I don't often make Chinese desserts (coz translating Chinese recipes take so much time) but I've been wanting to make this classic Chinese dessert for the longest time. I managed to find a good English recipe for it, however, I could not get all the ingredients needed until recently... gypsum powder was really hard to find! And you'd be surprised but freshly made unsweetened soy milk is not that easy to come by either. I'm just lucky that I remembered this tiny place nearby that I used to buy fresh soy milk from almost every morning. I only stopped going coz I switched jobs and didn't walk in that direction anymore.
And yes, I know I "cheated" by using the tofu fa recipe from Christine's Recipes since it allows me to skip a LOT of steps. Using soy milk that I purchased rather than making it from scratch is just so much more convenient! And I know this coz I used to help my mom make soy milk from scratch and it took more than a day to make it. The traditional method is that you start with dry soybeans and soak them overnight... then blend the beans until they become mush and the liquid comes out... then filter the liquid by hand using a cloth bag. The blending and filtering is repeated a good many times and even done on the mush itself (to make sure the beans are drained dry of as much liquid as possible). Filtering is necessary to remove the impurities from the liquid and also makes for a smoother tofu pudding! The final step is to boil the liquid (with more water) and when it's cooked, it becomes soy milk.
Phew... just the soy milk summary was tiring to type... so you can imagine how much I don't actually want to make soy milk from scratch! ;-) Oh and my mom now has a machine which does all of this... which is good for her, but not helpful to me since I live halfway around the world from her. =P Anyway, moral of the story, if you're lazy like me then just buy soy milk... It's SO worth it!
I also decided to half the ingredients of the original recipe so I wouldn't end up with too much tofu pudding. I know it's suppose to be good for the skin but it is possible to have too much of a good thing... ;-) I added a bit more info to the steps based on my own experience too... like that part about skimming bubbles off the mixture before letting it settle. I didn't quite get the syrup working too well though... I don't have a small pot or saucepan so I ended up heating the syrup until it turned almost candy like when cooled. Errr... maybe you'll have better luck with it than me... Or you could just sprinkle in some brown sugar instead.
Ingredients (makes around 4 servings):
Sweet Tofu Pudding:
4 1/4 cups unsweetened soy milk
1 tsp gypsum powder
1 tsp potato starch (or potato flour)
1/4 cup water
Syrup:
140g rock sugar (to your taste)
10g dark brown sugar (optional, to your taste)
3-4 slices ginger (optional, to your taste)
1 cup water
Method:
- For the tofu pudding, start by slowly bringing the unsweetened soy milk to a boil. Stir regularly as it may get easily burnt at the bottom.
- Mix the gypsum powder and potato starch with the 1/4 cup of water. Stir until well combined and then put the mixture into a pot (or container). The pot will be used to settle and store the tofu pudding so make sure it's big enough to hold all the soy milk. Also, make sure that the pot has a lid!
- Once the soy milk is boiled (i.e. bubbles and foams rapidly), pour into the pot containing the gypsum powder and potato starch mixture, from about a foot above. This action will cause all the ingredients to mix together on its own. Don't unnecessarily move or stir the mixture after adding the boiled soy milk.
- If there are any foam bubbles on top of the mixture, carefully skim off as much as possible with a spoon.
- Cover the pot with a cloth to absorb the steam and place the lid on top.
- Let the mixture stand for 40-45 minutes and it will settle and solidify into tofu pudding.
- Prepare the syrup by boiling the sugars, ginger and water together. Cool.
- To serve, gently scoop out some tofu pudding into a small serving bowl. Pour in some syrup.
Baked sago pudding is a childhood treat that my mom would make for our family friends potluck gatherings. It was one of her signature dishes and one that was frequently requested. I'm feeling a bit nostalgic and also recently saw my parents in SH so I decided to make this dessert. I didn't get her recipe (again, me and my impatience) so I just followed the recipe from my favourite website Do What I Like.
The recipe recommended using lotus seed paste as a center layer, but I've never eaten it that way... plus I find sago pudding already quite heavy so I didn't think it required anything extra. One thing that really threw me off when making this dessert was the sago pearls. The first package that I used, the sago pearls were too small and they all melted away. I had to run down and find another brand of sago pearls which turned out ok.
Be careful in the last step when browning the top of the pudding. For me, I stepped away to hang up my laundry and ended up burning a part of it. =P
Ingredients:
115g sago pearls
30g custard powder, sifted
30g cornstarch, sifted
160mL coconut milk
2 eggs, beaten
300mL water
160mL evaporated milk
90g sugar
30g butter
Method:
- Boil sago pearls in a big saucepan with plenty of water for 15 minutes. Turn off the heat and cover the saucepan with a lid and leave it aside for 5 - 10 minutes till sago pearls are transparent. Drain and rinse in cold water.
