White Coffee Mooncakes......almost traditional but not

Last year was a really busy year for me as I traveled more than I ever did throughout my entire life. For a non working full time housewife, I considered myself lucky and blessed to have the luxury of  traveling to lots of beautiful holiday destinations and shopping freely without having to worry about my other half's restraint.  Ironically, the desire to shop for luxury goods and traveling no longer appeal to me but rather, I started to enjoy the simplicity of life and having less. 

I begin to relish in the freedom of lesser attachments. Ultimately, when the day comes we would still depart this world empty handed, like the way we arrived when we were born. With that realization in mind, I slowly learned to let go of the years of accumulated negative emotional feelings which I willingly trapped myself into. Once I change my perception of people, seeing the goodness in each person rather than through the lens of my ego, I begin to feel less agitated and are at peace finally.

There are still so many wonderful truth to unfold and beautiful people to meet. No matter how bad a person is, there is still goodness in them. Anyway, back to the subject of this recipe, traditional mooncake. Two weeks ago, I found a packet of green bean lotus paste among my baking supplies which was intentionally bought for the making of mooncake last year. Obviously I was too busy and not around during that time to make good the packet of lotus paste. Instead of waiting for the  arrival of this year's mooncake festival, I launched into a pre-festive baking mood to revisit the making of home made mooncake.

While making the skin/ crust, I discovered that corn syrup can also be used to in place of the golden syrup which is a stipulated active ingredient. It wasn't deliberate but I was late to notice the depleting state of the golden syrup at home and I was already in the midst of preparation. Thankfully, the corn syrup also helps to bind the flour intact for the fillings and shaping.

The use of 3-in-1 instant white coffee mix was a deliberate move as I wanted to enhance the flavor of the mooncake.  As for the salted egg yolks, I had to buy the raw preserved salted eggs and remove the yolk and steam it together with some soy sauce and sesame oil for 10mins. Another precious lesson learnt through youtube on  how to cook and prepare the salted egg yolks.

White Coffee Mooncake
Recipe adapted from 花前月下by Alan Ooi

Ingredients
(Good for 14-15 pcs of 100g Mooncakes)

For the Skin (A)
200g Low Protein Flour
25g (1 Packet) of Super 3-in-1 White Coffee Mix
160 Golden Syrup (I use 70g Golden Syrup and 90g Corn syrup)
42g Canola Oil
4ml Alkaline Water

For the Filling / Paste (B)
1kg Mung Bean Lotus Paste (Store bought)
3 Tbsp Melon Seeds

Salted Egg Yolks (optional)

Egg Wash (for coating)

Instructions

Combine all ingredients (A) and mix to form a smooth dough. Cover with cling wrap and chill in the fridge for 2 days.

Mix melon seed with lotus paste (B) until even. Divide filling into 75-80g each and shape them round. Set aside.

Dust work table with flour. Divide dough into 35g each and shape them into round balls.

Flatten dough and place filling onto center of dough. Wrap dough over the filling and shape into round ball. Dust some flour into the 6cmx6cmx3.5cmH square mooncake mould as well as coat the wrapped rounded dough with flour.

Firmly press the ball into the mould and gently knock / press out (depending on the type of mould you use) the mooncake and place them on the tray laced with preferably, non stick baking mat or parchment paper.

Lightly spray sprinkles of water onto the mooncakes before baking. Bake in a preheated oven of 175C degrees for 10 minutes.

Remove the baking tray from oven and allow the mooncakes to cool completely between 10-15 minutes before applying egg wash onto the top.

Transfer the mooncakes back into the oven and bake again for another 13-15 mins until golden brown.

Store the mooncakes in a air tight container for minimum 2 days for 回油 mooncakes to soften before serving.

Do link back to Coco Sweet Tooth if you have used any information as published in this blog.

This post is linked to Cook Your Books Event #24hosted by Joyce of Kitchen Flavours

Korean Mochi Bread

Every time before returning back to KL, I usually be swamped with days of continuous bread and cake baking to fill up the fridge bread supply for the maid (while I am away) as well as to fill up my hand carry luggage with various bakes requested by my buddies. So far I always managed to fulfill both parts until lately when I started my own blog. For me, it is indeed a time consuming hobby which leaves me not much leftover time to perform as many baking trial as I used to.

I attributed it to my lacking in writing skills plus the photography, editing, baking, selecting of baking subjects and photo shoot of the finished product. Of course, I could make it easier by eliminating the photography, editing part by randomly shoot the end product with my iPhone. Then again,  the reason I started baking was mainly to feed my photography interest thereby I couldn't complain much.

So when I came across the Korean Sesame Tapioca Bread recipe by Mimi Bakery House, I started surfing the internet for equivalent recipes as I couldn't get hold of the required Sesame Tapioca Bread Flour Mix.  In the end, I opted for Guai Shu Shu's version of the bread which he made from scratch. 

This is one of the easiest and least time consuming bread I have made. The bread has a crispy outer crust but chewy inside. It's like eating freshly made salty fritters 油條. The original recipe suggested to bake 40g dough but I find the bread rather small, hence, I decided to add more volume to the bread by increasing it to 60g each, plus a little bit of baking powder.

Personally, I feel the bread tasted best on the day of baking. On the 2nd day, the crust would have hardened slightly, but still, received positive feedback from my buddies who wolfed down the bread in no time.

I will continue hunting for the original bread flour mix recipe and make the original version one day. 

Korean Mochi Bread
Adapted from Guai Shu Shu

Ingredients

270g Glutinous Rice Flour
15g High Protein Flour / Bread Flour
1 Tsp Baking Powder
15g Milk Powder
180g UHT Milk
90g Corn Oil
30g Black Sesame Seeds
1-1/2 Tbsp Light Soya Sauce
2 Eggs
1/2 Tsp Salt

Roast black sesame seeds in preheated oven at 130C degrees for 10 mins. Set Aside.

In a mixing bowl, sift flour, baking powder and milk powder together. Set aside.

Combine milk, oil, soya sauce and salt into pot and bring the wet ingredients to boil. Stir in the flour and powder mixture. 

Remove the pot away from heat and use a wooden spoon or spatula to combine by stirring the wet and dry ingredients until mixture become a loose, crumbly dough. 

Transfer the dough into the mixing bowl. Add in eggs and continue beating the eggs into dough mixer using a electric mixer until a smooth batter is achieved. Add in the toasted sesame seeds and continue beating the batter until well combined. 

Should the dough be overly sticky to handle, add in some glutinous rice flour.

Transfer the dough onto a work surface sprinkled with glutinous rice flour.  Divide the dough into equal parts of 60g each and shape it round. Arrange the dough onto a baking mat / pan and spray some mist of water on the surface of the bread. 

Bake the bread in a preheated oven at 180C degrees for 15minutes before turning the baking pan / mat and bake for further 15 mins or until golden brown.  This will give the crust a crispy texture.

Store any unfinished bread in a freezer or air tight container. Lightly toast the bread with bread toaster for a min or two prior to consumption. 


Do link back to Coco Sweet Tooth if you have used any information as published in this blog.