Hi there
Dragon boat festival is coming, and the quinessential delicacies during this festival is no other than Rice Dumplings. By now, you will have already seen many rice dumplings promotions. π
But if you are into something special and would like to try your hands on making some, I have a simple guide here for you. π
Every year my grandma or mum will make some of these rice dumplings, and this year we wanted to make something different, actually vegetarian rice dumplings to be exact.
Ingredients are pretty standard and are easy to source. π
Ingredients
- Glutinous Rice β 2Kg, Β½ teaspoon of salt & pre soak for one hour before cooking (or soak overnight)
- Dried Bamboo Leaves β half pack
- Thwee Bak β 500g, parboil and dice into cube size
- Dried shrimps β 150g, pound finely
- Shallot β 100g, sliced finely
- Mushrooms β handful, soak and diced in cube size
- Garlic β half clove, pound finely
- Winter melon β 6pcs, diced finely
- White pepper β 1 teaspoon
- 5 ground spices β 2 teaspoon
- Black & Light soya sauce β 1 te!spoon
- Salt β 1 teaspoon
Diced up all the ingredients for easy wrapping.
We have also boiled some Japanese red beans and also used packet Korean chestnut to make our vegetarian rice dumplings, just mix all the ingredients together.
Preparations of the fillings
- Add oil in wok (if you do not want to use lard, but honestly lard taste better though), sautΓ©ed garlic, shallot until fragrant
- Add dried shrimp, fry for 15 secs
- Add mushroom, pork, winter melon, fry for 1 min
- Add white pepper, 5 ground spices, black & light soya sauce, salt and fry until the fillings are fragrant
Preparation of Bamboo leaves
- Wash the dried bamboo leaves with hot water, rinse well to rid off any impurities and also this helps to soften the leaves so that it will not curled up during wrapping
- Sieve out excess water from the soaked glutinous rice.
- Fold the bamboo leaves as the image.
- Scoop the glutinous rice, layer meat fillings, then lastly another layer of glutinous rice.
- Tie the rice dumplings very tightly with the string so it will loosen out during the boiling
- Boil the rice dumplings in a large pot of water for 1 hour & 15 mins, remember to check and refill the pot with hot boiling water and ensure all rice dumplings are immersed in the hot water.
I used a very large pot to boil the dumplings, please take note remember to separate different pots if you plan to make both meat and vegetarian dumplings, in case the vegetarian dumplings will taste like the meaty ones.
One good tip after boiling the rice dumplings is to hang it up so that excess moisture will be dripped down, this will enable the rice dumplings from becoming over mushy and also they can then beΒ stored in the fridge for longer period.
My grandma has used pressure cooker to cook the rice dumplings too, but I personally prefer not using it, although it is much more convenient. The reason is that I find the rice became a little too mushy and I find it lost some bite to it.
So after the boiling part, you will be able to try out the fruit of your labor. π
I like the vegetarian ones using Japanese red bean, Korean chestnut, and Thai Glutinous rice, hahaha…
Most people use the raw chestnut when cooking rice dumpling, but I find raw chestnuts these days just does not taste as nice as it used to.
So I resort to using the packet ones instead. I tried both the Tianjin and Korean one, and Korean ones taste far better as it has this subtle sweetness to it. Perfect to make rice dumplings.
Feel free to adjust the rice amount and fillings amount, that’s the beauty of making your own rice dumplings, you can adjust and make your own version. π
Serve the rice dumplings with some Chinese tea and this can store in the fridge for up to one week to a max of 2 weeks, as it is free from preservatives.
You can either steam or heat it up in the microwave. If you do use the microwave instead, do remember to untie the rice dumplings, without unwrapping the leaves, place in the microwave and heat it up. I find this way the rice dumplings can retain more moisture and also the fillings will be heated up faster.
QUICK & SIMPLE FESTIVE RECIPES – RICE DUMPLINGS RECIPES FOR DRAGON BOAT FESTIVAL
Happy Dragon Boat Festival!
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Cheers,
Dawn