Chinese Brown Sugar Pancake Dessert

| By: Betty Wang |

There is not a clear boundary in Chinese cuisine between a dish with a dessert because we love to mix sweet, salty, and sour tastes in our cooking so brown sugar pancake is both one of my favorite desserts and breakfast staple food made by my mom. This recipe is written based on my mom’s recipe but also revised in ratios to have the best tastes. The recipe is designed for smaller size pancakes than average ones and with richer tastes. When you bite the finished pancakes, you are going to feel the hot brown sugar “lava” streaming down in your mouth. Be careful of the heat!

Ingredients

Yield: 4 servings

• 200ml hot boiling water

• 290g all-purpose flour

• 90g brown sugar

• 40g all-purpose flour

Cooking Instructions

1. Let the 200ml hot boiling water sit for one minute and then gradually add the water to 290g all-purpose flour.

2. Mix the flour with water to a flocculent state and start to knead dough.

3. After the surface of the dough is smooth without dry flour, let it sit for 10 minutes; (how to knead dough is shown in the video).

4. Shape the dough into a long thin strip and cut it into 12 smaller doughs.

5. Shape the smaller doughs into 12 small balls.

6. Using a rolling pin, roll the balls into circular sheets.

7. Mix 90g brown sugar with 40g all-purpose flour.

8. Put brown sugar into the center of each circular sheet.

9. Stretch and stick the side of the sheet together (as shown in the video).

10. Press down the dough stuffed with brown sugar to make it a pancake.

11. Using a rolling pin, lightly roll it into a bigger pancake until you can see the brown color from outside but be careful, don’t break the pancake.

12. Turn on the cooker and spray some oil in a pan.

13. Evenly spread the oil in the pan and place your hand above the pan to test temperature: if you can feel the heat, your pan is well-heated.

14. Place the pancakes in the pan and separate them a little bit.

15. Turn down the heat to medium and wait for 4-5 minutes to flip the pancakes.

16. Wait for another 4-5 minutes when the pancakes have turned golden, they are ready.

Notes

• The best place to find brown sugar is Asian supermarkets.

• The pancakes can be stored in refrigeration for three days.