This recipe is for Ruth, who requested Filipino buchi. Ruth, there are variations to this; what I’m giving you right now is the simplest one with the shortest ingredient list.

To make 12 sesame balls, you need:

1 1/2 cups sweet rice flour (a.k.a. glutinous rice flour or Mochiko)
more or less 3/4 cup water, plus more for moistening your hands
1/4 cup sweet red bean paste (homemade or store bought)
about 1/2 cup sesame seeds, for coating the balls
peanut or other high-heat oil for deep-frying

Put the sesame seeds in a platter or bowl. Form 1-level-teaspoonfuls of the bean paste into balls. Set aside on a plate.
Combine rice flour and water (a bit at a time) in a bowl, stirring with a wooden spoon until homogeneous. The dough will not come together like bread dough, but will be rather crumbly. If you can take a small amount in your hand, squeeze it and it stays together, then you know you’ve got enough water in there.

Take a heaping tablespoonful of the dough and form it into a ball in your palm, about an inch in diameter. Make an indentation in the middle with a round implement or your thumb — I used the handle of a baby spoon — large enough to accommodate the bean paste ball. Drop the ball in and enclose in the dough, pressing gently to make sure none of the bean paste peeks through. At this point you may find it helpful to moisten your hands while you continue to form the dough into a ball shape. Make sure you seal all fissures or cracks that appear in the dough. You will have a ball about 1 3/4 inch in diameter.

Moisten the balls, if they appear to be dry, with some water, then dip into the sesame seeds and coat well. Preheat the oil in a deep-fryer or wok to 350°F.

Deep-fry the balls, 2-3 at a time, carefully dropping them into the hot oil so they keep their shape. If necessary, shape them with two wooden spoons. It is essential to do this in the beginning stages of cooking before the dough hardens and crisps. Cook the balls until the dough is cooked through, ball has puffed a bit, and sesame seeds are golden, about 3 minutes total. Remove with a slotted spoon or Chinese skimmer/strainer. Drain on paper towels and serve warm.

Try it and let me know if you like it!

There are many variations to jin dui. You can add mashed sweet potatoes or taro to the dough, about 1/2 cup mashed taro or sweet potato for every cup of rice flour you’re using — add water judiciously. This will give you a nicely-textured dough that’s a bit easier to work with. If you want the dough to be crispier, replace 1 tablespoon of the water with vinegar. If you want a puffier buchi, use cooked sugar syrup (made with equal parts sugar and water) instead of just water. Or, if you want, use half-coconut milk-half water to make the dough. If you are feeling particularly industrious, make the dough from scratch using glutinous rice soaked overnight, then grind in a food processor. If you have a grinder, you may also want to try grinding sweet brown rice into flour and use that instead of storebought rice flour.

Other fillings can be used instead of the customary bean paste, such as chopped up peanuts. You can add chopped “baby coconut” — Philippine buco — to the bean paste filling, or even macapuno, or those things by themselves, minus the bean paste. (Buco is available in Asian stores in the frozen section, and macapuno is available preserved in syrup in jars, also in the Philippine section.) You can also use char siew. Or try the the filling used for Filipino Brazo de Mercedes! The biggest and yummiest sesame balls I ever ate were on a Japanese ship — they were 3 inches in diameter, and filled with a ground pork mixture.

Here are more Jin Dui/Buchi recipes for you to try:

Lily Ng’s Jin Dui
Jas’s Jin Dui
Kai’s Baked Buchi

Post from: Blisstree

Reader Request: Buchi / Jin Dui / Jien Duy / Lek Doi /Bean-Filled Sesame Balls

1 fresh tilapia, trimmed and cleaned (gutted and scaled)
2 tablespoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon minced ginger (optional)
1/2 cup chopped onions
1/2 cup chopped tomatoes
salt or fish sauce and freshly ground black pepper to taste

banana leaves or foil for wrapping fish

Cut some slits into the flesh of the fish, down to the bone. You can do this several ways: parallel to the backbone, or perpendicular (make it several slashes then), or use crosscuts. Mix garlic, ginger if using, onions, tomatoes, salt or fish sauce and pepper in a small bowl. Press down on tomatoes a bit with a fork to bring out the juices. Carefully insert this mixture into fish cavity and into each cut/slash you’ve made. Wrap the whole fish in banana leaves or foil and cook on the grill for about 20 minutes or just until cooked through and fish is fragrant. If using the oven preheat to 400°F and bake, wrapped in leaves or foil, on a baking sheet, for about 20 minutes. Serve hot!

Variations:

If you can’t find or don’t want to use whole fish, you can do this same treatment using fish fillets. You can even replace the banana leaves or foil with parchment paper, and call your dish “en papillote”!

Post from: Blisstree

Inihaw na Tilapia/ Grilled Tilapia

This dish illustrates the simplicity of the Filipino saute. Many Filipino dishes start off with a basic “guisa”, a stir-fried base of aromatics that provides a foundation of flavor that compliments a wide range of ingredients, from seafood to meat and poultry, to vegetables, to noodles. This base, with some variation depending on the end result desired, is the same base upon which other flavors may be built. It can also be used by itself along with a couple of seasoning condiments such as soy sauce or fish sauce.

Kilawin is a dish that takes its primary flavor from vinegar. After the basic saute is done, the meat and vegetables are added, along with vinegar. The dish is finished with fresh grindings of black pepper. A touch of sweetness is desired by some, hence the optional brown sugar. Though sometimes used interchangeably with the other Filipino word “kinilaw”, a term that refers also to a dish often characterized by some component of sourness coming from limes, lemons or vinegar, “kilawin” more accurately typifies the cooked dish, as opposed to “kinilaw” which is usually made with raw ingredients, such as fish, shellfish or seaweed.

To make kilawin, you need

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1/2 cup sliced onion
1/4 cup chopped tomatoes (optional)
1 pound pork, cut into strips (a cut with a bit of fat is desirable here)
1/3-1/2 cup vinegar
3/4 pound daikon, sliced thinly
1 teaspoon brown sugar (optional)
freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add garlic and stir-fry until just beginning to turn color. Add onion and continue to saute until limp and translucent. Add tomatoes if using and cook, stirring frequently until tomatoes are cooked through. Add pork and vinegar and cook 10 minutes, decreasing heat to maintain a simmer. Add daikon and cook another 10 minutes or until completely cooked through but not soggy. Add brown sugar if using, and season to taste with freshly ground black pepper. Stir and cook an additional 5 minutes to meld flavors. Serve hot.

Variations:

This dish can also be prepared without pork, making it a vegetarian dish. As such it is also a great accompaniment to grilled fish.
Instead of black pepper, chopped bird chilies can be used to provide the heat for this dish.

Post from: Blisstree

Kilawing Baboy at Labanos/ Filipino Pork and Radish Kilawin