Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Mooncakes

Two years ago we tasted our first mooncake . At the time we didn't really know much about the delicacy or appreciate its history. We are slightly more knowledgeable now. We know now that Mooncakes are Chinese pastries traditionally eaten in small wedges accompanied by Chinese tea during the Mid-Autumn Festival. They are round (moon-shaped), measuring about 10 cm in diameter and 4-5 cm thick, filled with ground lotus and sesame seed paste, bean paste, lard, nuts, dates, fruit, duck egg-yolk, and other ingredients. Mooncakes usually have an imprint on top with Chinese characters.

This is one of the mooncakes given to us this week.
Only one member of the Harvey family liked the taste. Can you guess who it was?

I've heard that Western companies like Starbucks and Haagen Dazs recently cashed in on the mooncake market too, creating popular mooncakes made of chocolate and icecream. So, like the lanterns in my previous post, mooncakes have succumbed to commercialisation. Here are some examples of less traditional mooncakes now available to purchase in Hong Kong.






2 comments:

  1. I think it is Jemilla who likes mooncakes!

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  2. How fun! The focus of our MK CAMP (homeschooling co-op) session next week is China. This post and the one about lanterns goes right along with some of my plans and it was fun to see.

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