Category: Snacks

How to make chinese radish cake or turnip cake (lor bak gou)

I don’t know if I’m getting older or what, but am a lot more interested in making traditional chinese dishes nowadays. I hope Liam will grow up knowing and liking food from my part of his heritage.

I love radish cakes or turnip cakes or lor bak gou , especially the fried ones. I always order the dish whenever I eat at dimsum restaurants.

However, I’ve never made one, I don’t really know why. Maybe cause it’s easy to buy them?

Till I found this recipe from Mummy Tong, a Dayrean I follow. After reading her post, I was determined to make it.

I took some liberties with the amount of salt and also omitted one ingredient as I couldn’t find it. Also, this recipe is enough for TWO 8″ x 8″ tins. That’s too much for two people but it didn’t occur to me till much later lol.

Ingredients

(A)

  • 2 pieces or 100 gms Lap yok or Chinese bacon of long chinese waxed sausages (lapcheong), soaked in hot water and diced

  • 100 gm of lapyok or Chinese bacon (I didn’t use this as I couldn’t find it), diced

  • 30 gm of dried prawns, washed and drained

  • 5 small onions, diced

  • A handful of spring onions, chopped

  • About 1 kilo of radish, peeled and grated

    • (B)

  • 400 gm or rice flour

  • 2 tbsp of cornstarch

  • 600 ml of water

    • (C)

  • 2 tsp of salt (original recipe only called for 1 tsp)

  • 1/2 tsp of white pepper powder

  • 1 tsp of white fine sugar

  • 1 tbsp of sesame oil

  • 700 ml of water

    • (D) For garnish

  • Chopped spring onions

  • Fried shallots

    • #1 – Prepare ingredients (A).

    #2 – Still preparing ingredients (A), this is the grated radish.

    #3 – Prepare ingredients (B).

    #4 – Prepare ingredients (C).

    #5 – Fry the onions, dried prawns and chinese sausages in a dash of oil till fragrant.

    #6 – Add the grated radish and cook it down for a couple of minutes.

    #7 – Now add (C) to the mixture and stir.

    #8 – Followed by (B). Stir well.

    #9 – On low heat, keep on stirring till the mixture become sticky and lumpy. This process is quite fast.

    #10 – Now add the chopped spring onions and mix in.

    #11 – Scoop mixture into an oiled tin and cover with aluminium foil. Steam on medium heat for 45 minutes.

    #12 – Chinese radish cakes, DONE! Sprinkle with (D).

    #13 – Nice eaten steamed (dang good with a dollop of sriracha) but you can cut them out into cubes and fry them up with some chinese salted vegetable (choi bou) and bean sprouts too, which is what I am going to do for lunch today :D

    By the way, buy this radish…not the tiny red ones ya. Grate till you die hah!

    Thank you Mummy Tong for such a delicious recipe!

    Saturday night in

    It’s stay at home with husband day so just put on this comfy dress.

    # – Looking at the phone.
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    Dress from a charity bazaar. Bag from Longchamp. Sandals from Ipanema Gisele Bundchen.

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    Cooked chicken kebab and made hummus for dinner today.

    # – Chicken kebab and hummus.
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    The kebab recipe here and hummus recipe here. I used chicken thighs instead of chicken breast though….much tastier!

    Then I deep fried the skin I saved from the chicken thighs for supper hehehe. Just season with salt and pepper then dunk em in hot fat. Easy peasy.

    # – Crunchy chicken crackling.
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    While nomming dinner and supper, we watched a sweet film called Win Win, followed by an old film called Mikey that is banned in the UK for like forever.

    Now watching Top Gear. Yeah, my perfect Saturday.

    First day in Bangkok with mom

    As you probably have known, am on holiday with my mummy in one of my favourite cities – Bangkok.

    We are staying in the Sukhumvit area. Thought I’d try somewhere else other than Yaowarat aka Chinatown.

    We arrived in the afternoon, perfect for a lunch of tender braised pork trotter, intestines and pickled mustard leaves with rice.

    Found this restaurant while trawling a narrow foot path dotted with stalls.

    # – Service with a grin is slightly better than service with a smile.
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    # – My perfect lunch.
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    After lunch, we bought more food; snacks for when we’re resting in our room. Saw this pudgy cat sleeping right at the front of a shop’s entrance #likeaboss

    # – Comfortable.
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    # – We bought too much food for two.
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    # – Good thing about hanging out with mom…..access to properly plated street snacks. There were more food that’s not in picture :P
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    After that, we food coma napped for a couple of hours before heading out for oil massages. It was soooOo good.

    Then we bought more snacks from a nearby convenience store. Then, we ate supper of noodles and mussel pancakes right outside our hotel.

    # – Supper time! That is mummy waiting for our food.
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    And here I am now, lying in bed, digesting & blogging this post. Thanks for reading!