Previous Post: Cross your teacakes   Next Post: Tangyuan

Niangao

February 11th, 2009

There are many variations of niangao (usually based on region – Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, etc), so I’ll just blog about the one I’m most familiar with – niangao from Singapore (also known as Tee Kueh or Kuih Bakul in Malaysia). Niangao is a sort of sweet ‘cake’ or ‘pudding’, made from glutinous rice flour.

Although commercially available all year round, it is especially eaten during Chinese New Year for its auspicious meaning.  The words nian gao literally mean “year cake”, but gao also means “high”, so symbolically, it means something like “higher each year”.  Thus, it is eaten or given to others during Chinese New Year – that time of year when auspicious greetings and wishes for happiness, prosperity, good health, good fortune, and ANYTHING else GOOD, are… well… good.

Some Chinese display niangao in their kitchens a week before the Chinese New Year.  This is because there’s a belief that the Kitchen God returns to heaven before the new year with a ‘household report’, kind of like ‘em HACCP guys. And like Santa, he knows if you’ve been good or bad.  So some folk offer this super sticky and sweet rice cake to the Kitchen God so that it glues his mouth shut and he has nothing to report to ‘headquarters’, or perhaps so that only sweet words will come out of his mouth!

We weren’t able to make our annual trip back to Singapore and Malaysia this year and Dubai isn’t exactly a place you’d easily find goodies from home to usher in the Lunar New Year.  Apart from mandarins, pineapples and a very hard pomelo, almost everything else symbolic of Chinese New Year had to be handmade.  From decorations to CNY snacks and goodies.

I finally found CM Supermarket (a small minimart in Karama that sells Thai food products), and paid an arm and a leg for some banana leaves.  I found out the next day that it’s also sold at the huge Lulu Hypermarket in Al Barsha for much cheaper.  Anyway, inspired with these leaves, I decided to try my hand at making niangao.  I wasted my first batch by following an absolutely bogus recipe from a magazine, which was actually a carbon copy of a recipe from another “recipe” book that we actually paid good money for.  Don’t you just hate these fake recipes?!!

Anyway, I finally combined a few niangao recipes sourced from the Internet and surprisingly managed to get it (quite) right.  You definitey need a lot of arm strength to stir the super thick mixture of flour, water, sugar and gula melaka (palm sugar).  The mixture was very lumpy so I had to manually ‘de-lump’ it till I got a smooth, silky texture.  And I just wasn’t able to keep the surface of the ‘cake’ dry while it was steaming in the pot, even after covering it with muslin and parchment.  So it looked quite gross after it was done.  However, the ugly duckling actually turned out nice after it was left to cool and set in the fridge for a day.

We only used it for display throughout the new year for its symbolism.  But of course, it can be eaten.  Even if its got a bit of mould on the surface, you can slice off the nasty bits.  And if it has become too hard, it can be re-steamed.  One way my Mom prepares tee kueh as a snack back home is to cut it into small pieces, steam it till softened, then roll in grated coconut (with a bit of salt).  A bit like Kuih Kosui.  Another popular way of eating niangao is when it’s cut into thick slices, sandwiched between a slice of sweet potato and yam, dipped in batter and deep-fried.  Delish!  Nothing the Kitchen God can complain about for sure.

Ingredients & Method

Banana leaves – boiled to soften and to remove waxy residue, then cut into strips to line ramekin or cake tin.  Best if it’s long enough so that the strips can be folded over the edge of the tin on the outside. Tie a string around the edge to keep the leaves in place. Brush the leaves with a bit of vegetable oil.

330g castor sugar + 170g gula melaka (can be substituted with brown sugar, or simply use 500g castor, brown or palm sugar).  Personally, I like the flavour from the palm sugar, and it gives the niangao a richer and deeper colour too.

Melt the sugar with 1 + 1/3 cups of water + 2-3 pandan (pandanus) leaves. Leave syrup to cool.

500g glutinous rice flour – sift into a large mixing bowl. Mix in 1-2 tbs vegetable/corn oil.  Make a well in the center and add in the cooled syrup, then stir/mix well till a smooth and creamy texture is achieved.

Pour into ramekin/cake tins.  Cover with muslin or parchment and steam for 5 – 8 hours.  Let cool, then keep in refridgerator to set. Makes 1 medium-sized (15cm diameter cake tin) and 2 small (ramekin-sized) cakes.

Ben improved on my recipe at work the next day and produced much better results.  And armed with the right kitchen tools, he didn’t have to worry about lumps and such.  Here’s his recipe (enough to feed a few kitchen gods and their many minstrels).

• 3000g glutinous rice flour
• 600g corn oil
• 3000g castor sugar
• 3000g water
• 5 pandan leaves

1. 1. Make syrup with sugar, water and leaves.  Leave to cool till at least below 6 degrees Celcius.
2. 2. Remove pandan leaves and add oil to syrup.
3. 3. Add flour and mix well.
4. 4. Strain the mixture and let it sit for 3 hours.
5. 5. Steam for 9 hours.