抹茶芋头酥 matcha green tea flaky mooncakes

Just like the previous years, weeks before the mid-autumn festival, my children started reminding me to make them their favourite snowskin mooncakes. Over the weekend, besides rushing out two batches of snowskin mooncakes to satisfy their cravings, I tried making some flaky yam mooncakes.

It's the first time I tried my hands at making these teochew style yam mooncakes. I followed the step by step instructions from my favourite Chinese blogger, Carol 自在生活, although the mooncakes I made do not look great, they taste really good!

The yam filling which I made from scratch is very fragrant and flavourful...not overly sweet and I like the hint of buttery and milky flavour.

The matcha flavoured pastry crust is not distinct at all but it certainly helps to made these flaky mooncakes look more appealing to the eyes :)

I also tried some with ready made red bead paste as fillings. The red bean paste which I bought from kwong cheong thye never disappoints me. It is not too sweet and the texture is very smooth. It is worth the effort to make a special trip each year to this shop to get my mooncake ingredients.


Here's wishing you a Happy Mid-Autumn Festival!
花好月圆，福满金秋，中秋节快乐！



Matcha Green Tea Flaky Yam Mooncakes 抹茶芋头酥

Ingredients:
(makes 12)

yam filling:
450g yam (peeled)
70g caster sugar
25g unsalted butter
15g milk powder (omit if not available)

water dough:
200g plain flour
15g icing sugar
70g shortening
100g water

oil dough:
155g plain flour
5g matcha powder
80g shortening


Method:

yam filling:

• Cut yam into chunks and steam for 15 to 20mins or until soft. Mash finely with a fork while hot. Add in caster sugar, unsalted butter and milk powder(if using), mix well. If desired, add extra sugar and adjust sweetness according to taste. Leave to cool. Divide into 45g portions and shape into rounds and set aside.

water dough:

• Sieve together flour and icing sugar into a mixing bowl. Rub in shortening with fingertips until the mixture becomes crumbly. Add in the water and mix and knead for about 5 mins to form a soft dough. Cover with cling wrap and leave the dough to rest for 40mins.

oil dough:

• Sieve plain flour and matcha powder into a mixing bowl. Add shortening and mix with hand to form a soft dough. Do not over knead. (Note: Cover oil dough with cling wrap and keep in fridge till ready to use.)

to assemble:

1. Divide oil dough into 6 portions (about 40g each), shape into rounds.
2. Divide water dough into 6 portions (about 65g each), shape into rounds. Flatten water dough and roll to form a disc (about 10cm diameter). With the smooth surface facing out, wrap one portion of the oil dough pinch and seal the seam. Shape into round ball. Repeat with the rest.
3. For each wrapped dough, flatten and roll out into a thin, longish oval shape. From the shorter end, roll up swiss roll style. Place seam side down and cover with a damp cloth, leave to rest for 10mins. (Refer to the first video demo posted here.)
4. When ready, repeat the Step 3. Place seam side down and cover with a damp cloth, leave to rest for 20mins. (Refer to the second video demo posted here.)
5. When ready, cut each rolled up dough into two equal portions. Flatten each dough and roll to form a disc (about 10cm diameter). Wrap one portion of the yam filling, pinch and seal the seam and shape into a round. (Refer to the third video demo posted here.) 
6. Place seam side down on a baking tray lined with parchment paper. Repeat with the rest.
7. Bake in preheated oven at 170degC in the middle rack for about 25mins. Leave to cool on cooling rack. Store in air tight container in room temperature up to two days. Reheat in oven till warm before serving as the crust tends to harden upon cooling. Reheating will make the crust flaky and crisp.

Recipe source: adapted from Carol 自在生活

homemade gift

Homemade gift for a special friend,

someone who shares the same passion for baking...

someone who fares way better than me in keeping....
her household of three active children with a full time job and without a helper...

someone who cares to listen to a housewife's never ending ramblings...

