Soon Kueh (笋粿)

My earliest memory of Soon kueh is my mother kneading the dough inside a red plastic container. I remember putting the starches into the pail and then pour hot water over that.

I didn’t like soon kueh, because it sort of reminded me of her making starch for clothes. Why would people eat starch for clothes? Yikes. (Hm… you do realize they are essentially the same thing, right?)

My husband loves these and he would buy them and I got used to eating them. No sure if I have grown to like them, but they certainly evoke lots of memories.

Today, I got inspired to do these in different ways.

Bangwang or jicama or yam bean are incredibly hard to find and expensive. So I mixed whatever I have and used Chinese chives.

I used whatever flour I have in the pantry and adjusted the texture accordingly. There was only 190g of rice flour, so I balanced that off with tapioca flour.

Instead of dried prawns, I used a triple portion of dried prawn skin.

This is how people used to cook. No recipe , no fixed rule. Just gut feel and whatever is available. Yet always yummy, always special.

Everyone had two helpings.

Had a wonderful time chatting and pleating these with my daughter.

Pan fried, water fried or steamed? We had it all together.

Pan water fried

No chillies, please

 

 

Soon Kueh

Print Recipe

Ingredients

  

Skin

• 190 g to 250g Rice Flour the less rice flour, the softer, more rice flour, more QQ
• 250 g Tapioca Flour
• 40 g Additional tapioca flour for flouring the hands and mat
• 400 ml Hot water
• 1 Tbsp Cooking oil
• 0 - 125 ml room temperature water add only if your dough is too dry

Filing

• 1 Yam Bean or turnip or bangwang or jicama they are all the same (julienne)
• 3 carrots jullienne
• 3/4 cup dried wood ear mushroom recontituted and cut into thin strips
• 11/2 cup of Chinese chives sliced thinly
• 5 garlic chopped
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 tsp chicken/bullion powder
• 1 Tbsp Cooking oil
• 1/2 cup dried prawn skin or 3 Tbsp dried prawns leave out for vegan diet

Instructions

 

Skin dough

• Place the rice flour with salt in a mixer (I used the Thermomix), and give it a quick swirl.
• Set it up for kneading and pour the hot water in a slow steady stream till mixed.
• Add the oil and set it to knead mode for 2 minutes till it becomes a dough, or, simply stir with a pair of chopsticks.
• Leave to cool covered for at least 10 minutes for the dough to cool to the touch while you make the filings.
• Add the tapioca flour and enough water such that the dough become springy. Chinese call it QQ.
• Dough is done.

Filing

• Heat a pan with oil and then fry the garlic at medium heat till golden brown.
• Add the prawn skin and cook till fragrant.
• Add in all the vegetables, fry till just jicama turns yellow, do not cook till limp!
• Add the seasoning and set aside.

Shape

• Divide the dough out in 6 portions. Keep the rest covered as you work on one.
• Using one of the 6 portions, divide dough into 6 smaller portions, about 30g each.
• Use a tortilla press or roll out thinly.
• Put a tablespoon of filing and shape according to preference.
• Steam for 12 minutes.
• Brush the dumplings with a layer of oil to stop the skin from drying up.

Water fried

• If water frying, heat up a pan with a tablespoon of oil.
• Place dumplings in the pan and lightly fried till light brown on one side.
• Fill the pan will hot water to about 1/2 mark.
• Cover the pan and remove only when you can hear that the pan is almost dry. 'Hear' means the pan goes 'tss' 'tss' 'tss', meaning it is drying up.
• Serve with kechap manis and some belachan chili sauce.

This elderly lady inspires me, reminds me of my own mother.

You can use any one of these methods to shape the dumplings.