Chap Goh Meh & Pengat

The Hokkien, and most of Penang people, mark the end of the Chinese New Year celebrations with a sweet dessert called Pengat. I shall list some of the basic ingredients for pengat. When I have cooked this yummy sweet soup, I shall blog again.

Basically, the pengat must have black eye beans as the base. Soak the beans for several hours (or overnight in the fridge). Boil it in a pot of about 1.5litre water until mushy.

Steam the roots vegetable. They are yam and several colourful version of sweet potatoes. Seen here are the purple, orange and yellow variety. Making beautiful and good pengat is very tedious because I remember my neighbour nyonya grandma labouriously cut the roots vege into diamond shapes of equal sizes and thickness.

The most tasty ingredient is the banana. Only the ripest Pisang Raja is acceptable. These bananas are then boiled in sugar syrup. The banana shown in the below photo is NOT pisang raja.

The yam/sweet potatoes are steamed. The bananas are cooked and soaked in syrup.

Another attractive thing in pengat is the tapioca jelly. This is made from tapioca flour knead with boiling water into dough and then, cut into small pieces and boil. (photo not available yet)

To summarise:
Add sugar to the black-eye beans. Put in screwpine leaves (pandan) and lots of coconut milk. Usually, I need about RM5 of coconut milk (which must come from at least 2-3 coconuts)

Once the sweet, milky soup is cooked, add in the steamed yam, sweet potatoes, syrup bananas and tapioca jelly.

Drool, drool, can’t wait till tomorrow to cook the whole pot.

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6 thoughts on “Chap Goh Meh & Pengat

    Jason

    (February 22, 2005 - 12:17 am)

    New receipe that can go into my book of receipe.Might try it out soon.Hehe,of coz its very important to cut them into equal size and shape mah!Very important!I am looking forward to it.Make sure ya take nice nice pic of it,ok?Will contact you for the exact recipe.I am drooling already.

    Keaukina

    (February 22, 2005 - 1:32 am)

    This is so interesting to me, because in Texas there is a tradition (or superstition) that one must eat black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day (Jan. 1st) for “good luck” in the coming year! In my family, we always eat black-eyed peas on that day, but we cook them with different seasonings. I have never thought of trying them with sweet flavors– I’m sure it is very good. In Texas, we cook our black-eyed peas with chopped onion and black pepper (and sometimes chili powder). Many people add bits of smoked meat, like ham or sausage, to the pot while cooking. We like to eat the black-eyed peas (and lots of the good juice) poured over cornbread. Thank you for the recipes and photos!

    Papi

    (February 22, 2005 - 2:28 pm)

    Pengat?? Bubur Cha-cha is it?

    Can’t wait for the photo…

    GUB2

    (February 28, 2005 - 12:11 am)

    Wah… got banana.. the one I had this year doesn’t have banana.. very disappointed.

    […] Yam. I found this yam from Thailand which is roundish and tiny. I haven’t try them yet and not sure if they are going to be ‘floury’ or hard and sticky. Yam rice, yam dessert or yam stir fried with dried shrimps and celery is good. Yam is also essential for the chap goh meh or 15th day of Chinese New Year pengat. […]

    […] the sweetest thing on Chap Goh Meh is the pengat which Penangites cook. I have the recipe for pengat also on Food Haven. As a Penangite, I must insist again that Pengat is NOT bubur cha cha. Once you […]

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