Freshly baked mooncakes for my friend....with my lack of skills, they are nothing close to store bought ones...

but, as the saying goes, best gifts come from the heart, not the wallet...

well, I do feel thick-skinned to give my humble mooncakes away...for my friend would need to pay a high price for them...

that is, for wasting her calories on yucky food, paiseh paiseh (^_^''')

little fishes...

tiny rabbits....

specially for her children...I don't think they will mind the empty calories ;)


Recipe from here and here.

Mid-Autumn Fest

Just like all the fellow Aspiring Bakers out there, I spent the past few days on a mooncake making marathon!

I have initially planned to make 2 batches of traditional baked mooncakes and another 2 batches of snowskin ones. Just nice to use up most of the lotus paste I bought.

My first batch of snowskin mooncakes....matcha green tea snowskin mooncakes with red bean paste, and,

....Coffee snowskin mooncakes with tiramisu lotus paste.

The matcha snowskin is made by simply mixing matcha powder with water, as for the coffee flavour, I used 3-in-1 coffee ;)

Last Friday, I did not know what has gotten into me, after sending our elder son to school for his project discussion, I made a last minute decision to swing by Kwong Cheong Thye. My better half didn't mind making a detour as he is always eager to be able to do something for me ;)

I gave myself just a few minutes to shop as I had asked him to park at the roadside to wait for me. It was the first time I stepped into this shop and immediately I regretted not coming here instead of going to the usual baking supply stores to get the first batch of mooncake filling. Besides the necessary ingredients for making mooncakes, the shop offers a wider varieties of mooncake fillings. The best thing is, there are also half-kg packs. I first grabbed the low sugar white lotus paste (the thing that drove me to this shop in the first place), then the durian ones...but when I saw the mango flavour, I dropped the durian paste, and went on to pick up another cranberry paste ;)

Here are the new flavours I made...Cranberry snowskin mooncakes with cranberry paste and Mango snowskin mooncakes. I used only fruit juices to make the snowskin, ie, cranberry juice and mango juice respectively. I didn't add any food colouring, so the colour was a bit on the pale side.

Of the two, we prefer the mango paste, it is softer and has a nice mango flavour to it, whereas the cranberry one is a bit bland, the only plus point is, it comes with bits of cranberries. The pastes doesn't taste overly sweet, they pair of quite well with the snowskin since I used a recipe that calls for less sugar than most recipes that I have came across. However, the mango paste is quite soft compared to the lotus paste and the cranberry ones. Even though I kept it in the fridge after shaping them into small rounds, it was quite difficult to wrap the snowskin dough over it. I used the leftovers for baked mooncakes, it is just slightly easier.

So, all in all, I made 7 batches of mooncakes this year, a whopping 87 moonies! Luckily, they are all mini ones and my boys could eat them the whole day! I shudder at the thought of how many pounds I will be piling on, but I do have this attitude of 'eat first, die later', haha!

 

We will be spending the night eating more mooncakes over pu-er tea (great for busting the extra fat) and enjoying the sweet juicy pomelo (not so easy to get sweet ones) and probably some yams to round up the night.

I wish all of you who celebrate this occasion, a Happy Mid-Autumn Festival, 中秋节快乐！




I'm submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #11: Mid-Autumn Treats (Sept 2011) which I am hosting :

Mini Snowskin Mooncakes

Ingredients:
(makes 12 mini mooncakes)

75g cooked glutinous rice flour
50g icing sugar
25g shortening,
90ml cold water

360g white lotus paste

Method:

1. Sieve together cooked glutinous rice flour and icing sugar into a mixing bowl. Rub the shortening into the flour mixture with fingertips until a crumbly mixture forms. Add cold water to the mixture and knead for a couple of minutes to form a soft dough. Do not over work the dough.
2. Leave dough in the fridge for about 15 mins. (You may skip this step.)
3. At the mean time, divide the lotus paste into 30g portions and shape into balls. (Note: I used a ratio of 40% dough to 60% filling for my 50g mooncake mould.)
4. When ready, divide snowskin dough into 20g pieces. Shape each dough into a ball. For each dough, place it on palm and flatten with fingers to form a round dough about 5cm in diameter. Wrap the dough skin around the filling and shape it into a ball. Seal the seams.
5. Dust mooncake moulds (diameter 4cm, for 50g mooncake) with some cooked glutinous rice flour. Place the wrapped dough into the mould and press the mooncake out. Make sure the surface of the dough in contact with the patterned-face of the mould is smooth. Store mooncakes in fridge for up to 1 week. Leave it under room temperature for about 15mins for the skin to soften before serving.

