There Was An Attempt: Hakka Moonlight Biscuits / Hakka Mooncakes 月光饼

Here's something a bit different – this isn't really a recipe post, rather an educational post about Hakka moonlight biscuits.

I came across Hakka moonlight biscuits while looking up which type of mooncake comes from what region. I'd never heard of these before, and it turns out they may well be the ancestor of the mooncake we now tend to think of – the golden pastry-encased sweet lotus, bean or seed paste with a salted egg yolk in the middle, pressed inside an intricately-shaped mould.

Hakka moonlight biscuits, as suggested by the name, are predominantly enjoyed by the Hakka Chinese community during the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival. But they were originally meant as offerings to the moon, rather than simply just being a festive dessert.

They also may predate the use of wheat flour when China was later visited by other countries, as their most simple form is made with rice flour, sugar and water.

I watched perhaps every available video on the internet I could find about how these are made and the results were... inconclusive. In short, everyone has their own way of making them. But the results look the same: a flat-ish, snow-white disc of lightly sweetened cooked rice flour, that's then dried.

Some cooked their own glutinous rice flour, some used koh fun (pre-cooked glutinous rice flour), some added icing sugar and water, some added just sugar syrup, some added syrup AND sugar, some used golden syrup instead, some added shortening, or oil, or butter, or a combination of fats... or no fats at all.

Some pressed them in the mould and then left them to dry, some pressed them into moulds but steamed them before drying. Some painted them with food colouring before the drying stage, and some left them plain.

Some didn't specify drying, but others said to try for two hours... and a few stressed that the moonlight biscuits have to be dried for at least two days.

And all of them had inconsistent quantities when it came to ratios of dry vs wet ingredients. But most had the same sentiment: just add 'enough' of whatever ingredients until you have the desired consistency. A traditional recipe at its best.

I tried no fewer than nine times, and each time ended up with a clumpy mess... apart from the last two times, where I used this method.

You can also watch my most successful attempt on my YouTube channel, Tashcakes:

Ingredients for Sugar Syrup:

100g water
100g caster sugar

Ingredients for Moonlight Biscuits:

50g koh fun flour
20–30ml sugar syrup (approximately)
Food colouring (optional)

Method:

1. To make the syrup, combine the water and sugar in a small pan, bring to a boil, and boil for three minutes. Then take off the heat and cool completely.

2. Mix the flour and enough syrup together to form a breadcrumb-like texture by rubbing it between your fingers as if you're making a pastry mixture. Pass as much as you can through a sieve, and discard the lumpy bits.*

3. Half-fill a mould, press the powder down firmly with your thumbs or the back of a spoon, and unmould. If you're using a plunger mould, then invert it carefully onto a small square of baking paper and onto a small chopping board, and press down firmly before releasing. If you're using a wooden mould, invert carefully on a small square of baking paper and onto a chopping board, and give the bottom of the mould a few sharp taps to release the cake.

4.  Steam for 10 minutes before painting on your desired extra details with a little food colouring mixed with water.

*A recipe that works will have no lumpy bits left – none of the recipes I saw had this problem, but no matter how many times and different ways I tried with koh fun flour, I always had lumps left.

The result? A dry, chewy biscuit-like confection that's pleasantly mildly sweet, but not really something to be savoured (when comparing it with all the modern cakes we're spoiled for choice with). 

Even after steaming, the little moonlight biscuits go hard and crunchy within minutes of taking out of the steamer. I didn't wait days for them to dry – I didn't doubt that they could become harder, but did doubt my enjoyment of them if they did.

This was a really interesting experiment, and the only way I could really get to try these ancient Hakka mooncakes without visiting Hakka communities in China during the Mid-Autumn Festival. Even though I kept having a frustrating experience trying to get the koh fun flour to combine with the liquid evenly, I'm glad that I did manage to get a few decent specimens from my efforts. I'm determined to perfect a recipe at some point.