pan-fried turnip cake
3 min readJust like a sigh-worthy baked potato, pan-fried lo bak guo(turnip cake)is soft and moreishly savoury on the inside with a perfectly thin and crispy skin on the outside. Although this dim sum is typically called turnip cake’ on menus, it is actually made from super-flavour-some snowy white batter of grated Chinese white radish and soaked rice flour.
Serves 4125g rice flour 3 dried Chinese mushrooms 1 tbsp granulated sugar, plus extra for soaking 1%2 tbsp vegetable oil, plus extra for oiling and frying 500g Chinese white radish or mooli 12 tbsp salt 2 cloves garlic, finely diced 34 tsp ground white pepper tbsp Shaoxing rice wine hot chilli sauce, to serve add an exotic(see here) 1 tbsp har mey (dried shrimp) 1 larp cheong (Chinese sausage), diced 1 Put the rice flour into a large bowl, pour over 150ml cold water to cover the flour completely, then cover and soak overnight.
2 The next day, soak the Chinese mushrooms in a bowl of hot water with a pinch of sugar for 30 minutes, then drain. Remove and discard the stalks then finely chop the caps. If you are adding an exotic, soak the har mey in a bowl of hot water for at least 20 minutes, then drain.
3 Lightly oil a 20cm loaf tin and set aside. Peel and grate the radish before putting it into a pan. If you have really juicy radish, catch the juice and add it to the pan. Stir in the sugar, salt and garlic, then put the pan over a medium-low heat, cover and cook gently for 40 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the radish is soft enough to cut through easily with a plastic spatula. Drain the excess cooking juices into a measuring jug and set aside. Stir the white pepper, 11/2 table-spoons oil and the rice wine into the cooked radish.
4 Using a pair of chopsticks, gently stir the soaked rice flour until it is a smooth slurry then gradu-ally stir it into the radish. Add the mushrooms, har mey and larp cheong, if using.
5 You will need 100-150ml liquid of the reserved radish juices, so top up with cold water if neces-sary. Begin stirring this liquid into the radish mixture, testing the consistency as you do so by dipping a chopstick into the mixture then letting a drop fall onto the back of your hand: the drop should look like cloudy water but it should retain its shape on your hand rather than spread out.
6 Pour the radish batter into the prepared loaf tin. Cover and steam over vigorously boiling water for 25 minutes, or until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Leave the lo bak guo to cool com-pletely before turning it out of the tin. Slice the loaf into 1cm-thick pieces.
7 Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a frying pan over a high heat. Add the slices and fry until both sides are golden brown and crisp. Serve with the spiciest chilli sauce you can get your hands on.
When choosing Chinese radishes, scratch them on the surface with your fingernail: you should only be able to scrape off a single layer of ‘skin’ before you reach the inside of the radish. Avoid radishes that flake off in multiple layers. The radish should also feel heavy for its size, indicating juiciness.
