Mooncake Attempt (1) - Snowskin Mooncake

The mid-Autumn festival is around the corner. Something that makes me shock is that today's people sell festival food tend to earlier. The mid-autumn festival is on October 1st but I already saw people making mooncakes and sell them at the end of July! What?! Can mooncake keep that long? Or people are just eager to eat one? Maybe they open slots for people's orders? I don't know, maybe both?

Anyway, as usual, each year I try to make mooncakes for my own self for much healthier and cheaper! You know, there days a piece of mooncake is expensive! And always, mine mooncake can't keep that long and mold easily. Not sure my storing method or making method went wrong but still try to make a small amount for myself. 

The recipe is somewhere I found online, write it down and do a little bit modify. I do not claim this recipe as my own. 

Ingredients:

Sweet potato paste:

3 palm-size sweet potatoes (about 10cm long, 5cm wide)

4tsp granulated sugar

1tbsp condensed milk

3tbsp corn oil

1/8tsp salt

1tbsp glutinous rice flour

1 1/2tbsp water 

1tbsp cocoa powder -for 1/2 of the paste (optional)

2tbsp melon seeds (optional)

Steps:

1. Wash and peel the skin of sweet potatoes. Cut into cube size for easy and faster to steam. Steam about 15-20min. Insert skewer/chopstick if it inserts through, it means is cooked.
2. Take out and use fork /potato masher to mash the sweet potato into a fine paste. Or use a blender to blend until a finer paste.
3. Add in sugar and mix until sugar dissolve.
4. Then mix all the ingredients until all combine.
5. Transfer the mixture to a microwavable bowl and cover the top. Microwave it in 800w for 2min for the first round. Take out and stir.
6. Repeat step, stir every 1min of microwaving until the mixture forms a dough-like paste which takes 6-7min.
7. Let it cool slightly, then cover the directly on top of the paste with plastic wrap and let it cool down. Then wrap it with plastic wrap and put it in the fridge before use.
8. If you want another separate flavor, knead the paste with cocoa powder and add some melon seeds for texture.

Snowskin:

30g glutinous rice flour

25g rice flour

20g wheat starch

1tbsp condensed milk

20g granulated sugar

125ml milk

10g corn oil

1/4tsp of each food powder (I use 1/2tsp for black sesame powder, purple sweet potato powder, pea flower powder, and matcha powder.)

50g  cooked glutinous rice flour (roast it with pan until slightly brown)

Steps:

1. Prepare a pot of boiling water for steaming.
2. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl except food powder.
3. Before putting into the steamer, stir well the mixture as the starch will sink down at the bottom. Then cover it with a plate to prevent water drop.
4. Steam for 20min.
5. Once done steaming, take out, let it cool down a bit, and knead the snowskin. Divided into 4 equal portions (4 colors) and add in food powder into each dough and knead until all combined. Wrap it with plastic wrap and put it into the fridge for 30mins before use.
6. Measure out all the sweet potato paste and snowskin dough. I use a 50g of mooncake mold presser with 30g of sweet potato paste + 20g of snowskin dough. 
7. Cover the snowskin dough with cooked glutinous rice flour, flatten it out.
8. Wrap the paste and roll into a ball.
9. Cover the ball with some cooked glutinous rice flour. Then, put it into the presser and gently press and take out. 
10. Store the snowskin mooncake in an airtight container and put it into the fridge.

A little mistake made this time, I forgot to put the snowskin dough into the fridge to let it set to a firmer dough. That's why my dough is so sticky and soft. When I try molding it by using the mooncake presser it stick and there is too much cooked glutinous rice flour on the mooncakes that make it look white-ish like snow. 

When it comes to how long I can put it? I can't give an answer but with my experience, the snowskin mooncake will start to harden on the 3rd day. I have tried to microwave it at 800w for 10 sec, it will soft again but is not cold to eat anymore but at room temperature. If you don't mine, it still can act like mochi but a less chewy mochi. 

If you have leftover with some of the sweet potato paste and not use immediately you can store it at the freezer. I saw some posts on FB that you can store the paste in the freezer for a month. Not sure about it, but you can try a small amount to test it out though. For me, I just recommend to eat it fresh. The recipe is not that much. I think it can make for about 8 snowskin mooncakes ( I forgot how much I make since this is passed for like 3 weeks or so.)