Chinese Dessert Recipes

Chinese Desserts are not the same as the American or European desserts which are served separately after a meal. Chinese desserts consist of sweet dishes which are eaten with tea as a snack or are served along with a Chinese meal. Chinese people don’t indulge in desserts everyday at the end of a meal. They generally include a fresh or tinned fruit in their meal, reserving proper desserts for feast and parties.

The long history of China clubbed with a plethora of cultures contributed to the wide variety of Chinese Desserts in the Chinese Cuisine. A wide variety of ingredients that are used in the East Asian cuisine such as glutinous rice and sweet bean pastes are used in preparing Chinese Desserts. A popular Chinese Dessert is “tang” which are candies or sweets made with malt sugar, honey and cane sugar. These candies also contain nuts and fruits. Some popular Chinese candies include tanghulu, white rabbit creamy candy and dragon’s beard candy. Rice cakes are also popularly eaten as Chinese Desserts and are called “gao” or “guo” in Chinese. Fukien speaking people in China refer to rice cakes as Kuei. Some commonly eaten gaos include bai tang gao, nian gao and tangyuan. Nian, also known as sticky cake is served at Chinese New Year celebrations.

Rice cakes are generally chewy and soft rice balls which are sweet in flavor. Jellies are also eaten as Chinese Desserts and are called “ices” in Chinese. These jellies are gelatin based and are flavored with fruits. Grass jelly is a popular Chinese jelly which sets by itself. Hot and sweet soups called “tongsui” or “tiantang” in Cantonese are also served as Chinese Desserts. Some Chinese soups also have restorative and preventive properties. Another type of Chinese Desserts is baked confections which are prepared from wheat flour and are referred to as “bing” in Chinese. The fat that is generally used in the bing preparations in is lard. Some commonly known bings are red bean paste bean cake, moon cake and sun cake. Names of some Chinese Desserts which are popular in the West are peking dust, almond tea and eight precious pudding. Though Chinese Desserts forms an integral part of the Chinese cuisine, still Chinese cuisine is more well known for its spicy stir fried dishes rather than its desserts all over the world.

For added information on Chinese recipes and other global cuisines please look at the ifood community at Chinese Recipes. Those interested in Chinese Dessert food can take a look at Chinese Dessert Food