Steamed Red Bean Rice Cake (Poot Jei Gou)

Heidi also made a dessert which is Steamed Red Bean Rice Cake. It is normally known as ‘Poot Jai Gou’ in Cantonese which simply means ‘dessert in a little bowl’. This is because the rice cake is steamed in small bowls. You can use bowl made in clay, porcelain, aluminum, etc. It does not matter, you just need bowls or else you cannot call this ‘Poot Jai Gou’. :-)

The Steamed Red Bean Rice Cake is very easy to make but requires a lot of time in preparing the red bean. The red bean has to be soaked in water at least two hours (preferably overnight) and steamed for at least 40 minutes. This is to make sure they are softened but not mushy. To sweeten the red bean, add 1 oz of granulated sugar after it is softened. The recipe calls for 1/2 cup of red bean.

Steamed Rice Cake is a popular snack Malaysia, found commonly in open air markets. However, those found on Malaysian market they are salty types and with topping made from salted radish. Anyone has a recipe for this?

Heidi made the sweet version of the rice cake. She made two different flavours — which is coconut milk and cane sugar flavour. The photo below is the cane sugar version.

Ingredients

• 320g rice flour
• 300g cane sugar (slab sugar) or 300g of granulated sugar for the coconut milk flavour version
• 960g (4 1/2 cups) water
• 1 tablespoon tapioca starch
• 1 tablespoon wheat starch
• 1 packet of instant coconut cream powder (50g) for the coconut milk flavour version only

Instructions

Sift the rice flour, tapioca starch and wheat starch into a large bowl.

Add one cup of warm water to the dry ingredients and knead until a dough is formed.

Let the dough sit for 10 minutes. The kneading and letting the dough sit will gives a chewier texture to the rice cake.  If you prefer a more softer texture, skip the kneading and dough forming part and go straight to the step below.

After the dough has rested, add 1 1/2 cups of cold water and mix well.  For the coconut milk flavour, add in the instant coconut cream powder at this stage.

Bring two cups of water and the slab sugar (or granulated sugar for the coconut milk flavour version) to a boil. Stir until the sugar is dissolved.

For the slab sugar version, you need to strain the syrup as there might be some impurities in it.  Pour the hot syrup into the rice flour mixtures while whisking vigorously to partially cook the flour mixtures.

Meanwhile, prepare a big steamer and place the little bowls in it to warm up them up.

Pour the mixtures into the little bowls and remember to stir your mixtures often to prevent the flour from sinking to the bottom.  If you are using a gas stove with high flames, skip the following step. Cover the steamer and steam for a minute or two to let the rice cake set a little.

Add in a tablespoon of the red bean onto the rice cake which has set a little. This will prevent the red bean from sinking to the bottom of the bowl.

Cover the steamer and steam for another 18 minutes.  To prevent water from dripping onto the rice cake, wrap the cover with a cloth to absorb any water condensation.  Let the rice cake to cool down before you take it out from the bowl. The rice cake will be firmer when it cools.

Heidi, thank you so much for sharing the recipes. The Steamed Red Bean Rice Cake certainly brings back lots of memory of the street food from Malaysia.

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