Adrianna Tan
I had a delightful Chinese dessert that would not be considered a dessert by most other people.
Cold milk and fermented rice wine, with goji berries, sesame seeds, raisins, walnuts, and.. slightly scrambled eggs (yes).
I really enjoyed it. (I had this at a restaurant and immediately looked up a recipe. You can use a translator)
Adrianna Tan
In general unless you grew up with that style of dessert you are unlikely to enjoy it.
Maybe something more accessible would be like a sesame paste or sesame rice balls, but even then, things are hot when others expect it to be cold, and lots of textures. Sugar levels just very faint, more interest in balanced flavors. The line between savory and dessert is very fine in a lot of Chinese dessert.
The most traditional Teochew dessert, orh nee, is yam paste made with lard and / or coconut milk.
Adrianna Tan
It’s funny how ‘dessert’ is so distinct cultural. I often cant eat a single slice of cake. When people say awful things about my desserts (they do), I remind them that some people don’t like cake. And people who think like that have never once considered that possibility.
Adrianna Tan
@morachbeag I never get the sugar high. I get an immediate sugar down, where once I cross a threshold I immediately start feeling horrible
morachbeag
@skinnylatte Oo this sounds tasty!
Heh. Yeah, in some places dessert is "Okay, I now have so much refined sugar in my system I could run thru that wall and not notice" 😅
Adrianna Tan
@libroraptor maybe less dessert and more ‘the sweeter thing at the end of the meal?’ But even then I feel like there is way less of the ‘need something sweet to close out’ aspect in Chinese meals. It’s almost always ‘let’s go somewhere for tong sui specifically’ rather than ‘I need something sweet before I go’, which is also an interesting thing I’ve observed in other people, which I almost never experience
Alistair K
@skinnylatte Following up on that cultural gap – "dessert" itself is a tricky word, too. I wouldn't call any of those desserts because they're not dessert courses. But I'd eat 糖水 tong sui or cake any time. I feel weird about applying the European "dessert" concept to Chinese dining, like when French people say "raviolis Chinois" for 蝦餃 har gaau as if they couldn't possibly understand it except by metaphor through Italian.
"Dessert" seems to mean something different again in US English, though – almost anything sweet regardless of when it's eaten. Yet not sweet potatoes with grilled marshmallows on top.
Adrianna Tan
@libroraptor I do make an exception for exceptionally well made dessert. But since those are hard to come by, my consumption of such things is low.
Until last year, there was a Thai owned cake shop across the street. They did very good cakes with Thai flavors, like pandan and coconut and mango. More importantly it was not too sweet
Alistair K
@skinnylatte My youngest brother has threatened me with diabetes for decades because of my unending inclination towards all things sweet.
One of my favourite breakfasts is sweet red bean porridge. It is maybe a good thing that I live in a town without a Chinese bakery; having to make everything myself does limit the quantity that I eat. I made 煎堆 sesame balls for dinner a few nights ago. Mainly because the oil was hot from frying chips, I had dau saa in the fridge from not making enough bao dough earlier in the week, so the stars were obviously lined up.
We have some English-style bakeries here but none of them are good. I bought a cake a few weeks ago for a party (after not having time to bake that day) and it was disgusting. It looked like a rolled chocolate sponge but tasted neither sweet nor chocolate, and the cream inside was just a whipped-up fat-and-water emulsion, no vanilla or anything.
We did have a passable pâtisserie for a while but it was too expensive and then the owners vanished. Their debts are becoming public now...
crzwdjk ✅
@skinnylatte For example in Mexico or at least in Michoacán, dessert tamales are a thing, you make the tamal masa but instead of savory filling you add fruit flavoring and a bit of sugar and maybe raisins or nuts.
Adrianna Tan
@crzwdjk people always say tamale is like a Mexican ‘zongzi’ (or that zongzi is a Chinese tamale). We also do the same (with rice instead of masa), and for a sweet version, sweet beans or other such things too
Raven667
@skinnylatte when I'm have sushi I get tamago and fried bean curd pieces for desert, they are both sweet enough for me 😋
Adrianna Tan
@libroraptor add a leaf into any tongsui you make. You’ll instantly make a SE Asian version of Cantonese tongsui with just that addition. You can switch out the regular sugars with interesting palm sugars as well to make it even more so. I usually do a base of some kind of palm sugar, with crushed ginger and pandan leaves.
Add it to rice as well for an extra fragrance. Rice and pandan leaves have a similar smell.
Put fish or chicken inside a leaf or more (making like a parcel with a few leaves), season the protein, use a toothpick to ‘close’ the parcel, then bake the whole thing.
Alistair K
@skinnylatte "Not too sweet" is becoming more important for me as I age, too. My tastes have been shifting a lot in the last few years. I suspect that it's about losing sensitivity to other flavours and now I don't want the sugar to blot them out.
Someone gave me a few frozen pandanus leaves. I've never cooked with them before, and have eaten pandanus so seldom that I don't know what it's meant to taste like. What would you recommend as the first thing I should try?
Adrianna Tan
@raven667 I have been enjoying a hojicha panna cotta recently!
Adrianna Tan
@ChasMusic it’s cooked! Just the texture is fluffy scrambled and just done
ChasMusic (he/him)
@skinnylatte ¡Sounds delightful! My one concern is the "slightly scrambled" part - I don't do undercooked eggs.
Adrianna Tan
@libroraptor @cwicseolfor sticky rice is best eaten with a larb type of dish. Look up hot Thai kitchen for a larb gai or larb moo recipe. Also good with Thai or Chinese bbq (roast pork or chicken).
Alistair K
@cwicseolfor @skinnylatte How does one eat it – just by itself?
Here's a recipe that looked convincing to me – what do you think?
cwicseolfor
@libroraptor Pandan sticky rice. It would be simple enough to showcase the flavor. Of course, it'll be a doomed batch after the first taste if you're anything like me, the texture makes me make profoundly stupid portion choices.
@skinnylatte
Adrianna Tan
@jgrg an ayurvedic practice, but it's usually a very tiny amount in comparison to a western dessert portion especially in the US or UK
James Gilbert
@skinnylatte I've heard there are Indian meals which start with incredibly sweet desserts.
Adrianna Tan
@jgrg some indian cuisines do lean far more sweet (like gujarati). i can't eat those either
Adrianna Tan
@ChasMusic Noodle Panda in the other sunset. Good noodles and skewers and sides too
ChasMusic (he/him)
@skinnylatte ¿Would you be able to share what restaurant is serving that? I blanch whenever a recipe goes over 5 ingredients.
Adrianna Tan
@ChasMusic yep it was the first really good one in this category that I’ve tried here
ChasMusic (he/him)
@skinnylatte Looks like it's northeast cuisine, something SF doesn't have enough of
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