Cantonese Sticky Rice Dumplings (Video 廣東鹹肉糭)

When I first learned to wrap sticky rice dumplings (鹹肉糭) for celebrating Dragon Boat festival, this was the easiest method I went for. It's so much fun. The dumplings tasted so great.

Sticky rice dumpling (Zongzi 糭子 in Chinese) is a classic Chinese food often eaten for celebrating Dragon Boat Festival. It’s mainly made of glutinous rice, stuffed with seasoned pork belly, salted duck egg yolks or many different fillings, then wrapped in bamboo leaves, cooked in boiling water.

My family especially loves the Cantonese sticky rice dumplings and would love to have them all the time through out the year, either for breakfast or lunch.

There are two camps of how to eat these dumplings, dipping with soy sauce or going with white sugar. So, guess which way my family loves to go for? Sugar. In fact, either way is fantastic and delicious.

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Molten Chocolate Cakes (Easter Dessert)

My favourite part of Easter is the chocolate desserts. Molten chocolate cake, aka lava cake or chocolate fondant pudding, is very popular around the world. It is even served in high-end restaurants and is suitable for all occasions. I personally feel that the bitter taste can resemble the remembrance of the sufferings of Jesus Christ, and the sweet taste associates with the joy of the victory of His resurrection.

Back to the cake, it’s not that difficult when you actually roll up your sleeves to make this delicious chocolate cake. But producing the spectacular, oozing runny, lava-like chocolate inside needs a little experience of knowing how to work with your own oven. The prime principle is not to over cook the chocolate batter.

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Baked Coconut Sticky Rice Cake (Chinese New Year)

This baked coconut sticky rice cake (aka baked Chinese New Year cake) is absolutely tasty. It's a no-brainer recipe. You won't go wrong if you try. I often bake this coconut sticky rice cake for Chinese New Year celebration recently.

As Chinese New Year is coming around the corner, my daughter begins to ask me what I’m going to cook to celebrate. The first thing came up in my mind was this baked Coconut Pudding.

My dear friend, Vivian who came from Malaysia baked one to share with us some time ago. I was impressed because it was so delicious. Vivian told us that her family would bake this coconut pudding to celebrate Chinese New Year in Malaysia.

(My daughter likes eating coconut pudding with some fresh cream.)

During Chinese New Year, Chinese people would make all kinds of cakes or puddings for friends. I have tried a steamed coconut cake that is very popular in Hong Kong.

Honestly speaking, I like this baked one most.

So I plan to bake one in the coming New Year season. The delicious taste, fragrant smell and chewy texture will make it a hit in my family for sure.

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Garlic Butter Tiger Prawns (Tutorial Video)

The tiger prawns were so fresh that I didn’t need any more seasonings except garlic and butter, with salt and pepper of course. The prawns are so delicious.

Chinese New Year is just around the corner. Are you still searching for ideas of planning Chinese New Year menu?

Here comes a good one to put on your menu. Well, this dish is also suitable for any days throughout the year. It’s a no-brainer dish and quick to be done. Not only is this dish flavoursome, but also it’s full of nutrients.

These large tiger prawns I used were so big. From head to tail, it’s long as my palm. They were so fresh that I didn’t need any more seasonings except garlic and butter, with salt and pepper of course.

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Gingerbread Men Recipe

Here comes a recipe that requested by my Chinese fan. She wants to make some gingerbread men cookies for a church gathering. It’s my pleasure to help of course, although it’s not my plan to make any bakery in such a hot weather in Australia. I have already got used to celebrate Christmas in warm weather, although I miss the chilly season’s atmosphere in my hometown.

Got two gingerbread men put on swimming suits. Ready to go with me !

Going back to our gingerbread men making, I can’t stress enough about the importance of the sugar choice. Try the best to get brown sugar. It adds an inviting sugar cane fragrance and beautiful brownish colour. On top of it, use molasses or golden syrup, available at supermarkets, that helps create delightful taste and lovely texture. If you can’t find any, you can replace it with honey.

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Pandan Snow Skin Mooncakes with Coconut Mung Bean Filling

How nice to make these fragrant pandan snow skin mooncakes for Mid-Autumn Festival? It's fun and divinely tasty. Step-by-step photos are in the recipe below.

Mid-Autumn Festival (aka moon festival or mooncake festival, 中秋節) is one of the important festivals in Chinese calendar. I’ve grown up from a family that would have store-brought mooncakes every year. Since I moved to Australia, I’ve been pondering over the idea of making my own mooncakes. After many years, I made some traditional and trendy ones finally.

