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Mooncakes are a staple of Mid-Autumn Festival, a holiday celebrated throughout China (and some other parts of southeast/east Asia). Mid-Autumn Festival traditionally was a way to celebrate the fall harvest and bring family together. As with essentially all holidays in the lunar calendar, the moon and stories about the moon also play a prominent role in the holiday’s lore.
While many Chinese fables talk about mooncakes as if they were always part of Chinese culture, the more likely reality is that they’re related to the ma’ammoul of the Middle East. If you take a look at a ma’ammoul mold and a traditional mooncake mold, you’ll immediately see a striking resemblance.
Mooncakes come in all different shapes, sizes, and with different fillings — lotus, red bean, and black sesame are a few popular ones in Southern China where my family is from — but traditional mooncakes are notoriously tricky and time consuming to make. They feature a tender pastry exterior that requires 2-3 days of resting at room temperature, which allows fat from the filling to permeate the pastry and tenderize it. Forming uniform mooncakes with a thin pastry shell (which indicates a “good” mooncake) is also hard to pull off for beginners.
Snow skin mooncakes, on the other hand, are a more contemporary cousin of the traditional mooncake. They likely originated in Southeast Asia in Singapore or Malaysia in the late 21st century. Snow skin mooncakes feature a mochi-like exterior made from glutinous rice flour. They contain fillings that range from the traditional all the way to western twists like chocolate. They’re much more forgiving than traditional mooncakes and can (and should) be eaten the same day they’re made for best results, meaning procrastinators will prefer this option.
These are some of my favorite fillings to pair with snow skin mooncakes:
- Pandan mung bean
- Black sesame (not to be confused with this black sesame filling recipe for traditional mooncakes, which has different ratios)
- Crispy peanut butter (my own twist that’s definitely not traditional but is always a crowd favorite at the mooncake workshops that I teach)
Special tools
Snow skin mooncakes are relatively easy to make but you’ll need to get mooncake molds in order to form them. Wooden molds are traditional but a huge pain to use, and are unlikely to work for snow skin mooncakes anyway. Stick to plastic molds, which come in a variety of shapes and sizes. I’ve linked some of my favorites here.
For most of my filling recipes you’ll also need a food processor. Immersion blenders and regular blenders can’t really handle the thick texture of the paste so I don’t recommend trying that (I burnt out one of my immersion blenders this way many years ago). I have this one and love it for smaller batches.
Special ingredients
- Glutinous rice flour — This is the type of rice that’s used to make mochi and other chewy desserts and should not be confused with standard rice flour. The two are not interchangeable as they have very different properties. Glutinous rice flour can be found at most asian grocery stores (sometimes called mochiko flour or sweet rice flour) but you can also get it here.
- Potato starch — Potato starch is commonly used to dust mochi, so if you’ve ever eaten the white powder on fresh mochi then you’ve had potato starch. This can be a slightly tricky ingredient to find but make sure that you don’t confuse it with potato flour or potato flakes, which are different products. I’ve also found that at Asian markets, sometimes what’s advertised as “potato starch” is actually cassava, so make sure you check the ingredients. Potato starch is also sometimes available at health food stores like Sprouts. Or, you can just buy it here.
A note on natural food colorings
Snow skin mooncakes often feature a bright, multicolored appearance that traditional mooncakes lack. You can achieve this by using normal food coloring (just add a drop or two to the water in the recipe) or you can use natural food colorings, which is my preference. Here’s a list of the ingredients I use to naturally color my snow skin mooncakes:
- Green — Matcha powder
- Blue — Butterfly pea flower powder (buy it here)
- Red/Magenta — Beetroot powder (be careful because this stuff does have a taste so don’t go overboard) (buy it here)
- Purple — A mix of butterfly pea flower powder & beet root powder
- Yellow — Turmeric (be careful because this stuff does have a taste so don’t go overboard)
- Black/Grey — Activated charcoal powder (buy it here)
All of these ingredients are powdered, so I recommend starting by sifting 1/2 tsp of the powder into the water for the snow skin dough. You can add more as desired to achieve the color you’d like. Be aware that as the dough steams, the color will brighten/deepen a bit as the rice flour becomes translucent.
Snow Skin Mooncake Wrapper Dough (and Assembly)
Ingredients
- 60 g glutinous rice flour
- 60 g rice flour
- 30 g corn starch
- 30 g granulated sugar
- 225 g water
- 20 g refined coconut oil Melted/liquid. See notes.
- potato starch for dusting your work surface
Instructions
- Make the dough: Pour water into a medium-sized bowl (ensure that the bowl is heatproof if using microwave method). Add food coloring if desired, according to the notes below. Gently stir to combine evenly.225 g water
- Add the glutinous rice flour, rice flour, corn starch, and sugar. Whisk to combine well, ensuring there are no lumps left.60 g glutinous rice flour, 60 g rice flour, 30 g corn starch, 30 g granulated sugar
- Add the coconut oil and whisk to combine (it will not fully incorporate into the batter — that's okay).20 g refined coconut oil
If using a steamer
- Ensure water is boiling in the base of your steamer, then turn the heat to medium-low and simmer.
