Orange Vanillin Tang Yuan

Closely related to the traditional chinese dessert of glutinous rice balls in sweet fragrant soup. U can choose to fill the balls with red bean paste but its ok to leave it blank as it is as the soup base is already sweet. The balls will be chewy and this will be the contrast texture against the smooth syrup.

Balls

300g orange vanillin glutinous rice flour
1 cup of water

mix together in a bowl with your hands and knead until it's pliable enough to work it into a dough. If it's too dry and crumbly, wet yr hands a little at a time until u get a workable texture. If it's too wet, add a little bit more glutinous rice flour. Shape into little small balls and set aside.

(if u can't find orange vanillin glutinous rice flour, just mix 300g glutinous rice flour, 2 tsp vanillin powder, 1/2 tsp orange zest and add 1/2 tsp of orange essence to the 1 cup of water)



Boil enough water in a pot. Drop the raw balls into the rapidly boiling water and let it cook approx 10 mins. The balls will float to the surface when it's cooked. Scoop out and dunk into cold water. This is to prevent them from sticking to one another. U will notice it will sink when placed into the cold water. This is normal.

Sweet Soup

Meanwhile, throw the water away from the pot and boil another 8 cups of water with 4 or 5 cups of sugar plus a few knots of pandan (screwpine) leaves. Adjust the sweetness according to yr preference. Add 3 slices of fresh ginger, which is optional. Omit if u don't like it. Drop the balls into the sweet soup and let them simmer for abt 5 mins b4 turning off the heat.
Serve.