Coconut milk and pandan juice often go well together in making Chinese dessert. Off I went with this idea and made these mini snow skin mooncakes for our church gathering.

The smell, taste and colour of both coconut milk and pandan are very unique, that you hardly find any other things to replace them.

Fresh pandan leaves are not common here. I could source some frozen ones though, and was glad that it was a big hit in our gathering.

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Glutinous Rice Dumplings with Red Bean Fillings

Dragon Boat festival is coming again. It's time to enjoy eating zongzi (aka glutinous rice dumpling/sticky rice dumpling). This traditional Chinese food can be eaten all year round though.

I made some with savoury fillings. They were nice and hot from my large pot. To better use the large pot of hot water, I made some more with sweet fillings —— red bean paste. Who doesn’t like snacks with red bean paste?

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How To Wrap a Pyramid Shaped Sticky Rice Dumpling (五角糉 + Video)

I reckon this pyramid shaped sticky rice dumpling is the most beautiful one. It’s the traditional shape mostly made by Hong Kong people. You need four pieces of bamboo leaves to make a dumpling. It sounds too many things to manage. But don’t be nervous. I posted a tutorial video below the recipe. It’s not that difficult as you thought.

Dragon Boat Festival (端午節) is coming on the weekend this year. Get ready to make some sticky rice dumplings (zongzi 鹹肉糭) to celebrate?

When I first learnt to make zongzi, I took the easiest way. Here's the recipe I posted previously. It only needs three pieces of bamboo leaves to wrap a zongzi. If you jump on the bandwagon to try making zongzi at home, I highly recommend the easiest method.

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Purple Sweet Potato Snowskin Mooncakes

Ever thought of using purple sweet potato to make some snowskin mooncakes for Mid-Autumn festival celebration? Both the texture and taste are wonderfully good.

After the first attempt of making mooncakes used my own branded mould, I was itching to make another batch with a different filling.

A purple sweet potato (purple yam) has been sitting in the basket on my kitchen benchtop for quite a while. Guess that it’s perfect for my second attempt. The purple sweet potato grown in Australia is quite dry itself, with less water content compared with other kinds of sweet potatoes.

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Traditional Mooncakes (廣式月餅)

Mooncake is a must-eat snack during Mid-Autumn festival (中秋節) that I grew up with.  Once you gather all ingredients needed for making your own mooncakes, you'll feel not that difficult as you thought.  

Mid-Autumn festival (中秋節) is celebrated on the 15th day of the 8th month in the lunar calendar every year. So we finished this year’s celebration two weeks ago. You might’ve wondered why this recipe comes so late. Actually, I've also juggled whether I post its English translation this year or keep the draft until next year since I posted the Chinese version.

Here you go, the traditional mooncake recipe that’s been sitting for a long time in my draft folder has come alive on this blog. As I need more time working on my cookbook project, the posting on this blog has been slow down a bit. Yet, I've been cooking and working very hard.

For the past few weeks, I uploaded a few batches of recipes and photos to my editor. Thank you all for bearing with me for such a slow posting pace recently.

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Butter and Jam Cookies

These buttery cookies were dotted and filled with bright red plum jam. The slightly tangy taste of plum jam is just right to balance the no-so-sweet cookies.

I often feel cookies are for festive seasons. Whenever any festive seasons come, especially Christmas, we like to have some and feel the atmosphere.

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Green Tea (Matcha) Custard Snowskin Mooncakes

The Mid-Autumn festival is just around the corner. Why not make some mooncakes to celebrate? How about make some green tea custard snowskin mooncakes?

The Mid-Autumn festival is just around the corner. What makes the festival unique for me this year is that I can celebrate it with my own brand mooncakes.

The customized mooncake mould, engraved with my Chinese blog title, 簡易食譜 (means "easy recipes" in Chinese) was a hearty birthday gift from my loved ones in the family. I treasure it so much. With it, I made these green tea (matcha) snow skin mooncakes with custard filling.

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Sago Dumplings with Red Bean Filling (桂花豆沙西米糭)

Dragon boat festival is coming around the corner. I experimented to make some non-traditional sago dumplings. It's a huge success and became big hit in my family. It's tasty and easy to make. These dumplings can be served as a dessert or snack.