- Combine the custard powder, cornstarch, coconut milk and beaten eggs till smooth. Strain if lumpy.
- Boil 300mL of water till bubbling hot. Add in the sugar, butter and evaporated milk. Stir till sugar dissolved. Reduce the heat, add in the custard mixture and then the cooked sago pearls. Stir till thicken.
- Grease ramekin cups with butter and spoon in sago mixture. Sprinkle a little sugar on the surface.
- Bake at 200C/400F for 15 minutes in the middle rack and move to upper rack and bake till surface shows sign of golden brown caramelized spots.
I'm not sure why, but until I started making crème caramel, I honestly didn't like it very much. I sound a little weird and quite shallow when I say this, but I think the appearance of crème caramel put me off more than anything. It just didn't look "pretty" to me and it's sad to say that I shunned this poor dessert. =P Instead, I much rather preferred its "cousin", crème brûlée… now *that* is a beautiful dessert. Ok one final thing I want to say (before you decide to ship me off to the funny farm) is that I've had a change of heart and I do appreciate crème caramel now.
Anyway this recipe comes from the "hit and miss" book 曲奇蛋糕cook得起 2 that I used to make the shell cookies. I made this dessert twice and both times I had to bake it longer than the stated one hour. I really have a big fear of undercooking eggs and I don't think my guinea pigs would appreciate getting food poisoning… =P At the same time, one of my guinea pigs almost had a heart attack when he realized how many eggs went into making this dessert. Oops… well sometimes sharing recipes may not be a good thing. =P
To test whether it was done, I shook the container to see how much the dessert wiggled. When it stopped jiggling like jello then I felt comfortable enough to take it out of the oven. Both times I ended up baking it so long that I overcooked the side of it which did not have caramel. I think what I might try next time is to cover it with tinfoil so that hopefully it can prevent the mixture from overcooking and getting hard on one side.
Ingredients:
Pudding:
500g milk
175g sugar
375g eggs (I used 7 eggs)
250g whipping cream
Caramel:
100g sugar
1 tsp water
Method:
- Prepare the caramel first. Place 100g sugar and drinking water in a stainless steel mixing bowl.
- Heat over medium heat until sugar dissolves to a dark brown liquid. Stir constantly.
- Arrange pudding moulds on baking tray. Pour a thin layer of caramel (2) into the moulds. Set aside.
- Mix milk with 175g of sugar. Set aside.
- Beat eggs with an electric mixer.
- Pour in whipping cream and mix well with the electric mixer.
- Pour in (4) milk mixture and mix well with the electric mixer.
- Sieve (7) egg mixture and pour into (3) pudding moulds.
- Pour hot water in the baking tray. The height of the water should be the same as the caramel in the baking moulds.
- Bake at 140C/285F for 1 hour.
- Let cool and invert pudding onto a serving plate.
It's been so humid lately that I almost had a heatstroke the other day. The air con in our living room is not working and even with a light breeze drifting in from the windows, our place still traps a lot of heat. So I decided that it was in my best interests to make a dessert that didn't require any baking whatsoever. =P
I'm not sure why… but there doesn't seem to be a big emphasis on the concept of seasonal fruits in HK. What I am referring to is a particular time of year when a certain fruit is at its peak. It's usually also when that fruit is the freshest and cheapest. Perhaps it's because HK imports all their fruits so there's always somewhere in the world where a certain fruit will be in season? Anyway, in Canada, my mom used to wait until summer when mangoes were in season before making mango pudding. Since it's already starting to feel like summer here, I picked to make this yummy dessert!
This recipe comes from one of my favourite blogs… Do What I Like. I find this blog extremely helpful as it has many Asian dessert recipes and the blogger writes them all in English! I've tried making many desserts from her blog already and I've had success with all of them so far. =)
Ingredients:
(A)
2 eggs (lightly beaten)
250mL boiling hot water
240g mango puree (made from fresh mangoes)
100mL whipping cream or evaporated milk
(B)
90g mango flavoured jelly crystals
5 tsp gelatin powder
3 tbsp sugar
375mL boiling hot water
(C)
2 or more mangoes (diced into cubes)
5 tbsp aloe vera (diced into cubes) - optional
Method:
- Lightly beat eggs in a big mixing bowl. Add in 250mL hot boiling water, stirring all the time to prevent eggs from curdling. Strain egg mixture, add in the mango puree and whipping cream or evaporated milk. Mix gently till well blended.
- Put all ingredients in (B) into a large mixing bowl and stir till jelly crystals, gelatin and sugar dissolved.
- Mix both egg and jelly mixture together till well combined.
- Pour mixture into jelly cups that are rinsed with cool drinking water. Add in spoonfuls of (C) - the cubed mango pieces and aloe vera pieces into individual cups.
- Chill in the refrigerator till set.
- Serve chilled drenched with evaporated milk or mango puree and extra serving of mango and aloe vera cubes.
