A soy-free version of the Chinese Sticky Rice dumplings wrapped in bamboo leaves, known as Joong, or Zhongzi that are traditionally eaten in late Spring for the Dragonboat Festival. You can buy them at Asian supermarkets (like T&T here), and my husband’s family makes them, but they all have ingredients my son can’t have. Usually these have dried shrimp or scallop, mushrooms, nuts, soy sauce, 5-spice powder, chinese sausage and egg, but yummy as they are, these all make my son itchy, so I improvised! Special thanks to W.K. Leung for his pictorial description here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=88644 You may want to see the pictures of the various packages he uses. If you don’t need to avoid all those ingredients, you’ll probably want to follow his recipe, as this one is a little bland (shhh, don’t tell my son…) Wrapping the dumplings is tricky – I had to watch a few different videos, and even then, my first one took about 20 minutes! Eventually I figured it out. My best ones ended up as somewhat rectangular pyramids, rather than the tetrahedrons I usually see. This is a fairly time-consuming project, most families make it a group activity! Preparation time below is for one person doing it all herself for the first time, with a little “help” from my little man, and does not include overnight soaking time.
This is a traditional favorite in Hong Kong, found in most dessert houses and revered for its heartwarming and revitalizing properties. It can just be as easily prepared at home, and is sure to warm even the coolest of days (though it’s popular all year-round). Yellow, red, and purple sweet potatoes are commonly found in the market, though yellow ones are ideal given its richer flavor. The amount of ginger may be adjusted according to level of tanginess desired. Red dates are natural sweeteners that add more flavor (optional). Raw slab sugar is commonly used in Southeastern Chinese desserts, and can be readily found in Asian groceries. The slab sugar is ideal for this recipe as it not only enhances the taste but also adds a nice golden color. A light, non-creamy, easy and healthy dessert that works great for any time of the day… and especially when you are down with a cold.
Wonderful Asian flavors in this salad! I have doubled the sauce recipe so there’s plenty to spoon over the veggies. From Martha Stewart Living, March 1996.
i began with Recipezaar’s Ga Kho but was in a BIG hurry and misread the directions. That, plus my usual tweaking, left me with a wonderful dish which is even quicker to prepare. Enjoy!
Found at a cooking-by-country website, this recipe was entered to accompany another Cambodian recipe I entered titled “Khmer Sweet Corn Pudding”, but I foresee its uses being expanded to include more typical rice &/or bread puddings as well. The recipe did not specify the # of servings, so I opted to allow an average of 1.5 ounce servings = 10 servings. Enjoy!