Variations:
* Matcha flavour - replace cold water with: mix 1 teaspoon of matcha powder with 90ml of hot water. Leave to cool and then chill in fridge for at least 30mins before using.
**Coffee flavour - replace cold water with: mix 1 satchel of 3-in-1 powder powder (about 20g) with 90ml of hot water. Leave to cool and then chill in fridge for at least 30mins before using.
*** Cranberry flavour - replace cold water with same amount of cranberry juice.
*** Mango flavour - replace cold water with same amount of mango juice.

Traditional Mooncake

This year's mid-autumn festival is indeed a special occasion. My better half is able to celebrate this Chinese festival with us, just in time before he leaves for the airport for a mid-night flight :)

The next 'biggest' thing for me is, I have finally attempted to make traditional baked mooncakes!

Even though I know in advance that I will be hosting this month's Aspiring Baker's event, I didn't think that I would be ready to make any traditional moocncakes when the theme was firmed up. I only changed my whole impression on making baked mooncakes when I picked up a magazine from the library recently. I was flipping through the pages when a picture of some beautiful mini mooncakes appeared right in front of my eyes. With the easy-to-understand instructions and detailed step-by-step illustrations, I started to think that making traditional mooncakes is not that difficult after all.

With the newly acquired knowledge, I set off to get the necessary ingredients. The recipe from the magazine has included instructions on how to make the lotus paste filling and golden syrup from scratch, I thought I should go for ready made ones this year. No matter what, I am a first-timer. I don't want my effort to go into waste if I failed miserably.

You will be surprised at how easy to transform the basic ingredients into these mooncakes, all ready to go into the oven. The dough or skin of the mooncake is made by a simple mixing of golden syrup, alkaline water, peanut oil and flour. Peanut oil is used to enhance the flavour, but I replace it with canola oil as I couldn't get any peanut oil that comes in small bottle form. The alkaline water helps to make the dough more stretchable, and allows the mooncakes to brown nicely upon baking. However, just a small amount is needed, if used more than recommended, it will give the mooncake a very dark colour. The important point to note about the dough is, you need to let it rest for at least 2 hrs or more before using it. This step is known as 醒面.

I am no stranger when it comes to wrapping the filling with the dough. I learned the trick when I first attempted to make some snowskin mooncakes years ago. You may ask what is so difficult about wrapping dough around the filling? It  may appear to be an easy task, but not when you are wrapping a dough that is only 15g while the filling is 35g. By right the dough to filling ratio should be 2:8, so I will actually have to use only 10g dough. But for newbies like me, I opted to up the ratio a little, I worked on 3:7 instead.

I am no professional baker, but since I am lousy with words, I think a video clip will be good to demonstrate how I went about wrapping the mooncake. As it is the school holidays, I got my younger son to help me take the video :) Notice the small piece of dough in comparison to the huge ball of filling? The trick here is to hold the dough between the thumb and index finger of one hand, and the thumb of the other hand should gently press the filling down while turning the dough and at the same time pushing the dough up to cover the filling. Sounds mind boggling right?! Besides the right technique of wrapping, another thing to note is, always dust your hands with flour to prevent the dough from sticking and tearing. Trust me, dust your hand lightly with flour every time you pick up the dough, it will make your mooncake making experience a more enjoyable one ;)

Stamping the mooncake was easy since the mould I have comes with a plunger. The only thing here is, instead of dusting the mould (I am not talking about the traditional wooden mould), I dust the wrapped dough with flour before putting it inside the mould. If you have dusted the mould AND the stamping plates with flour, some flour may get trapped inside the grooves of the patterns, and you may end up with a clump of flour on the imprints.

