VIETNAMESE MOON CAKE RECIPE

For 5 persons

Preparation Time: 1 month for the salted eggs, 5 hours for the dough

Cooking Time: 30 minutes

Difficulty: 4 stars

What you need: A special baking mould for moon cakes

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1. SALTED EGGS

Ingredients:

• 5 fresh eggs
• 150 g of coarse salt
• 1/2 liter of water
• A bit of rice alcohol
• Black Cardamom (Indian spice easy to find in Asia, can be substituted with ginger or cinnamon)

Preparation:

• Dissolve the coarse salt and spices in a pot of boiling water.
• Allow the water to cool down.
• Place the eggs in a container (it must be large enough and must be able to close it).
• Pour the mixture into the container. Close it up and store in a cool place. Let it marinate for a month (yes, a month!).

Note:  It is possible to buy ready cooked salted eggs, but it may be expensive.

Cooking:

• Remove the eggs from the mixture.
• Cook them in a pot of boiling water like hard-boiled eggs for about 10 minutes.
• Break the eggs and collect the eggyolk.
• Soak the yolks in a little water and rice alcohol to eliminate the smell.

2. THE DOUGH

Ingredients:

• 150g of flour
• 375g of lotus seed paste
• 4 teaspoons of peanut oil
• 1 teaspoon of Pu-erh Chinese tea (or green tea)
• 1/2 teaspoon of baker’s yeast
• 50g of sugar
• 1 fresh egg yolk

Preparation:

• Separate 5 portions of lotus seed paste. In the center, place a salted egg yolk. Roll it up until you get a ball.
• Mix the flour, sugar, tea, yeast and oil until you obtain an even dough. Let it rest under a wet cloth for 4 hours.
• Separate 5 portions of the dough. Pour a dough base into each of the moon cake mould, add the ball of lotus seed paste, then finish pouring the dough to fill each of the moulds.
• Flatten it well. Remove from the mould. Place them on a baking tray.
• To brown the cake when baking: mix the egg yolk with a little sugar and water and brush the cake with the mixture.

Baking:

• Preheat your oven to 200ºC.
• Bake for 15 minutes at 200ºC.
• Remove the cakes from the oven and sprinkle with water.
• Bake again for 5 minutes at 180ºC.
• Remove the cakes and brush it with the mixture previously prepared in order to make it brown.
• Cook for another 10 minutes.
• Remove from the oven.

Tips for serving:

Be careful, cakes can be very filling and serving small portions is widely recommended. They are usually served with Vietnamese tea.

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