Taiwan Tea Guy

Usually when we think of ‘tea snacks’, we think of British High Tea. silver tea service, scones, tarts, biscuits, and etc. However, Chinese tea drinkers also have an awesome assortment of snacks to go with their oolongs, baojongs, Tie Kuan Yins, and even Black teas. In this first installment of my new ‘Tea Snacks’ series, I’ve decided to introduce my personal favorite: Pineapple cakes.

Pineapple cakes aren’t exactly cakes. They are baked pastry-type snacks with a pineapple filling. Especially around Chinese New Year, local bakeries create their own unique recipes to entice customers. These are usually round, and have plum blossoms or auspicious characters molded into the top to enhance their presentation. They are sold as whole cakes, or in 1/4 wedges. These type tend to have a thinner crust, and a sweeter, thicker pineapple filling. If they aren’t cut up they can last quite awhile, although I generally finish each cake in one sitting. 

The best thing about them is they’re baked fresh daily, so they’re never stale. Way back ‘in the day’, I spent a week of Chinese New Year on my motorcycle travelling around the island, camping out wherever I could find a spot. There weren’t many places to get food, so I picked up an extra large pineapple cake (twice the size of the large one pictured above) and that was all I had to eat for 2 1/2 days. Needless to say, it was also my last pineapple cake for about 6 months!!

 Of the store-bought variety, there are several well-known chain-bakeries that produce them. Although these are considered superior cakes because of their ‘famous’ name and fancy packaging, my extensive research into the subject has let me to the conclusion that most of that reputation is marketing hype. Here are some photos of common pineapple cakes:

I had a chance to watch a DVD at a friend’s house recently, and decided to take a variety of pineapple cakes along to sample and discuss for this article. My original plan was to do a blind taste test, but unfortunately, none of my friends would let me poke their eyes out! (groan!)

The key to a good pineapple cake is the crust. If the crust is too oily or too dry, the tea you serve with it ends up  being simply a means to wash the bad taste out of your mouth, instead of highlighting  and complimenting the flavor of the tea.

Of the 3 samples shown below,  The left cake is overbaked and has an oily, crumbley crust. The middle cake has too much filling, making it overly sweet and chewy. The one on the right (Typhone) is the best. You can see from the lighter texture that the crust is firm, and the ratio of filling to crust is more balanced, giving it a much more pleasant ‘mouth feel’. It’s also been our pineapple cake of choice for over 10 years! They don’t use a lot of fancy packaging, but they have the right formula for producing a light, flaky crust,  balanced with just the right amount of filling to provide the sweetness & consistency desired.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 14th, 2009 at 7:50 pm and is filed under My Tea Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.