Today we help our host prepare some turnip pudding for the Chinese New Year Festival. Our host knows that we are really good with cooking so she enlists her help. And we are excited to learn some Chinese cooking too! There are many types of cakes or puddings for the ew year, the sweet ones made with ingredients such as sugar, coconut, red beans, waterchestnuts and the savory ones with yam or turnip. For our host, her favorite is the turnip pudding.
First we prepare the ingredients. We have sausages, shiitake mushrooms and dried shrimps.
I dice the mushrooms after soaking them in water.
Then the shrimps.
And the sausages. It's a lot of work!
Now we season them with some cooking wine, sugar and soy sauce.
Next come the main ingredient, the turnip. We use 6 lbs of it!!
We peel and shred it.
Now we are ready to cook! First we stir fried the diced ingredients.
Then the turnip. I work together with my twin as the work is getting heavy!
Now, we mix everything together.
We prepare a paste of rice flour and corn starch with water, which we add to the mix.
Everything is poured into a pan.
We now steam the pudding for an hour.
When it's cooked through we add some sesame for garnishing. Our host usually uses some cilantro too but she forgot to buy some.
Now it's ready! The pudding is enjoyed with some soy sauce and hot sauce. It's very delicious.