Hot Grass Jelly with Tang Yuan

In the final episode of Cooking With Steam’s second season, I team up with my friend and collaborator Jess Wang of LA’s Gu Grocery to bring you Hot Grass Jelly and Tang Yuan 燒仙草, one of my favorite Taiwanese desserts, and perfect for the winter weather.

Jess and I make tang yuan as a topping for hot grass jelly, a thickened pudding made with grass jelly herb. I’d enthusiastically describe this as the opposite of ice cream: warm, heady, and full of sweet and herbal notes. The toppings add texture of all kinds, from crunchy, roasty walnut to the chewy and sweet bite of the tang yuan.

Hot Grass Jelly 燒仙草

Yields 8 servings

Ingredients

• 75 g Grass Jelly Herb (or 25 g per every L of water)
• 3 L water
• ¼ tsp lye water 鹼水
• 160 g Taiwanese red rock sugar, or to taste (depending on the brand you buy, you may need to add more)
• 150 g sweet potato starch
• 200 ml water

To Serve

• Tang yuan, to taste (see recipe below)
• Sweetened red bean paste, to taste
• Crushed walnuts, to taste

Equipment

• Digital scale
• Mesh strainer
• Tatung 11-Cup Steamer
• Stockpot (for thickening the grass jelly tea)

Instructions

1. Measure out the grass jelly herb in the inner pot of the Tatung Steamer.
2. Wash the herb in a water bath then strain out the water.
3. Place the inner pot into the outer pot of the Tatung. Pour 3 L of water and ¼ tsp lye water into the inner pot, alongside the herb.
4. Add 1.5 Tatung rice cups of water to the outer pot of the Tatung.
5. Close the lid and flip the switch to steam for about an hour (add more water to the outer pot if needed to complete the steaming). To test for doneness, ladle some grass jelly tea into a clear cup and hold it up to the light; if the tea is opaque enough to block the light, it’s done.
6. Strain the liquid through a mesh strainer, into a stockpot.
7. Over the stove, add the red rock sugar and bring the liquid to a simmer, stirring until the sugar is dissolved. Taste and adjust sweetness level.
8. Bring the liquid to a boil.
9. Separately, mix the sweet potato starch with cold water and stir into a slurry.
10. Once the grass jelly tea has come to a boil, add the starch slurry in while stirring. Continue to stir and let the liquid come back up to a boil. Stir for a minute more to allow the starch to cook through.
11. Ladle into serving bowls, then top with your desired amount of tang yuan, sweetened red bean paste, and crushed walnuts.

Tang Yuan (Unfilled) 湯圓

Recipe by Jess Wang of Gu Grocery

Yields 200 tang yuan (about 2g each)

Ingredients

• 250 g sweet rice flour (also known as glutinous rice flour)
• 70 g water, boiling
• 140 g water, room temperature
• 1.5 g spirulina powder (optional; you can divide the dough in half and add spirulina to one half to dye the tang yuan green)
• ½ cup brown sugar

Equipment

• Digital scale
• Heatproof mixing bowls
• Dough mat (optional)
• Bench scraper
• Large plate (if cooking tang yuan right away)
• Parchment-lined sheet tray (if freezing tang yuan)
• Stockpot (for boiling tang yuan)

Instructions

Make the dough

1. Measure sweet rice flour into a heatproof mixing bowl.
2. Using a pair of sturdy chopsticks, stir boiled water into the bowl of sweet rice flour. Mix in circular motion until lumps break down into flake-like bits and mixture is fluffy.
3. Add room temp water to the flour mixture and continue stirring with chopsticks until a crumbly dough begins forming (it will look like crumbled feta cheese). At this "feta" stage, put chopsticks aside and knead the dough by hand until smooth. If dough is dry on the surface or tacky, adjust with water or more rice flour accordingly. When ready the dough will look like fresh mozzarella.
4. On a dough mat, roll dough into a log and cut in half with a bench scraper. Work with one half of the dough first. Cover the other half of the dough by folding over one side of the dough mat or return it to the mixing bowl and cover.

Form the Tang Yuan

1. Cut the halved piece of dough in 4 equal portions and roll each piece into a log, about 8 inches long.
2. Line the logs up so they're parallel to each other and portion the dough into 1/2-inch chunks by cutting across the four logs at once with the bench scraper.
3. Roll each piece of dough into a smooth round ball. Try rolling multiple pieces of dough at the same time, between your palms.
4. Arrange rolled balls on a plate if cooking right away, or on a parchment lined sheet tray for freezing.

Cook the Tang Yuan

1. To cook, prepare a bowl with brown sugar.
2. Bring 3 quarts of water to a boil.
3. Drop dumplings in boiling water, stir gently to prevent sticking, and cook until they float up (about 2 minutes from fresh).
4. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the cooked tang yuan into the bowl of sugar and toss to coat the dumplings.