tonight i am celebrating the mooncake festival with a wedge of a two-yolk lotus paste mooncake and a pot of tea. the mooncake left an oily slick on my fingers when i removed it from its little tray, so i thought a mean, smoky tea would be good with. and it was: muji pu-erh tea with whole rosebuds — not quite so mean, then.
have you eaten the eggyolk in a mooncake? it is peculiar. unapologetically savoury. tough and dense, crumbly in some spots, and waxy in others. there is something wrong about it — i don’t actually enjoy eating this golden globe encased in the sweet lotus paste. but it is compelling.
anyway.
last night, finally, it was me, david duchovny and the throw-me-down. you know, the adriano zumbo tiramisu: layers on layers of mascarpone creme legere, savoiarde soaked in coffee syrup, and chocolate-coffee sauce. it certainly was saucy! the divine gloopiness of the sauce melding into the foamy mascarpone; the sodden biscuits sending an immediate buzz into my head.
(i know that “gloop” and “sodden” are not normally words that you associate with goodness, but listen: last night, they were!)
riding the crest, impossibly light chunks of crisp meringue that dissipated on my tongue. where does it all go?
actually, yes, i know where it goes. sigh.
9 Comments
You people are like the living dead of Zumbo or something!
I wonder how they make the egg yolk in mooncakes.
I adore mooncakes (oddly enough!), particularly lotus-seed paste ones with a gorgeous poached and salted yolk in the middle!
Oh, and the way you described that tiramisu was so compelling that I found myself craving for some – at eight in the morning!
i love mooncakes! although in malaysia & singapore, you get modern fillings like coffee, cheese flavoured, green tea and wut not, i like the traditional lotus paste and red bean.
don’t like the egg yolk though, i just push or pull it out depending how the mooncake was cut [ :
extra info: sydney asian stores are selling pig shaped mooncakes made locally .. i like i like coz of it has heaps of lotus paste
happy mooncake festival
oh! now i see what you mean about the tiramisu. i dunno if i liked the vulnerable/nice hank moody. is his ex wife starting to annoy you?
the egg has to be eaten in context – if you pull it out and eat it alone, it’s truly hideous. All dry, flaky and salty yuck! You know it’s meant to be good luck or something if you pick a piece with the most egg. I think I appreciate it more in my old age.. you can buy ones without them!
oh wow i just wrote an entire comment about an egg yolk!
i can’t wait til the fest is over and the boxes of mooncake go really cheap! it’s like shopping for easter eggs the day after. awesome…
duchovny! You’re watching Californication!! I still have ep 6 to catch up on before i can watch the newest ep. So many things, so little time. AIYAH.
I shall now have a marcolini champagne truffle to make me feel better.
sue: hmm. “you people”? “living dead”? i don’t know what you mean. are you jealous? i know you liked that strawberry custard tart! 🙂
i wonder about the eggyolk too. maybe they boil up whole pregnant chickens for many hours, and then extract the egg from it. how else would they get such a tough texture out of the yolk? and what do they do with the whites??
midge: not odd at all! mooncakes can be quite adorable. what is the mooncake situation like in the phillipines? and how about the tiramisu situation? i think it would be perfectly acceptable to have tiramisu for breakfast. it does contain a few breakfast staples after all.
tian: i really like the idea of mooncakes, but somehow once i start eating it, i quickly lose interest. maybe i need to track down some of those modern ones. i did see breadtop was selling exotic mochi mooncakes in a range of unusual flavours like taro and green tea and maybe chocolate. was just too busy to go hunting this year. 🙁
deb! hmm, i can’t remember what i said about the tiramisu — d’you mean apart from the blog post? was i gushing? 😉
i have always found the wife annoying, and possibly have the same issue with everyone on the show. even hank! and yet…
sonya: mm. the quarter i cut did contain a whole egg yolk. i was really calculating that i’d only have to deal with a half. 😉 have you stocked up on mooncakes yet? last weekend they were already 20% off at saint honore bakery.
cour marly! i am! it’s the only reason i look forward to mondays. but it is possible i would trade you my half hour of “californication” for your truffle. maybe.
i believe it was how “sexay” it looked… in a little glass and all creamy mascarpone. i think the small swooshy layers are quite appealing too.
My dad smuggled mooncakes into Sydney from overseas, once. A customs officer got him to cut one open, to check that there wasn’t anything dodgy inside (although to some, the idea of lotus seed paste and duck eggs would be considered dodgy enough!). Apparently you aren’t allowed to bring in the ones with the yolks. Anyway, my dad won the mooncake lottery when he cut one that didn’t have egg in it, open. Otherwise they might’ve confisticated the lot.
…..Not sure why he bothered though. None of us like the yolks anyway! 😀