Confertzel Cookbook: Mocchitashen

So thin...Eat! Eat!

The "Confertzel Cookbook" should serve as documentation of one Jew-in-China's attempts to make "soul food" using what is available at local Chinese wet markets and corner stores. I intend to keep the recipes fairly low budget and to use methods that most people in China (or with limited resources and kitchen facilities) could accommodate. If I offend anyone with how heinously I drift from traditional recipes, let me apologize preemptively. Specifically, I apologize to my Jewish grandmother.

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Firstly, I want to wish a Happy Purim to friends and family: I hope you had a festive if not inebriated holiday. חג שמח. In my stead, I hope everyone consumed at least half of an apricot hamentaschen and half of a poppy seed hamentaschen. I usually only eat about two bites of each variety before I remember that I only enjoy four-bites-worth of hamentaschen per annum.

For those unfamiliar with the traditional Purim treat, hamentaschen (or, oznei haman) are representative of the Purim story's villain's ears. Carbohydrate-packed, doughy, apricot-filled ears.
Take a moment to spin a mental grogger.

Sadly but as expected, China lacks in hamentaschen diversity. On Purim, I think there may have been one genuine hamentaschen somewhere within 100 miles of me. I sensed it.

But, alas, sensing the 'taschen is far from eating one. In light of this, I decided to make my own hamentaschen this year. This happens to coincide with another personal cooking project I have procrastinated [because I was intimidated] for some time.

Before I launch into the recipe, I would like to note that the ingredients for this Confertzel Cookbook entry were not affordable on the average Chinese worker's budget--nor can I imagine a way to make this an affordable recipe if one includes halfway decent ice cream and cocoa powder. Also, this recipe requires at least a toaster oven to make. Most Chinese households do not have one of these utilities. Also, mocchi is a Japanese creation--though it is widely enjoyed in China. I drifted far from my original restrictions, but I hope you grant me this leniency in the name of celebrating Purim.

It brings me great pleasure to introduce the following recipe, which is an amalgam of a few recipes I found.

Recipe:

1. Sift about 200 grams of glutinous rice flour with 1.5 cups of white sugar.
2. Add 6 ounces of unsweetened coconut milk. Do not stir.
3. Add 3/4 of a cup of water. Now stir until smooth.
4. Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius (~325 F). While the oven is heating, pour the mixture into foil lined (and well-oiled or greased) pans--I used three pie tins. The batter should be about 1/2 inch deep. Cover the batter with a layer of foil.
5. Bake for one hour.
6. Let cool for 45 minutes.
7. Remove the top layer of foil (careful now--this is a glutinous recipe). Dust a counter with equal parts corn starch and cocoa powder (the cocoa powder will blend well with some flavors, but not all).
8. Cut strips of mocchi 1-2 inches in length and no more than 1 inch in width. Squish the ends of the strips together to form an equilateral triangle of doughy bliss. Use the triangle of doughy bliss as a model to cut a bottom for the triangle of bliss (i.e. a piece of mocchi dough to seal the bottom of the triangle). Press all sides of the mocchi against the dusted counter to coat with chalky starch and cocoa.
9. Scoop 2 teaspoons of ice cream into the open side of the doughy triangle of bliss--I used coffee flavored ice cream. Put in freezer for 20-30 minutes. 

Serves: 5 mocchitaschen with some extra dough to be used for about 3 small mocchi balls

Mocchi ear

Notes for improvement:

I was surprisingly pleased with the result--this being my second attempt at making mocchi. I definitely found a reasonable blend of recipes to work with my kitchen appliances and ingredients, though I suspect a different set of measurements might be required for different kitchens. I think that I will work with the balance of flour to result in a final product that is a little chewier--this one needed more than just a few minutes to defrost.

I would like to try to use a traditional hamentaschen flavor next time, though I have not decided what flavor would work: raspberry, I think.

Next time, I would also add a layer of dough to seal the ice cream into the mocchitaschen. I imagine that I would receive a good amount of joy from a gooey, self-contained bite.

Also, I would be more judicious about how much corn starch and cocoa powder I used since the clean-up was less than pleasant or brief.