Mid-Autumn Festival Mooncakes • 中秋節的月餅
Updated: Jul 3, 2021
Hello, my name is Halden Levin, and you are listening to Little Dragon’s Journey. 你好！我叫李靜辰，你正在聽小龍的旅程。
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中秋節快樂！Happy Mid-Autumn Festival! Autumn actually began on September 22, 2020, and will end December 21, 2020, so it’s not actually mid-autumn today, but it is the Mid-Autumn Festival. Before I talk about mooncakes, and the laborious process I went through to make a small batch, I think it’s important to talk about “what is the Mid-Autumn Festival?”
Occurring on the 15th day of the 8th month of the Chinese lunar calendar, the Mid-Autumn Festival is an important holiday celebrated in many Eastern/South-Eastern Asian countries. Primarily, the Mid-Autumn Festival is characterized by family gatherings/reunions, gazing at the full moon, gifting and eating mooncakes, lighting lanterns, etc. There is of course much more to be said, but that’s a pretty brief, basic overview. For more information, check out the links in the transcript:
What are mooncakes? Mooncakes is a Chinese delicacy traditionally consumed during the Mid-Autumn Festival. Traditionally, mooncakes are round, like the moon, with a crispy pastry shell and a dense filling, such as lotus seed paste, red bean paste, and sesame seed paste. Sometimes salted duck egg yolks are baked in the center. The tops of mooncakes typically have Chinese characters or symbolic images imprinted. There are a lot of variations on the original form of mooncakes. One popular, and more recently developed, mooncake style are snow skin mooncakes, which are mochi-skinned, non-baked, and served chilled. During the Mid-Autumn Festival, mooncakes are commonly gifted to friends, family members, and colleagues. Also, although originating in China, mooncake creation/consumption and the Mid-Autumn Festival celebrations occur throughout Asia.
To be completely honest, Chinese people don’t usually make mooncakes themselves, since they’re not difficult or expensive to acquire, and making mooncakes is not easy, especially traditional mooncakes. Given this information, you may wonder why I would try making mooncakes. Well, for one, acquiring fresh, inexpensive mooncakes in the United States isn’t easy, and I like to have control over the ingredients I’m using; I’m certainly a fan of occasionally indulging while still being health conscious.
Since I prior had no knowledge on how to make mooncakes, I did a little research, and the best resource I found is “The Ultimate Guide to Traditional Mooncake（传统广式月饼）” from the Omnivore’s Cookbook. Per the Omnivore’s Cookbook’s directions, to start the mooncake making process, I purchased a few tools and ingredients, including mooncake molds (for properly shaped mooncakes), a pocket scale (for precise measuring), and glutinous rice flour (for the filling and shell). Two ingredients the recipe called for, golden syrup and kansui, were a bit difficult to find, so I made them myself.
For step one, I made golden syrup; a simple, but long process. First, I mixed 200 ml of water and 400 g of caster sugar and brought the mixture to a boil. Then I added about 50 ml of lemon juice and let simmer for about 40 minutes. Over time, the translucent mixture transformed into a beautiful golden-colored syrup that was over 230 degrees Fahrenheit. I’ve actually made homemade caramel before, and the key with these sweets is that you’ve got to go slow and be patient. For kansui, the process was pretty simple: I baked baking soda and mixed my baked baking soda with water.
With all the proper tools and ingredients prepped, I got into making the mooncakes, starting with the black sesame seed filling. First, I carefully and briefly roasted my black sesame seeds. Roasting nuts or seeds on the stove always makes me a bit nervous because I’m afraid of going too far and burning the nuts or seeds. One time, I went a bit overboard and badly burnt a good portion of hazelnuts. Hazelnuts are not cheap.
Once properly roasted, I blended/mixed together the black sesame seeds, powdered sugar, butter, and glutinous rice flour. We don’t have a food processor, so I just used a blender instead, but please note that food processors work much better. Traditional blenders usually don’t blend as fine or as thoroughly as food processors; making nut butters, nut milks, pastes, and what not generally requires a food processor. Any who, with the not-super-fine paste I made, I created 10 balls, and placed half a salted duck egg yolk in the center.
While the filling cooled in the fridge, I worked on making the dough, combining golden syrup, kansui, peanut oil (one of my favorite oils for the fragrance), and cake flour. After kneading the dough a few times, I covered the dough and let it rest and repeated this kneading/rest process one more time.
Once the dough was ready, I finally got into the assembly process. This took me much longer than it should. The dough was a bit sticky and difficult to fully and evenly cover the filling. I fully recommend using plastic gloves to make it easier to handle the dough. After quite some time, I was able to produce 10 mooncakes. I think using the mooncake molds was one of the most enjoyable parts of the process. Traditionally, mooncake molds are carved out of wooden slabs, but the ones I used were plastic stamps.
Cooking the mooncakes was probably the easiest part. I cooked the mooncakes for a good 8 minutes or so, covered the top of the mooncakes with egg wash (honestly a bit too much egg wash), and then cooked them again for another 8 minutes. After the mooncakes cooled, I stored them in a container for a few days. According to the Omnivore’s Cookbook, mooncakes look and taste the best after 3 days, which I can personally attest to.
I was honestly scared that my family wouldn’t like the mooncakes, since the flavor of traditional mooncakes is quite different from conventional Western desserts. However, everyone, especially my younger brother, seemed to enjoy the mooncakes (none were wasted).
In Chinese class, our teacher asked us if we had ever tried mooncakes, and since none of us had, she offered to send mooncakes to us. Unfortunately, due to the salted duck eggs, she said she wasn’t able to legally send us traditional mooncakes.
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Please visit haldenlevin.wixsite.com/littledragonjourney to access the transcript of this episode, and know you are always welcome to contact me through my website, email, or social media. Thank you for joining Little Dragon’s Journey. 謝謝你們參加小龍的旅程。拜拜！
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