Tang Yuan (mandarin) or Tong Yun (cantonese) is a dish of glutinous rice balls served in a sweet broth. In Southeast Asia Chinese culture, it is traditionally served on Dong Zhi or known as winter solstice. This is the time when winter is welcomed by eating tong yun. My favorite is made with peanut filling inside and since Mother-in-Law (MIL)has come to stay with us for the past few days until Sat, I've been trying to soak up every recipe I can before she leaves. =P The first one being tong yun. I was busy writing down the recipe and taking pics, so really didn't help much except the end when it's time to fill the dough. MIL did the bulk of the work. =D
Don't let this pic fool you. I ate 2 b/4 I remembered to take a pic! hehe
First start off with a bag of glutinous flour, which you can find in any asian market, and 1 3/4 cup of boiled water.
Then start adding 1 cup of boiled water, mix by hand and then the last 3/4 cup, add a little at a time so that you get the right consistency of the dough. Be careful not to burn your hands since the water is very hot. If you want, you can try wearing rubber gloves to help with the mixing. The dough should look like this when done. Sprinkle a bit of flour over the dough and pat around, then let sit with moist towel over bowl while you do the fillings.
Now you can actually have whatever fillings you like for the inside of tong yun. I've seen them being filled by red beans, black sesame seeds and in this case, peanuts.
If you want a creamier texture, you can always just use peanut butter as the filling and skip this step. If you want to have crunchier texture, continue on to make the filling. =)
Pour handful of peanuts in pan to toast over stove on medium. After few minutes, turn to low. Continue to toss peanuts in pan until toasted.
Now peel off the skins on the peanuts, put in blender and pulse till blended.
Next sprinkle about 2 T of sesame seeds, 2T of peanut butter and 1T of flour over the blended peanuts and mix by hand.
Now sprinkle a bit of flour over plate and uncover dough bowl. Grad a piece of the dough and mold it lengthwise then start forming little dough balls around the edge.
Next, roll the dough into a ball shape, flatten it with your fingers and then add peanut filling to center. Bring all the edges up and close the ends together and roll into ball shape. Try squeezing gently to make sure no air is inside and roll again.
It should look like first pic below. Repeat process till you have a whole bunch of them to place on floured pan.
Now for cooking them, boil some water with ginger in it and place the desired amount of tong yun that you want to eat. Once cooked which should only be a few minutes (like 5 or so) or until the tong yun starts to rise to the surface. Add desired amount of sugar to the pot, for me that's like 3 TB. =P Now it's done and ready to serve.
You can freeze the rest and when ready, just cook the same way frozen but timed it for about 9 mins or so and should be ready to eat. Enjoy! =)
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