Sunday, June 29, 2008

Bak Chang

This is one food item that I never learned to make from my grandma that I do regret. I remember as a kid, she used to make them every 5th month of the lunar calendar when the Chinese celebrate the Rice Dumpling Festival. And we could eat them for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I love zhang or 棕 子 (glutinous rice dumplings). And never tire of them. My favourite of all is Nonya zhang. The meat is sweet and there's very little fat.

However, as I grew older, I ate it less. It gives me indigestion and it's fattening. Hehe. So once in a blue moon, I pamper myself with it. This lot I happened to pick up last weekend while I was waiting for my take-out from Aston's and as it took forever, I took a wander to Kim Choo's a couple of doors away and picked up a couple.

Do you love zhang too? What fillings do you go for?

12 comments:

Peony said...

for me, I go for the Cantonese version, with salted egg n chestnut.

But the rest of my family members love the Nonya type.

eatingclubvancouver_js said...

We have it the the pork filling (don't know what it's called), but it was the only kind I knew growing up.

One question is what condiment people eat the zhang with. We grew up with ketchup, and then one day, I saw my Taiwanese classmate eating it with soy sauce. She was horrified that I was putting ketchup on mine. ;)

Now, since I can't stand ketchup (only for fries), I put soy sauce.

SIG said...

peony - Ahh... I c.

js - We don't eat them with any condiment at all. The meat is flavoured so there is no need for any soy sauce. Ketchup? I've never heard either. Haha. It's after all a Chinese dish and ketchup is American. ;) There is an exception which is the sweet dumplings which do not contain any fillings and can be dipped in kaya, sugar etc. Hope that helps. :)

Shazz said...

I remember helping Ah Ma make changs in primary school. It was great fun (for me not for her cos she'd to clean up after me...lol). Yep love Nonya chang. In fact it's the only type I'll ever eat. But the last time I had chang was over 10 years ago!! HAPPY CHANG-ING!

SIG said...

shazz - Haha, we were more of a hindrance than help. ;)

Cranberry said...

I love to eat Zhang with lots of 'liao' and less rice; my favourite zhang's filling will be the salted egg , chestnut, hae-bee, mushrooms and some lean meat (no fatty meat for me!)hehe.. The rest of my family members love Nonya Zhang.

SIG said...

cranberry - Ah, so you like the type Peony likes too. Hehe. I like sweetish zhang not savoury and they usually have fatty pork although nowadays it's less unless if it's homemade.

Big Boys Oven said...

lovely zhang, we luv them a lot! but have to take them moderately.

Little Corner of Mine said...

I love both bak chang and Nyonya chang! YUMMY!

karlsfoodie said...

i love the hokkien n cantonese ones.. yummmmmm

Unknown said...

i love indonesian bak changs...i dunno how they do it...they dont really hv the fancy egg yolks or dry scallops and stuff...but very yummy... T_T i miss it dearly

BeautifuL Life said...

I only had this once this year for the festival.... :(