Lotus Leaf Rice Parcels (2011-07-31)
Glutinous rice wrapped in lotus leaves is one of my favorite dim sum in a yumcha restaurant. I don't order it most of the times because they are very filling and I want stomach space for other dim sum. They are not hard to make and taste just as good as from a restaurant.
The flavor base for them is chicken and oyster sauce, without which
they won't taste authentic. The rest of the ingredients is really
up to your taste. Mine just have chicken, dried shrimps, dried
shiitake mushrooms and Chinese dried sausages. The seasonings are
approximate, I don't measure the amount of soy or sugar when cooking
savory dishes. The amount I give below is just a guesstimation, so always taste as
you go.
The lotus leaves I used that day were full of tears and holes, so I
used two halves per parcel. If you can get nice intact ones, half
a leaf is good for one parcel (or 1/4 of a leaf for miniature
rolls). Steaming the parcels at the end is
essential for the lotus leaf flavor to permeate into the rice, it's
not just for aesthetic purpose.
Lotus Leaf Rice Parcels (Makes 4)
2 whole dried lotus leaves, 500gm glutinous rice, a chicken thigh
cut into bite-sized pieces, 4 dried shiitake mushrooms, 1Tb dried
shrimp, one Chinese dried sausage, sliced.
Sauce mixture:
1/2 cup chicken stock, 1Tb oyster sauce, 1tsp dark soy sauce, 1/2tsp sugar, 1/2tsp cooking wine, salt, pepper.
- Soak leaves at least two hours, preferrably overnight.
Blanch for 5 minutes, remove from pot. Pat dry, cut
each leaf in half.
- Soak rice overnight. Steam in fine mesh container or cheese cloth for 30 minutes. Spritz water over rice every ten minutes during steaming. If prefer very soft rice, steam for 20 minutes more or cook in rice cooker following package direction for water amount.
- Marinate chicken with a bit of salt, pepper, soy, sugar, and cornstarch.
- Rehydrate mushrooms and shrimps. Slightly squeeze out water from mushrooms and cut into bite-sized pieces.
- Dry fry sausages till lightly browned, set aside.
- Fry mushrooms and shrimp in a bit of oil, add chicken till it's almost cooked, add sausages. Add sauce mix, adjust seasonings, thicken with constarch and water mixture (1:1 ratio). Make sure the sauce is thickened more than usual so it doesn't run off everywhere when assembling the parcel. Let sauce cool.
- Lay leaf on board, smooth side up, oil the center a bit to
prevent rice sticking. Spread 1/8 of the rice on it, top with
chicken mixture, cover with 1/8 more of the rice. Wrap the rice
snuggly like you would for a gift. (You can roll from the edge side or
the pointy side, as long as the rice is snuggly wrapped, it's ok)
- Make the rest of the parcels. Do two layers of leaves and tie each with string for added security.
- Steam them for 30 minutes.
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