- Pour the batter into a heatproof container/dish that fits in your steaming basket, then move the dish to the steamer. Cover and steam for 10 minutes.
- After 10 minutes, remove the lid and gently scrape down the sides of the container with a heatproof spatula. Be careful — the mixture will be very hot and can splash easily.
- Cover again and continue to steam for another 10-15 minutes until the mixture becomes somewhat translucent (it won't go fully clear) and either very little or no opaque liquid remains (there will still be a layer of oil floating on top, that's okay). Remove the dish from the steamer and let cool for a few minutes.
If microwaving your dough
- Cover the microwave-proof bowl with a tight layer of plastic wrap and transfer to the microwave. Microwave on high for 3 minutes.
- After 3 minutes, carefully remove the bowl. Peel back the plastic and scrape down the sides of the bowl with a heatproof spatula. Cover with plastic once again and return to the microwave. Heat for another 3-5 minutes on high.
- Check the dough: it should be set and somewhat translucent with no opaque liquid in the center (you will need to poke through the surface with your spatula to ensure no liquid is hiding beneath the surface). There will still be a layer of oil on top — this is ok. If you still see opaque liquid, cover the bowl again, return it to the microwave, and heat on 1 minute bursts until it's set.
- Remove the bowl from the microwave and let cool for a few minutes.
For both methods
- Carefully scoop your hot dough out onto a clean baking sheet. Break it into pieces with your spatula and allow it to continue cooling for a few minutes until it's cool enough to work with. Note that the dough should still be as hot as possible when working with it, but not so hot that you burn yourself. I also recommend wearing tight food safe gloves during this step if you are able, though they're not necessary (the loose fitting plastic gloves will not work).
- Once JUST cool enough to handle, begin kneading the dough onto itself. It will be soft and pretty oily — just keep kneading. The dough will eventually become uniform, soft, pliable, and just a bit oily on the exterior with no big pools of oil anywhere. Let the dough continue to cool, uncovered, at room temperature, for 10-20 minutes. As it cools, it will continue to absorb more oil.
- After the rest period, the dough should be soft, pliable, and not oily to the touch. Wrap tightly in plastic wrap until ready to use — if you don't wrap it tightly it will dry out.
- Use same day for best results. This dough does not keep well.
- When working with this dough, remember to always keep it covered with plastic. I recommend liberally dusting your work surface with potato starch when forming your mooncakes.
Mooncake assembly
- Prepare your work surface by dusting it pretty liberally with potato starch.
- Pinch off a golf ball sized ball of filling and roll it between your hands until it's fairly round and smooth with no deep wrinkles or grooves. Set aside.
- Pinch off a similar sized ball of wrapper dough. Pinch the dough to flatten into a round pancake shape about the diameter of a dumpling wrapper — try to make the edges thinner than the center. This doesn't need to be perfect, just make sure there aren't any overly thin spots in your "pancake" as these may tear. You can use some potato starch if the dough is sticking to your hands a lot during this step but be careful to not over-dust, as it will make the next step harder.
- Wrap the flattened dough around the filling ball, taking care to try to push out any gaps between the dough and the filling (these become air pockets, which we don't want). Pinch the dough together to close up the ball completely — you want to ensure there are no holes in the dough. If there are any
- Roll the ball between your hands until it's smooth with no holes, then roll it gently in potato starch. Roll it between your hands one more time to remove any excess starch. At this point I like to roll the ball into a slightly oblong shape like a sausage to make it easier to fit into the mold.
- Push your oblong ball into the mooncake mold and then set the whole thing down onto your flat work surface. Press the plunger down firmly but not aggressively, just until you feel the plunger stop, then continue holding it down for another 5-10 seconds to ensure the design stays imprinted neatly. If you press too hard, the filling may squeeze out. If you don't press hard enough, you'll end up without sharp edges. This takes a little bit of practice/trial & error to figure out.
- Store snow skin mooncakes tightly sealed at room temperature for up to 24 hours — they are best eaten day of. They can be transferred to the fridge for another day or two but their texture will change significantly.
Notes
- If you're planning to dye your dough and want to experiment with natural food coloring, here's what I use:
- green — matcha
- blue — butterfly pea flower powder
- purple — butterfly pea flower powder + beetroot powder
- yellow — turmeric
- pink/magenta/"red" (it's very hard to get a true red with natural food coloring) — beetroot powder
- black/grey — activated charcoal powder
- How to add natural dyes: sift a small amount of your colorant of choice into the water before you add the remaining ingredients and whisk gently to combine. Start very small — about 1/4 tsp, and add additional color as you'd like. Note that colors will become more intense as the dough steams and the whiteness of the flour goes translucent. Also be cautious about adding too much coloring, as natural food colorings can start to alter the flavor when added in large amounts.
- If you want to use standard food colorings, I recommend powder or gel type food coloring, added to the water and whisked gently before adding the remaining ingredients.
- Refined coconut oil is recommended, as it doesn't have a strong coconut scent or flavor; however, if you're okay with coconut flavoring (or maybe even like it!), feel free to use virgin or unrefined coconut oil, which are both names for the same thing. You could also likely substitute vegetable shortening, though I have not tested this myself so proceed with caution.