We will surely have some traditional savoury Cantonese sticky rice dumplings. As I was itching to make some sweet ones for my family as well. I soaked some sago for a little while, then wrapped in with red bean filling. Voila, the steamed sago dumplings looked so spectacular and went so well with the fragrant Osmanthus syrup.

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Meatballs with Cranberry Sauce (Christmas Party Snack)

These little meatballs are perfect as finger food in Christmas party. The tooth picks will help keep your hands clean from dipping the little meatballs into the delicious cranberry sauce. Your guests will appreciate your thoughtful arrangements.

You might notice there are two ingredients in the recipe, not often used to make meatballs. Yes, they are soda water and mashed potato. These two special ingredients can magically keep the meatballs even moist and soft than usual ones.

The cranberry sauce I used was store-bought, so it’s very handy to prepare this party snack. Even better, these meatballs can be made well ahead without any fuss. Let’s enjoy the party !

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Braised Shiitake Mushrooms in Oyster Sauce

One of the must-eat dishes for Chinese New Year celebration is this braised shiitake mushrooms in oyster sauce dish. The shiitake mushrooms are meaty, smooth and delicious. I often follow my mum's trick to make this dish even more appealing and shiny. Just a little bit of rock sugar will do the trick.

I easily associate this braised shiitake mushrooms with all traditional Chinese festivals, like Winter Solstice (冬至), Chinese New Year’s Eve, as my mum used to cook it on these occasions.

During my childhood, when I saw this dish served on our dinner table, I’d feel that we’re enjoying a luxury meal simply because mushrooms were quite pricey at that time. Although big and best quality shiitake mushrooms are still very expensive now, we can get smaller ones with good quality at much cheaper price for substitute. We are quite satisfied with their texture and taste.

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Deviled Eggs (or Angeled Eggs)

These deviled eggs are very delicious and well-liked at any parties, perfectly served as finger food. The whites are not chewy but soft and smooth, with well-seasoned yolks on top.

I can understand why we have eggs during Easter. Eggs symbolize life, making sense to me in relation to the meaning of Easter.

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Hot Cross Buns (Tangzhong Method)

Easter is just coming around the corner. Due to my recent addiction to making tangzhong breads, I tried to turn this traditional hot cross bun recipe into a Tangzhong version.

I can make as many hot cross buns ahead, so that I don’t need to get up from bed very early on the Easter morning, because the Tangzhong buns can be kept soft for more days.

If you are a big fan of spicy flavoured breads, please adjust the amount of the mixed spice, and add extra hint of cinnamon powder if you like.

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Chocolate Pound Cake

Chocolate pound cake is so easy to whip up as an after-work or after-school snack. The deep chocolate flavor will be intensified more if you manage to make it in advance.

The attractiveness of chocolate is irresistible. As simple as this pound cake, a little bit of cocoa will intrigue your family and friends to want more.

You can make this chocolate cake well in advance. The chocolatey taste will be intensified more.

As Mother’s day is coming around the corner, it won’t be wrong to make one for your family, or yourself.

Brew a cup of hot tea with a slice of this rich, buttery chocolate pound cake. It’ll make a day for your mother.

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Hasselback Potatoes

When time constraints or you’re busy around with preparing celebration meals for special occasions, like thanksgiving or Christmas, you may want to try these Swedish roast potatoes to go with the main. The fan-out potatoes with attached bottoms look a bit fancy and attractive on the serving table. This side dish only needs a few minutes of preparation. The rest of the job is done in the oven. The buttery oil made these roasted potatoes smell very aromatic and taste so good. You may want to peel the potatoes, but it’s not necessary. I used some already washed potatoes from a nearby supermarket for convenience. I don’t even scrub them, just rinse them instead. The flesh of the potatoes is soft and tender with crispy outside after roasting.

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Nutella Chocolate Cookies

Love is in the air ! These chocolate cookies are made for my daughter as an early Valentine's gift. It's partly because I still have a large bottle of Nutella left after making those favourite tangzhong buns. (wink wink)

Every dessert made by Nutella sauce is really tempting. Be cautious that you can’t stop eating one mouth after another. These Nutella cookies are no exception. By adding some chocolate chips and cocoa powder, these cookies are even more addictive. The upside is that these cookies will make you feel refreshed and got mentally energetic again after long hours of work. The texture is quite charming, crisp on edges, slightly chewy in the middle. Taste-wise, they are wonderfully good. No doubt at all, you can make some as a present of Valentine’s Day for your loved one too.

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