My late Grandma loved Bak Chang and I started preparing home made ones for her 6 years ago as those sold outside were usually a little oily. The ones I made today were specially for thanksgiving - for folks who showed her kindness through love and encouragement during her years of illness. I’d initially thot that I would never prepare this delicacy again now that she is no longer around… but the idea of sharing her favorite food with people who love her has made this first Duan Wu Festival 端午节 without her meaningful. Here’s my humble recipe...
Again, as the recipe is quite lengthy, it is broken down into 2 posts - this one details the ingredients and preparations... and the following one, the making of the dumplings and the final product.
The main ingredients are: glutinous rice 糯米, bamboo leaves 竹叶, pork leg meat 前腿肉, chestnuts 栗子, Chinese mushrooms 香菇, dried shrimps 虾米, dried scallops 瑶柱, dried oysters 耗干, salted eggs 咸蛋, ginger 姜, garlic 蒜, shallot 葱头 and red bean paste 红豆沙. Teochews include red bean paste into dumplings to give a balance of sweet and salty taste and this type of the dumplings is called 双拼 or 2 flavours. Try it... it’s a lovely blend! The ingredients are given below:
To prepare the pork filling, please refer to Pictures (a) to (f)...
(a) Cut pork into cubes and marinate with rice wine, five spice powder, pepper, brown sugar, dark soy sauce, light soy sauce and sesame oil. Leave in the fridge overnight.
(b) Soak chestnuts in hot water, remove skin and rinse. Cook in water for an hour and set aside.
(c) Soak Chinese mushrooms in hot water till soften, rinse, drain and cut into smaller pieces.
(d) Soak dried oysters in hot water, rinse and set aside.
(e) Soak dried shrimps in hot water till soften, rinse, drain and blend.
(f) Blend garlic, shallot and ginger to give a paste.
Next, let’s cook the pork filling... heat a little oil and fry garlic paste, dried shrimps and mushrooms till fragrant. Next, stir in pork and dried oysters and add five spice powder, dark soy sauce, light soy sauce, pepper, brown sugar and rice wine. Stir fry thoroughly till the ingredients are cooked and mix in cooked chestnuts. Remove and set aside. The pork filling looks like this:
Other preparations…
(g) Rinse glutinous rice till the water becomes clear, soak in it overnight. Drain and fry lightly in a little oil and mix with a little dark soy sauce and salt.
(h) Gather salted egg yolks, rinse and drain.
(i) Soak dried scallops in hot water, rinse and steam over high heat for 2 hours.
(j) Soak bamboo leaves in hot water till soften, rinse and drain.
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