This is a fairly confusing post but I’d originally intended this post to be about the dorayaki I made following Nami’s recipe but before I got photos of the dorayaki they were gone. Nevermind, I thought, I’ll just make a post on making red bean paste but since Nami posted a blog on red bean soup I finally found another way of using up all the bean paste I made!
The red bean paste I made is a chunky kind, I’ve adapted the recipe from Apple pie, Patis, & pate and changed a few steps + amount of sugar used. The colour in the photo isn’t very vivd/red as I took this photo at night under non-ideal lighting >.<[clear]
Red bean paste
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Ingredients:
- 1 cup red beans
- 1/4 cup sugar
- Water
Method:
[toggle title=”1. Soak the beans in a bowl of water over night. Leave at least 2cm (little bit less than 1 inch) of water above the level of the beans”]if you don’t have time, don’t worry too much about this. Just give them a wash – you’ll just have to spend more time boiling/simmering it[/toggle]
2. Put the beans in a pot and fill it with enough water to cover 2cm above the top of the beans. Bring it to the boil and reduce to a simmer.
3. Keep an eye on the pot and stir frequently. If the water level starts getting low add more water (only up to 2cm above the level of the beans!).
[toggle title=”4. Let it simmer like this for about an hour and keep stirring.”]If you’ve soaked the beans over night it should take less than an hour for the beans to start to break up[/toggle]
[toggle title=” 5. When the beans start to break apart with the stirring do not add any more water and keep reducing the water.”]This is the important part – make sure the beans don’t burn especially now that there isn’t much water left[/toggle]
[toggle title=”6. Add the sugar in portions, stir in well and taste – keep adding sugar until you’ve reached a level of sweetness you’re happy with.”]I’ve said 1/4 cup sugar because I didn’t use up 1/2 cup sugar as indicated in the original recipe. If you have a sweet tooth feel free to add more sugar[/toggle]
[toggle title=”7. Once the water has evaporated, your paste is done! The stirring would’ve mashed up the beans to a suitable texture (if you’re making Tsubuan paste).”]If you want it to be a smooth paste, use a fine sieve or use a clean splatter guard and mash the paste through it. If you want it even smoother, try using cheese cloth (don’t fold the cloth in half and use only one sheet of it) and smush the paste through it.[/toggle]
Yummy things
As mentioned before I used this paste to fill Dorayaki – I also suggest eating the paste with vanilla ice cream (or simply by itself if you like it as is) but Nami gave me a great idea with her Zenzai (Red Bean Soup) recipe – my mum used to make this soup for us (in a different way – it was much more involved and she would spend ages making the soup) and if you’ve got the paste why not try it? Its so simple and easy – utilising only a few ingredients! The only thing I can add is if you’d like to try, add in some dried orange peel when you’re boiling up the soup and let it sit for a few minutes before serving. It’ll give it an extra tangy after taste that should be nice – fair word of warning, little ones don’t tend to like that taste (or at the very least I remembered disliking that taste when I was younger).
I’ll come back to the Dorayaki when I make it again (perhaps I’ll guard it more closely next time!) and I’ll include extra tips and troubleshooting pointers.
In other news! I won a copy of “Crazy, Stupid, Love” and it arrived in the mail today! It’s possibly one of the only things I’ve ever won! It’s a really cute show and I did enjoy watching it so if you enjoy romcoms without the usual plot line I really do recommend it! (Steve Carell was great in the movie too!)
There has been so many things I’ve been wanting to do/make! I keep making bargains with myself like “I’ll make this after I finish studying XYZ” really doesn’t leave me with a lot of time to do anything! I really do want to get a sewing machine when the holidays come around again though.
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