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When I go to the Chinese restaurant for Dim Sum, I always order the daikon radish cake (蘿蔔糕) or taro / yam cake (芋頭糕). However every time after I taste it, it always disappoints me, there aren’t enough ingredients and flavor in it, plus the texture is either too mushy or too hard. They just never taste the same like home made rice cake. Back home my grandma’s cousin sister (姨婆) always made a big serving of  taro cake for us, fully loaded with ingredients and flavor. She truly made the best taro cake. I missed it so much that I decided to try this complicated dish.

Taro or Yam Cake (芋頭糕) is not that kind of sweet cake that you find in dessert, in fact it is a savory cake made with the main ingredients of taro or yam and rice flour. It is also one of the Chinese New Year recipes that you can prepare. Traditionally it is cooked and steamed for long period of time in a big round deep mold. When it is done, they are cut into cute diamond shapes. Now they can be found in dim sum cuisines, usually cut into slices, you can either eat it as original or pan fried for extra crunchiness and fragrant.

I like my taro cake loaded with ingredients, so I added additional ingredients for more flavors, optional ingredients such as Chinese sausages, black mushrooms, chopped scallions, fried shallots and red chillies. Don’t forget to prepare the hoisin sauce and chili sauce for dipping. Although it was a lot of work, these delicious savory taro cake just made my day!

Ingredients:
4 lbs taro or yam (peeled, cut into small cubes)
2 Chinese sausage (chopped into small pieces)
5 black mushrooms (soaked in water till soft, chopped into small pieces)
1/2 cup dried shrimps (蝦米) (chopped into small pieces)
1 cup rice flour (粘米粉)
3/4 cup potato starch flour (英粟粉)
2 tbsp wheat starch flour (澄麵粉)
2 1/2 + 1 cups water
1/4 tsp five spice powder (五香粉)
1 tbsp soy sauce
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

For the toppings:
3 scallions (chopped)
2 red chillies (de-seed and chopped)
6 shallots (peeled, sliced and pan fried till golden brown)

Cooking Methods:

1. Mix the flour together and sift the flour. Add in 1 cup of water and mix well.
2. Heat  up a wok with 2 tbsp oil stir fry chopped mushrooms, Chinese sausage, dried shrimps till fragrant. Dish up.
3. In the same wok, stir fry the yam cubes with five spice powder till fragrant.
4. Add in 2 1/2 cups of water to the yam cubes and bring to boil. Turn to low heat and cook till yam cubes become slightly tender.
5. Scoop up 1/4 cup of yam and mashed into paste. Put in back to the wok. Add seasonings of soy sauce, salt and pepper. Stir well.
6. Add in other cooked ingredients of mushrooms, chinese sausage, dried shrimp. mix well.
7. Pour in the flour mixture and stir throughly. The mixture will start to become sticky. Add in some fried shallots for more fragrant if desired. Turn off heat.
8. Pour the mixture into 8″ cake mold. Steam for 45 minutes.
9. When it is done let cool a bit, top with chopped scallions, red chillies and fried shallots. Serve with hoisin and chili sauce.