Baking the mooncakes requires one to have patience. First, before sending them into the oven, spray or mist them with some water. This is to prevent the surface from cracking, and especially good if you have dusted the dough with too much flour. After the first 10mins of baking, the half-baked mooncakes have to be left to cool for about 15mins. Wait for them to cool off before applying egg wash on the top or top and sides as preferred. The next thing is to watch them carefully during the second baking. As all ovens work differently, check every now and then to make sure they don't get over browned. Do stand by at the oven at the last few minutes before the baking time is up. Take out the moonies when you feel that the colour is right.

I made these mini mooncakes with tiramisu lotus paste (a better name for lotus paste added with coffee flavour!). I have also tried with red bean paste, and added melon seeds as I liked the nutty texture.

It was a very good learning experience, especially for a self taught baker. I was already giving myself a pat on the shoulder while the mooncakes were baking in the oven. I received another huge encouragement when my better half went oooh and ahhh when he took the first bite. He even asked me whether I could make some for him to bring overseas for him to show off to his overseas colleagues (*^^)


I'm submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #11: Mid-Autumn Treats (Sept 2011) which I am hosting :)




Traditional Mooncakes (广式咖啡莲蓉月饼)

Ingredients:
(makes 12~13 mini mooncakes)

for dough:
100g plain flour
70g golden syrup (I used Abram Lyle's Golden Syrup with maple flavor)
2ml alkaline water
25ml peanut oil (I replaced with canola oil)

for filling:
415g tiramisu lotus paste
40g melon seeds

Method:

1. Mix lotus paste with melon seeds. Divide the filling into 35g portions and shape into balls. Set aside. (Note: I used a dough: filling ratio of 3:7, for 50g mooncake mould)
2. Place golden syrup in a bowl. Add in alkaline water, stir to combine. Add in oil, mix well.
3. Place plain flour in a mixing bowl,make a well in the centre. Add in the above mixture. Mix with a spatula to form a soft dough. Gently knead the dough till smooth (takes 1~2 mins). Shape it into a smooth round dough. Wrap with cling wrap and leave in fridge to rest for at least 2 hours or over night. This step is known as 醒面.
4. Dust work surface with some flour. Give the dough a few light kneading to smooth it.
5. Divide dough into 15g pieces. Shape each dough into a ball. Roll each dough over some flour. Dust hand with flour and flatten each dough into a small disc (about 5cm in diameter). Wrap it around the filling and shape it into a ball. (always dust hand with some flour to avoid the dough from sticking).
6. Lightly dust the wrapped dough with some flour. Place it in the mooncake mould and press the mooncake out. Place mooncake on a baking tray line with parchment paper.
7. Spray some water on the mooncakes. (Note: this helps to prevent the mooncake from cracking during baking.)
8. Bake at preheated oven at 180degC for 10mins. Remove from oven and leave to cool for 15mins (do not skip this step).
9. Brush the top with some egg wash. Return to oven and continue to bake for another 15mins until golden brown (since all oven works differently, do check after 10mins, and subsequently every other 2 mins to make sure the mooncakes are not over browned).
10. Leave mooncake to cool completely and store in air tight containers. Wait for 2 ~ 3 days for the mooncakes to 回油 (for the skin to soften) before serving.

Recipe source: adapted from 贝太厨房

a prelude

I know, there are still six days to go before the lunar eighth month...or another three weeks before the mid-autumn festival. I am not in the hurry to make any mooncakes before the end of next week.

What you see here are not traditional mooncakes which we are familiar with...

rather, they are steamed purple sweet potatoes...moulded with a mooncake mould...

and served with maple syrup and chopped nuts. I got this recipe from a magazine, and it is actually a recommended dish to serve to guests during the Chinese New Year festive season.

