Kuih Bangkit

Finally, I have success making my favorite Chinese New Year cookie! I wasn’t sure if I could have ever done it in my lifetime, lol – the recipe seems so simple but yet, extremely complicated at the same time. The list of ingredients is short but there are so many variables in the process and techniques! For the life of me, I couldn’t seem to get the dough consistency right until this instance! After scouring different recipes and blogs for years, I recently came across the recipe and tips (such helpful tips!) posted by Marvellina from the What to Cook Today blog – I willl forever be grateful!!! So, if you want to make these delicious, coconuty, melt-in-your-mouth cookies, head on over to her page.

Here, I will chronicle my experience for my own future reference:

1. I used a 1-pound bag of tapioca starch (enough to make 2/3 of the original recipe with a little starch leftover at the end).
2. I cooked the tapioca starch using the baking method – placed it in a half sheet pan (13” x 18”) and baked at 300F for 2 hours (omitted pandan leaves since I didn’t have any on hand).
3. Used 150g powdered sugar and 2 egg yolks.
4. Total amount of coconut cream used was approximately 3/4 cup or slightly less than that.
5. I tried to get my dough to the consistency as described but it’s hard when the person is not right in front of you to show you exactly what she means – for me, that perfect point was when some of the dough had started to form small clumps but overall, it was still a very loose dough. As mentioned in the original post, if you squeeze the dough together, it will form a mass but it will crumble when you press it gently – see what I mean about it being complicated? Lol.
6. Using a mold (not a true kuih bangkit mold – need to find one of those) that has been in my possession for over 20 years, I churned/pressed out the cookies, one by one, hahaha – so tedious and tiring!
7. Next time, instead of following the recommendation of dusting the baking sheet with extra tapioca starch to prevent sticking, I find that I don’t like the taste of undiluted tapioca starch which now coats the bottom of the cookies. Granted, I can easily brush off this extra starch but I will likely just use parchment paper next time.
8. Using my particular mold, I baked the resulting cookies for about 25 minutes or until the bottom turned very lightly brown. I removed the baking sheet from the oven and let the cookies cooled entirely on the baking sheet.
9. 2/3 of the recipe yielded approximately 95 petite cookies for me.

Verdict – success but soooooo tedious! I would purchase them if I can, lol. Nevertheless, I am so, so thankful to Marvellina from What to Cook Today for sharing her recipe and expertise! At least, I now have the option of making kuih bangkit if I desperately crave some. :)