Maltose Crackers 麥芽糖夾餅

Here's a treat straight from the past of Hong Kong!  These simple to make and yummilicious snacks were sold from street vendors to children in the 50s and 60s of Hong Kong.  The conveniently sandwiched stick allows children to eat their snacks and run around at the same time.  A type of Hong Kong  lollipop, if you will.  

Both savory and sweet, these Maltose Crackers 麥芽糖夾餅 are unique snacks from Hong Kong's past!  Plus they're so easy to make that kids can do it themselves, with some supervision during the maltose part...you don't want to come back and find them ensnarled in a sugary web!

Chinese Candied Walnuts 琥珀核桃

I've been wanting to make these special treats for a long time, since last year actually.  I had everything prepared to make it last Chinese New Year but never got around to it...sigh.  I love eating these nuts, it's absolutely my favorite way to eat walnuts!  

These Chinese Candied Walnuts, or 琥珀核桃, are just gorgeous: lovely caramel coated walnuts deep fried to a crunchy deep golden brown sheen.  It tastes like nothing else, the lick of sweetness of the almost burnt caramel in pleasing contrast to the slightly bitter nuttiness of the walnut.  So yummilicious!  

This Chinese New Year we made a whole bunch of these delicious traditional symbols of abundance and wealth and presented them, the lovely darling things, to our New Year's guest as part of the selection in our Tray of Togetherness 攢盒.

Bing Tanghulu Candied Hawthorn Stick 冰糖葫蘆

Gosh darn-namit...I'm super excited about these!  For up to a thousand dusty long years, on any street corner in China might be found a street vendor holding a wood pole spiked with these traditional candy fruit skewers for children.  And since they are a lovely lucky red color and a beautifully rounded symbol of happiness and family reunion, they are especially popular during the Chinese New Year celebrations when all children would get one of these as an extra special treat!  

Besides being super cool and fun to eat and super yummilicious to boot, these lovely traditional Chinese hard caramel coated fruit skewers also have the coolest name: Bing Tanghulu Candied Hawthorn Stick or 冰糖葫蘆.

How to Wrap Jau Gok Peanut Puff Dumplings 炸油角包法

We just finished posting on how to make those delightful Chinese New Year's sweet treats, the Jau Gok Peanut Puff Dumpling, or 炸油角.  This little dumpling is really easy to make and easy to wrap as well if you use a dumpling press of some sort.  But...if you want to go all traditional and hard core and wrap by hand, the wrapping is a bit more tricky, so we decided to do a quick post on How to Wrap Jau Gok Peanut Puff Dumplings 炸油角 by hand.

Jau Gok Peanut Puff Dumpling 炸油角 / 炸角仔

This post is inspired by the stories that have come in from our dear readers that spoke of their fond memories of the making and eating of the traditional Chinese New Year Treat, Jau Gok Peanut Puff Dumpling, 油角 or 角仔, also known as Tim Gok or Gok Jai.  This sweet treat is especially made by grandmas and grandpas, mothers and fathers for the Chinese New Year festivities as snacks to munch on and to share with the many Chinese New Year guests expected.  

Another good reason to make and serve these crunchy munchies is that the distinctive shape of the Jau Gok is evocative of the gold ingots that the Chinese used for centuries as money.  So you could make and eat piles of golden ingots, what better way to start off the Year of the Monkey!?  

Pan Fried Cheung Fun (Rice Rolls) with Egg 香煎腸粉炒蛋

Recently we were really excited when a new little food shop opened on our street and we saw that they sold all kinds of chinese noodles (like Cantonese egg noodles), and most exciting of all, at least for me, was that they sold really fresh Cheung Fun 腸粉, also known as Rice Rolls or Rice Noodle Rolls.  

Cheung Fun is used for all kinds of dishes, both savory and sweet, but for myself the favorite preparation is the classic Hong Kong snack food Pan Fried Cheung Fun with Egg.  Chewy fragrant rice, just fried egg clinging to the rolls, splashes of sweet soy sauce and oh, the tasty deliciousness of hoisin sauce!  YUMM...comfort food alert!!

Traditional Taiwanese Cakes

Published: 2013-10-22

My 媽媽 came to us from Taiwan, where she stopped for a while before coming to Hong Kong.  With her came a suitcase chock full of delicious Taiwan snacks and cakes of all kinds.  Here we share about the delicious little cakes that she brought: the Pineapple Cake, 鳳梨酥,  and the Suncake, 太陽餅.  These are traditional cakes that Taiwan is famous for.  As my mom lived in Taiwan when she was young gal, she obviously knew where to go to get the real stuff.  And that, as usual, makes a lot of difference!

Hong Kong Late Night Snack 食宵夜

Published: 2011-10-12

In Hong Kong there are the usual standard three meals a day: breakfast, lunch and dinner; and then there is the special Hong Kong style forth meal: late night snack or 食宵夜.  You don't have to 食宵夜 but the opportunity and the luxury is always there.  

So there we were one late, late night, hungry as wolves for some reason and looking for some good hot satisfying food.  We ended up at our local late night Hong Kong style roasted meats eatery, or 燒味舖, which sells the classic Cantonese roasted meats atop of rice or noodles or a la carte.  This little eatery is open until 4 am every night, proving the 'Oh So Seriousness' of the Hong Kong people towards 食宵夜.