Visual wise, the clever use of a mooncake mould does make it a very presentable and stylish dish. However, what is important to me is, I've found an interesting way to eat steamed sweet potatoes ;) The maple syrup helps to moisten the sweet potatoes...which tends to get dry especially when it is left cold. The pairing of chopped nuts lends a sharp contrast to the soft texture of the mashed sweet potatoes. My younger child who doesn't care for sweet potatoes or pumpkins, helped himself to as many sweet potatoes 'mooncakes' he could stuff inside his stomach. Overall, it is a simple, healthy and delicious 小吃 (snacks), something to reach out for in between meals instead of unhealthy snacks or junk food :)



Sweet Potatoes 'Mooncakes'

Ingredients:

300g purple sweet potatoes
50g chopped cashew nuts (or walnuts, pistachios, hazel nuts, peanuts etc)
20ml maple syrup or honey (adjust according to preference)

Method:

• Roast nuts (of your choice) with a small frying pan over low heat until lightly browned, stir constantly. Leave to cool and coarsely chop the roasted nuts, set aside.
• Wash, peel sweet potatoes. Cut into small chunks.
• Steam under high heat for 15-20mins until soft.
• Mash sweet potatoes with fork. Mould into small round balls about 30g each, (my mooncake mould is for 50-60g mooncake). Place inside the mould (comes with a plunger), push the plunger to release the sweet potatoes.
• Drizzle over maple syrup or honey and serve with roasted nuts.

Recipe source: adapted from 贝太厨房

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival

I have never thought that I would venture into making baked mooncakes. I chickened out after going through the ingredient list for making traditional baked mooncakes ^_^"


I was glad that I managed to get hold of this "Y3K cookbook, Mooncakes". Besides the snowskin mooncakes, I was happy to learn that I could actually try my hand at making mooncakes with flaky pastry! I nailed down this 'Apple Allure' flaky pastry mooncake recipe since I had all the ingredients on hand. Making the doughs was a breeze, but I had a hard time trying to figure out the correct way of wrapping/rolling the water dough with the coloured oil dough. Even though there are several photos to illustrate the steps, certain parts of the instructions is quite vague. In the end, I went about making it with my gut feel. I am not sure whether I did it right as the finished mooncakes appeared slightly different from those illustrated in the cookbook.


These tiny morsels are no bigger than 2", my tween is able to pop one into his mouth without getting choked. I used ready-made pandan lotus paste but I think it would taste better with yam paste. Since this is my maiden attempt, I am rather satisfied with the taste and texture. On the other hand, I think I could have done better. I probably didn't roll out the dough thin enough so the skin is not as flaky and definitely not comparable to those store-bought Teochew style mooncakes. Nevertheless, I felt a great sense of achievements when I left them to cool on the rack.

八月十五送你一個月饼
含量：100%祝福
配料：
100克快乐枣
兩把关心米
300cc友情水
作法：用幽默扎捆
保质期：一辈子
保存方法：珍惜

中秋节快乐!

Flaky Pastry Mooncakes

Ingredients (makes 16 pieces)

filling:
400g pandan lotus paste
80g melon seeds

water dough:
70g plain flour
5g icing sugar
25g shortening
35ml water

oil dough:
75g plain flour
40g shortening


Method:

1. Filling: Mix pandan lotus paste with melon seeds. Divide into 30g portions, shape into rounds and set aside.
2. Water Dough: sieve together flour and icing sugar into a mixing bowl. Rub in shortening with fingertips until the mixture becomes crumbly. Add in the water and mix to form a soft dough. Cover with cling wrap and set aside.
   
3. Oil Dough: Sieve plain flour into a mixing bowl. Add shortening and mix with hand to form a soft dough.
   
4. Divide oil dough into 3 portions. Add food colourings to each dough and knead to form pink, yellow and green doughs. Roll each dough into a square, about 5" by 5".
   
