Glutinous Rice Cake with Red Date (红枣切糕)

This snack is called "Cut Cake" in Chinese because it was sold at street vendor as slices before. When you slice it, there are clear layers. Traditionally, it was made with layers of glutinous rice and red dates only. You can add any other kind of dried fruit or sweet pastry fillings that you like. You can also make in more layers if your container is tall enough.

Ingredients

Glutinous rice - 4 cups

Dried red date - 1 cup

Red bean pastry filling - 2 cup

Yield an 8"x8"x3" cake

Steps

1. Soak glutinous rice and dried red date overnight.

2. Steam rice directly on steamer over high heat for 15 minutes. Steam the red date separately for 10 minutes. 

3. Transfer rice to containers. Add just enough boiling water to level with the rice. Steam the container in steamer for 30 minutes. 

4. Line a cake mode with parchment paper and grease the sides. Then start to press on a layer of cooked rice, a layer of red date, another layer of rice, and a layer of red bean paste. If you container is deep enough, you can build up more layers of rice, red date and red bean paste. 

5. Steam the packed cake mold in steamer for 1 hour. 

6. Cover the cake mold with shriek wrap, and put something heavy on top to press on. This help the cake integrate layers together. 

7. Cut and serve.

Unfinished pieces can be wrapped air tight and stored in freezer. Steam thoroughly before serve. 

"Laughing" Sesame Ball(开口笑)

These sweet and crisp balls are traditional Chinese snack, originated in Beijing. The Chinese name literally means "Laughing". These small flour balls will be crackled during frying, like laughing. I modified the recipe from Xiachufang.

Ingredients

Sugar - 1/2 cup
Water - 1/4 cup
All purpose flour - 1 and 3/4 cup
Baking soda - 1/4 tsp
Oil/clarified butter - 1 TBSP
White sesame - 1/2 cup

Steps

1. Add sugar and water in sauce pan, boil util sugar is fully dissolved. Set aside to cool down. 

2. In a mixing bowl, mix flour and baking soda; then add oil and sugar water to knead lightly  into a dough. If the dough is too dry, add up to 1 TBSP water. Cover the dough and let it rest for 15 minutes.

3. Portion the dough into small balls. Prepare a small dish of water. Dip each ball in water before roll it in sesame so that the sesame will stay on the ball.

4. Add oil in a sauce pan and heat up until 320°F, turn off heat, put in the sesame balls. The high temperature should cause the sesame ball to expand quickly and crack the surface. When the balls are starting to float, turn on low heat to fry until the balls are turning yellow. At the end, turn on high heat to quickly brown the balls.

5. Serve after the sesame balls are cool down.

Pork Zong-Zi (肉粽子)

Zong-zi is a special food for “Dragon boat festival”. Zong-zi is like dumplings, you can put variety of things inside, you can make it sweet or salty. Our favorite is the meaty one. We make them throughout the year for snacking or quick meal.

Ingredients

Glutinous rice (sweet rice) - 5 lb, soak in water for 2-4 hours

Dry shiitake mushroom - 5 oz, soak in cold water for 20 minutes or more, keep the soaked water

Bamboo leaves - 10 oz soak in water overnight, clean and trim the stem end of the leaves.

Pork belly with no skin - 2 pounds
Shallot - 1/2 lb or more
In a typical Chinese cooking fashion, the following ingredients are all depends on how salty and strong flavor you want, there is really no right or wrong combination.

Soy sauce 

Dark soy sauce

Salt

Sugar 

Five spice powder

Bay leave

Garlic

Ginger

Star anise

Steps

1. Preparation is important. The night before, soak the rice, mushroom, bamboo leave. Cut the pork belly in small pieces, marinate with soy sauce, dark soy sauce, sugar and salt overnight.

2. In a cooking pan, add oil and diced shallot, brown the shallots. Be generous with shallots because it add good fragrance. Put browned shallots on the side.

3. With low heat, add oil, garlic, ginger, bay leave, star anise in a cooking pan, saute until brown; pick out the browned spices, add mushroom and pork in the pan to saute until half cooked. Then mix in the cooked shallot. 

4. Take out the meat and leave all sauce in the cookie pan, add glutinous rice (drained), saute the rice for a minute so that sauce is absorbed by the rice. If there is not enough sauce or saltiness , add more soy sauce and five spice powder.
5. Wrapping the rice and meat into triangle shape and tie with cotton string. Make sure the rice is well covered before you cook it. There are many YouTube video on how to wrap Zong-zi.

5. Put Zong-zi in the Instant-pot or other pressure cooker, add the mushroom soak water, some soy sauce and salt, then add water to make sure all Zong-zi is covered. Cook at high pressure for 1 hour.

Baked Rice Cake(烤年糕)

This is a simple and pretty fail-proof way to make a cake for party or snack.

Ingredients:

Glutinous Rice Flour - 1 bag (1 lb)

Baking powder - 1 tsp

Sugar - 1/2 cup to 1 cup

Egg - 3

Butter or vegetable oil - 1/2 cup

Milk - 2 1/2 cup (can mix with coconut milk)

Optional ingredients to mix in or to add as filling layer: Coco powder, Raisins, Dried Cranberries, Chocolate chips, Shredded coconut, Nuts, Red bean pastry filling, etc. 

Steps:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F

2. Mix all ingredients together well and pour in a baking pan (13"x9"x2").

3. Bake for 1 hour.

4. Wait for it to cool down before serving.

Purple Yam ZongZi(水晶粽子)

Zongzi is a traditional Chinese food made to celebrate the Dragon Boat Festival. It is made of glutinous rice stuffed with different fillings and wrapped in bamboo or reed leaves. The filling varies from region to region, and the way to wrap it also varies. This is a spin off  desert version which tapioca is used instead of glutinous rice so that the end result is a semi-translucent, chewy desert.

Ingredients:

Tapioca
Reed leaves
purple yam 4-5 medium
Sugar
Optional: Black sesame (Roasted and grounded)

Steps:

1. Peel and steam purple yam. Then blend the purple yam and sugar to your taste. Optional, you can add some roasted black sesame powder.

2. Soak leaves in water overnight. Drain all water and rinse off leaves. Cut the end stem off.
3. Immerse leaves in boiling water and boil for 3 minutes. Then drain off water. The leaves are now ready to use.
4. Rinse Tapioca (no soaking). Mix in some sugar.

5. There are few different ways to wrap Zongzi. Just search "Zongzi" on YouTube. I basically followed YouTube to make those.

6. Steam Zongzi for 1 hour. Unwrap and serve.

You can store Zongzi in refridgerator. Just steam it again for 10-15 minutes before serving.