Chinese White Honeycomb Cake - Pak Thong Koh Version 3, Yochana's/Y3K

Seeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!! Seeee the picture. What do you see? I’ve got double decker honeycombs!!!!!!!

I was so so happy when I cut through the kuih.
Oh please be happy for me.



I didn’t expect this recipe to yield me my dream result, double decker honeycombs as seen from this pic.

I’ve never seen any blogger having double decker honeycombs with any recipe, or is there any out there, let me know. I wonder if it’s due to the yeast or me chilling the batter during the last stage of fermentation, or due to me using wheat starch instead of tapioca starch. I don’t know, I just don’t but I’m darn happy!!!!! Wooohooo!!!!

This recipe is so tasty!!! Really!! It’s bouncy, crunchy, doesn’t stick to teeth at all, almost like a fishball. You get what I mean? But not those super super bouncy fishball ah, regular real fish fishballs. It doesn’t taste grainy like my 2nd version. The sweetness is just nice. Slightly sweeter than my 1st version, but definitely not too sweet. It smells sweet, yeastily sweet, not a tinge of sourness detected.

One thing about this though, I find this to be too thick if steamed on a 10 inch round pan as said in the original recipe. I used a 11 inch round pan and I got a 2 inch high cake (at the center). You can split the batter into two 8 or 9 inch pans to get a thinner cake.

Thank you so much Aunty Yochana for sharing this recipe. Indeed very very good. But needs advanced time planning to do this. But don’t worry, you can use the fridge to manipulate your time, just like I did

See them again........ and I shall talk about the recipe

Starter dough (Tuesday Day 1 : time: 12pm)
100gm cooled, cooked rice
½ Tbsp Chinese Wine Yeast ( 甜酒饼，Ragi, sweet type)
1 tsp sugar
½ Tbsp water
Mix everything together, keep in a covered container (not air tight, best is use those disposable Microwave safe containers that comes with your take-away sweet desserts).
Leave it somewhere dark (Aunty Yochana use the cupboard) to ferment for 48 hours. (I open it once every 12 hours to let it have some fresh air)
After 48 hours, weight out 60gms (balance keep in fridge for the next recipe) and see instructions below.

Kuih Starter dough (Thursday Day 3: Time 12pm)
60gm starter dough
100gm rice flour
Some plain water (Now, only if it’s too dry. Add some just to moisten)

Mix everything together in another container. Leave to ferment for 16-18 hours
Weigh out 80gm of this. (keep balance in fridge for the next recipe)

Friday Day 4 : Time 10am
Ingredients (A):
220 gm. pure rice flour (Cap Teratai, Cap Gajah are blended rice flours, and if you choose to use these 2 brands, omit the starch below and subsitute the amount with more blended rice flour)
30 gm. tapioca starch (I used wheat starch)
280 gm. water

Ingredients (B):
200 gm. castor sugar
400 ml. water
3 blades of pandan leaves (tied into a knot)

Ingredients (C):
80 gm. of the fermented kuih starter dough

Method:
(1) Combine ingredients (A) together in a big mixing bowl. Set aside.
(2) Bring ingredients (B) to a boil, then discard pandan leaves. Pour half portion into no. (1) and mix well. Cool the remaining half portion for about 2 mins. before pouring into the rice flour mixture in the mixing bowl. Mix well, leave mixture to cool.
(3) Add the 80 gm. of fermented kuih starter dough and sieve it. Let it ferment again for about 12 - 14 hours.

Due to sudden thought of going to KL, I shoved the fermenting batter into the fridge after 4 hours to temporary stop the fermentation. But the KL plan was canceled and I took the batter out from the fridge at 8pm to ferment until 2am. Then I put it back into the fridge. Took it out at 12pm the next day to let it come to room temp. Steamed at 2pm. (Total hours at room temp:12 hours)



Saturday, Day 5: 2pm

Ingredients (D):
1/4 tsp. Alkaline water/ lye water or air abu (or dissolve ¼ tsp baking soda in 1 tsp water, and use ¼ tsp of that solution)
1 tsp. cooking oil

(1) Add oil into the fermented mixture (no.3). Add alkaline water and mix well before pouring into a greased 10" round steaming tray. Steam for about 15 - 20 mins over medium heat. Test with a skewer before removing from the steamer.
(2) You can glaze the pak thong koh with some oil whilst still hot and cool well before cutting kuih into pieces. (it's oily enough from that 1 tsp oil added before steaming) BE PATIENT AND WAIT FOR IT TO BE TOTALLY COOL TO TOUCH BEFORE CUTTING, if not the surface will be sticky and kuih will be soft and not crunchy.

I can't wait for it to cool down, so when it's not too hot, I put the whole thing into the freezer for about 10 minutes and it was cool enough to be cut by then.
And see those pretty honeycombs again... see seee....

I suggest you use this timetable, or adjust your own time
Day 1 : 11pm, ferment rice
Day 3: 11pm, make kuih starter dough
Day 4: 1-3pm, prepare final batter
Day 4 :11pm, put batter into the fridge to chill
Day 5: take batter out from fridge 2-3 hours in advance before steaming time(whenever you wish :)

OR

if you are an early riser that needs to work....

Day 1 :7am start rice fermentation (48 hrs)
Day 3: 7am start kuih starter dough fermentation(16 hrs)
Day 3 :7pm start prepare the final batter, needs time to cool down after boiling.
Day 3: 11pm put kuih starter dough into the final batter
Day 4: Wake up and put the whole batter into fridge and chill until you come back from work to steam. (overall calculate 12 hours in room temperature for final batter)

A gist of the fermentation time
1. Starter dough(Rice fermentation) : 48 hours
2. Kuih Starter dough : 16-18 hours
3. Final batter: 12-14 hours
No matter that time you do it, as long as it stays in room temperature for this period , it'll be fine.
Shove it into the fridge anywhere anytime if you are not free or the hours are awkward for you.


Oh yes, one more thing if you want to know what brand of rice flour I’m using all along, I used Erawan brand, imported from Thailand. It has a decorative elephant as its logo. Becareful that there is another rice flour, Cap Gajah., also with an elephant logo, but it’s a plain elephant. So be careful of which brand you’re buying. Cap Gajah is a blended rice flour, means it’s not pure rice flour and it contains added starch as said on it’s packaging. The difference in price? 10sen only. I bought Erawan at RM3.00 and Cap Gajah sells at RM2.90. Cap Teratai is also a blended rice flour.

And see my honeycombs again.......

Now, before you go, remember there are leftover fermented rice and kuih starter dough? What to do with them???? I’ll show you in my next post.

One more... one more pic :) The last one, I promise.

You may go now :)

Update : 6/6/2012:

I made more of this cake again, twice and it wasn't as crunchy as before, nor was it as crunchy as Version 4.

Thinking back, version 3 and 4 were made using the same pack of rice flour that was almost expiring. The Indian grocery store nearby sold my husband a pack of rice flour with only 2 more months to expiry. Rice flours have a long shelf life, due to it's lack of gluten. So, this pack of almost expiring rice flour is definitely more than 2 years old.

Like how noodle makers will prefer using old rice (my friend who owned a noodle factory told me this), so that it will give a less sticky texture, so does this cake. It needs an old old pack of rice flour to give it that crunch. New rice flours will be more sticky and soft.

Think of your rice. If the pack of rice bought is a new harvest, or freshly opened pack... it surely does taste softer, stickier, has less water absorbency qualities than old rice right?

I think I need to stock up my rice flour and keep it for a year before I make another attempt. LOL