5. Roll the water dough into a square about 10" by 10". Place the oil doughs in the centre of the water dough. Start with pink, then place yellow dough over the pink dough, overlapping end bit of pink dough. Place green dough over the yellow dough, overlapping end bit of yellow dough. Refer photo no. 1 below.
6. Fold both sides of the water dough over the oil doughs. Cover and let rest for 20mins. Refer photo no. 2 and 3.
7. Flatten all sides and roll out the dough. Turn over and roll flat. Starting with the pink side of the dough(refer photo no. 4 above), roll up Swiss roll style to form a cylindrical log. Cut off excess parts from both ends and keep aside. Cut the dough into 16 equal portions.
   
8. For each portion, flatten to form a round disc. Roll to about 5cm in diameter.Wrap the filling with the dough, seal the seams and place it downwards on a baking tray lined with parchment paper.
   
9. Add some green food colouring to the excess dough in step 7 and use it to make leaves. With the pointed end of a chopstick, press the top of the dough to create a slight dent that resembles the surface of an apple. Place the leaves over the dents. Bake at 180degC for 15-20 mins until baked through but not golden. As the finished mooncake will be very soft, let cool on the baking tray for about 5 ~ 10mins before transferring to a wire rack. Let cool completely.
   

Recipe source: adapted from Y3K cookbook - Mooncake.

Mid-Autumn Treats

It's the time of the year again to indulge in a tempting array of delicious mooncakes that are bursting to the brim with dense, cloyingly sweet fillings.


Weeks ago, my elder son kept asking me whether I would be making any mooncakes this year. With his constant nudging, I started gathering the necessary ingredients once I returned to my usual "baking -mode'.

This is the second year that I am making these 'ping peh' or snowskin mooncakes...made with cooked glutinous rice flour which does not require any baking. Having struggled with makeshift moulds last year, I made it a point to order a proper mooncake mould from Elyn. The mould is very easy to use and the mooncake doesn't really stick to it, I only had to dust it once before using or whenever I need to change the template. Most importantly, the mould is able to create very clear and deep imprints of the pretty designs of the templates.

From the experience last year, I managed to come up with my own snowskin dough recipe. I adjusted the amount of sugar to make it less sweet, and the proportion of liquid is just right as the dough is soft and yet not too wet or sticky. It is very easy to work with as I didn't have to dust it with any extra flour, it doesn't even stick to my wooden rolling pin.


I am getting better at wrapping the filling with the dough. Last year, I made the mistake of rolling out the dough too thin...since the amount of fillings is so huge compared to the dough, I thought I had to roll the dough big enough to cover the fillings. This year, I finally got the hang of the correct way of wrapping, a skill I learned through wrapping pineapple tarts ;) I am not able to describe the process in words, but I managed to find a relevant video clip here.

I made an assortments of mooncakes...strawberry, mango, pandan and matcha. I experimented again with strawberry flavoured milk and mango juices to make the snowskin. Sad to say, the flavours are not as prominent, so I had to rely on some artificial mango flavours to bring out the flavour. I filled the mooncakes with ready-made white lotus paste, pandan paste and red-bean ones. To give the fillings some texture, I added in some melon seeds. My kids love the mooncakes, especially my elder child, who could wolf down two at a go. I guess at their age, they can truly enjoy these sweet treats without having to worry about the calories.



Mini Snowskin Mooncakes

Ingredients:
(makes 12 mini mooncakes)

75g cooked glutinous rice flour
50g icing sugar
25g shortening,
90ml cold water

300g white lotus paste
60g melon seeds


Method:

1. Mix white lotus paste with melon seeds. Divide the paste into 30g portions and shape into balls. Set aside. (Note: I used a ratio of 40% dough to 60% filling)
2. Sieve together cooked glutinous rice flour and icing sugar into a mixing bowl.
3. Rub the shortening into the flour mixture with fingertips until a crumbly mixture forms.
4. Add cold water to the mixture and knead for a couple of minutes to form a soft dough. Do not over work the dough.
5. Leave dough in the fridge for about 15 mins. (I skip this step and the dough works just as fine.)
6. Divide dough into 20g pieces. Shape each dough into a ball. For each dough, flatten to form a small disc and roll it out into 3mm-thick circle or about 5cm in diameter.
7. Wrap the dough skin around the filling and shape it into a ball. Seal the seams.
8. Dust mooncake moulds (diameter 4cm, for 50g mooncake) with cooked glutinous rice flour. Place the wrapped dough into the mould and press the mooncake out. Make sure the surface of the dough in contact with the patterned-face of the mould is smooth.
9. Store mooncakes in fridge.
   
