender, and there were quite a few pieces of lamb in the curry too! We got the curry in mild and you definitely get the kick, but it’s a tender kick.

Now, for the twist on my naan, we normally get the garlic naan (which is fantastic from Karma), we got Keema Nan which is made with white flour bread stuffed with mildly spiced round beef. We normally don’t get the stuffed ones, but since I went to England and tried Indian Edge with their stuffed naan, I had to get it again (at least some version of it!). This was delicious and I would definitely get keema nan again, or other meat stuffed into my nan! Keema naan is just stuffed with some sort of “seasoned ground/minced meat” and varies from location to location, as Keema just means “minced meat”

Then, for my favourite dish of curry for the evening, we ordered a plate of Prawn Korma which obviously had prawns in it, but cooked in a mild curry enriched with cream, nuts and spices.

My overall experience here at Karma was a VERY positive experience, and I have no problems returning or bringing friends & family here who like eating Indian curries! I’m sure when my sister and brother-in-law come and visit me, I’ll take them here for dinner! I’m sure they’ll love it – but it’s definitely not as good as the curry where they are…

Karma Fine Indian Cuisine

4600 130 Ave SE
Calgary, AB
(403) 257-4977

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Cafe Churchill – London, England

It was a cold, rainy London morning in September when we decided to take a walk through the touristy area. When we got towards Westminster Abbey, I realized how hungry I was — and there wasn’t much food options nearby. So, we walked towards the Parliament buildings, we found Cafe Churchill where we quickly popped inside to dry up and fill up on our bellies.

This location was really cute, with little table outside – which I can’t see anyone utilizing in the rain, but probably perfect for the nice days without the rain! Once we walked into the cafe, we saw this pastry display where I got excited! I love pastries!

We both sat down and asked for some English Tea and I wanted mine with lemon. It was so nice to have and anything hot like teas really warmed me up from the inside out! I know it’s just a normal tea, but it was just great timing for this tea.

From entering the cafe, one of the first things I saw was croissants and I noticed a Giant Almond Croissant so I knew that was something I would need to order. The croissant was nice and fresh, crispy layers, subtle sweetness from the powdered sugar, and the sliced almonds made a for a delicious treat!

I thought a croissant for the 2 of us wouldn’t be enough, so we also ordered a Ciabatta Salmone which is a great sandwich of smoked salmon, cream cheese and lettuce on a ciabatta bun. This was a little disappointing compared to the giant almond croissant. This only had 2 thin slices of smoked salmon, and there wasn’t much cream cheese or even lettuce either! The bread was really good as I believe it was fresh. None the less, I ate it up and continued on my journey.

Overall, it was a great experience, and it definitely gave you a small town feel in this cafe! If I’m there, I’d definitely stop by for an almond croissant again though!

Cafe Churchill

Westminster/Millbank
49 Parliament Street, Westminster
London, United Kingdom
(020) 7930 7676

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Planet Dailies at Planet Hollywood – Las Vegas, Nevada

It was American Thanksgiving when we came to Planet Dailies inside Planet Hollywood on the Las Vegas strip. We were originally going to eat at the Spice Market at Planet Hollywood, but they were doing a special “Thanksgiving Dinner” buffet for lunch, which we didn’t want to eat that much – so we settled down here instead.

I ordered a Patty Melt which is a sandwich with marble rye bread filled with an Angus beef patty, sauteed onions and melted Swiss cheese. Of course, I got this with fries, which was nice and crispy on the outside, and tender on the inside. Also, it was served with Thousand Island dressing on the side – which I thought was a little odd, but the tangy taste of the dressing actually was quite refreshing with the sandwich!

As it was Thanksgiving, we ordered a Thanksgiving Lunch Special with slices of Turkey, some fresh vegetables, and mashed potatoes with gravy. It’s kind of your typical Thanksgiving lunch, but it was good! The turkey wasn’t dry at all, and the vegetables was fresh and crispy!

Then, we ordered a pasta dish, and had the Chicken Primavera with tons of tender chicken sauteed with shallots and garlic, tossed with broccoli, yellow squash, zucchini, asparagus, tomato and gemelli pasta. This pasta dish was light enough to be a pasta salad, and it was refreshing!

Planet Dailies at Planet Hollywood was a great place we popped into! It worked out better actually, and the food is great! Our waitress was super cute and so happy that she could make anyone smile – no matter how bad of a day! The food was excellent, service was great and prices was reasonable too!

Planet Dailies

3667 S Las Vegas Blvd
Las Vegas, NV
(702) 732-1222

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Asian BBQ & Noodles in Spring Valley Las Vegas

So, the last time I went to Vegas, we had a combination of food from tourist locations and local. We went for some Chinese cuisine in areas where locals are more likely to go. We went to Asian BBQ & Noodles located in a strip plaza, which really wasn’t too far off the strip, but definitely easiest with a rental car. This stop was more like a second lunch, or a snack so the 3 of us only ordered a few things to share.

We enjoyed a plate of Yang Chow Fried Rice, and in fact it was a fairly large plate, especially for it’s price. I don’t currently remember any of the prices, but I know they are very reasonable with large delicious portions. It definitely was enough to share everything! The fried rice had lots of ingredients in it, and seasoned perfectly! it’s so easy to eat the entire plate by myself because it was so good!

A bowl of Wonton Noodle Soup was something that really hit the spot! There’s nothing as calming for me than a bowl of noodle soup – especially when the soup is “clear” versus soup with lots of things in the soup or very flavourful (spicy, coconut milk, etc). The wontons here were enormous!

And has some Gai Lan with Oyster Sauce, as we needed some vegetables. Sure, the gai lan looks a little big, but they cooked it just long enough where it’s still crisp, but tender! Good job for them with the boiling of it! ๐Ÿ™‚ It was just the perfect plate of veggies for this snack!

Overall, I do enjoy this location! It was actually busy – even at these odd times of day where it wasn’t lunch or dinner. People were coming in and ordering from the hot buffet section and their phones was ringing off the hook for take-out! It’s nice to see such success for little restaurants like this!

Everything tasted really good and the prices were extremely well priced! This is definitely a place to try if you’re craving a little local Chinese food that is worth your pocket change!

Asian BBQ & Noodles

3400 S. Jones Blvd, #5C
Las Vegas, NV
(702) 202-3636