Chinese New Year is the upcoming big festival in Singapore. Like all other festive moments, food plays a major role in this festival too. Nian gao is the traditional
Chinese New Year cake that is made with rice flour and unlike other modern types of cakes, it is a steamed one. But many modern bakers have introduced baked versions too.
Those who don’t have a microwave can opt for the steaming method. For that, you need to simply prepare the batter (as mentioned below) and place it inside a bamboo steamer where you have to let it steam for 3 hours minimum. Thus, you need to keep on adding hot water every hour so that the cake batter is properly steamed.
These days, most people don’t have that much time and thus here is the microwave recipe of Nian gao that will save your time.
Read below the recipe of Nian gao- the sweet and traditional cake for Chinese New Year.
Ingredients:
- Unsalted Butter- 3 tsp
- Sweet rice mochiko flour- 1 pound or 3 cups
- Eggs- 4 large
- Whole milk- 3 cups
- Granulated sugar- 2 and a half cups
- Toasted Almond slices- 2 tsp
- Toasted Sesame seeds- 2 tsp
- Toasted coconut (sweetened)- 2 tsp
- Chinese red dates- 1 tsp
- Almond extract- 1 tsp
- Table salt- 1/4th tsp
Process to make Nian gao
- First of all, pre-heat the oven for at least half an hour to 325 degree Celsius
- Butter a 9-inch round cake pan
- Take a large bowl and whisk the eggs one by one
- Then in that egg mixture add flour, melted butter, granulated sugar, milk, salt, and almond extract
- Keep on whisking until you receive a smooth batter
- Now pour this already tempting mixture into a 9-inch round pan
- Tap the pan so that no air bubbles are left
- Now, place this pan in the oven
- Bake exactly for 30 minutes in the pre-heated oven
- Now, take the cake out once and sprinkle toasted almond, sesame seeds, Chinese red dates, and coconut on top of the cake
- Insert the cake pan again and bake for another 25 minutes until you get the shining golden brown colour
- Remove the cake from the pan carefully and let it cool for 15-20 minutes before cutting and serving
I hope this easy and simple recipe of Nian gao- the traditional Chinese New Year cake will help you create many sweet memories on your table this year.