   Variations:
   * Strawberry flavour - replace cold water with same amount of strawberry flavoured milk, add 1~2 drops of red food colouring (as desired).
   ** Mango flavour - replace cold water with same amount of mango juice, add 1 teaspoon of mango flavour (as desired).
   *** Matcha flavour - replace cold water with: mix 1 teaspoon of matcha powder with 90ml of hot water. Leave to cool and then chill in fridge for at least 30mins before using.
   ****Pandan flavour - add 1 teaspoon of pandan flavoured paste to the cold water.

Mini Snowskin Mooncakes

Our first homemade snowskin mooncakes...

I always have the impression that mooncake-making is something that involves very complicated steps, very time consuming, and any effort to try it would unlikely pay off very well. It was only after reading a recent article featured in the papers that I learned that snowskin mooncakes are actually quite simple to make, especially when baking supply stores here are well-stock with all the necessary ingredients, including ready-made fillings. The recipe which was published alongside the article almost made me wanted to drop everything and rush to the nearest store to get all the items. Well, I got all the items a few days later...except one important tool, that is, a mooncake mold! I didn't quite like the designs of the molds available at the store, and I didn't want to buy one since I wasn't sure how the mooncakes would turn out. So I used a set of cookie cutters instead. This is nothing new, as I have seen several very creative bloggers use their Disney cookie cutters to shape their mooncakes.

When I told my kids that I was going to try making mooncakes for them, they too got very excited, and were very eager to help me out. Both had fun shaping the dough and the fillings into small rounds. I finds it very satisfying to release the finished mooncake from the cutter. It was also a surprise that they tasted really delicious, I certain didn't have any high expectations when I was making them! Everyone commented that the sweetness was just right. The snow skin was soft and a little 'QQ' which means chewy. The ready-made white lotus paste was smooth and not overly sweet. Those who have tried them were all thumbs up. Our first attempt at making mooncakes was a great success.

Before I went on to make the second batch of mooncakes with my remaining ingredients, I searched around the internet for other recipes to try. It was only then that I discovered that fruit juices can be used to replace the water in the recipe. So, for the second batch, I tried with this recipe here. I divided the ingredients into two equal portions...I used mango juice for one portion, and the other I experimented with pomegranate juice...both were what I had in the fridge. The pomegranate gave a pleasant purple tint to the dough. However, without the use of any artificial essence, the flavour was not prominent. I tried moulding the mooncakes with my Pooh cutters, but it was not as easy as I thought. I couldn't achieve a smooth surface, Pooh's face looked all cracked and wrinkled ;') In the end, I had to fall back on the piggy cutter.


This is the last batch I made yesterday. The yellow snow skins were made with mango juice and I used strawberry milk to made the pink ones. Again, I didn't use a proper moon cake mould, instead, I used a set of improvised moulds...which happens to be my old plastic koniyaku jelly trays.


I have pretty much convinced myself that I should get a mooncake mould next year. It's very obvious that the surface of the finished mooncakes were filled with awful cracks. I wondered whether it was the way I mixed and kneaded the dough? Do I have to knead it longer in order to get a very smooth skin?? Furthermore, I read that the proportion of the dough to filling ratio should be roughly 40% : 60%. As such, I used about 20g of dough to 30g of fillings. However, I find that the dough was a little too thin for easy wrapping the fillings.


We made this assortment of mooncakes and the kids were very proud to give them to their Granny. It was a good learning experience and I hope I can do a better job next year!



With this set of calligraphy done by my younger boy (yes, he stil has got a long long way to go before he could reach his brother's standard), I wish all of you who will be celebrating the mooncake festive today, 中秋节快乐!