Snack Time

I was at Funan Centre when I saw some snacks on sale and could not resist to give them a try. So I bought some for myself and for my colleagues to enjoy :)

My favourite - kueh tutu. According to the singlish dictionary, It is a small, flat, white steamed cakes filled with orange-coloured sweetened shredded coconut or other ingredients, made using a mould with a scalloped pattern. The owner makes deliciously moist steamed cakes with peanut or coconut filling. The snack was originally eaten plain in China. But filling was added when it was reproduced here. Its name ‘tutu’ was given to mimic the noise that came from traditional charcoal-heated steamers.

kueh tutu

I love kueh tutu! It is the steamed rice flour that makes it a bit chewy and I like the texture of it. Sometimes I wonder if anywhere in Singapore sells ones without the filling?? I don't quite mind both the peanut and coconut filling, although I slightly prefer the coconut over the peanut. Reason is that coconut tends to make the kueh more juicy, whilst peanut filling is a little drier. Most stalls outside sells 5 for $2 and my usual combination will be 3 with coconut filling and 2 with peanut filling.

There is a 'cousin' of kueh tutu - known as putu piring. It is a flat, white Malay steamed cake filled with Gula Melaka. Not to be confused with kueh tutu. putu piring is slightly larger and comes with a filling of gula melaka, not peanut or coconut.

A search on Google tells me of a recipe of putu piring that someone else blogged about. I have tried putu piring at the Jonker Street market in Malacca when I went there in 2004. However the stall disappeared since and I did not see the uncle last year and this year. Putu piring is twice the size of kueh tutu and it only costs RM$0.50 each. Of the 2, I still prefer kueh tutu :)

The other snack I bought from Funan was the Japanese Mochi. (But I think having found out more about mochi, I think what I had was not exactly known as mochi...) The traditional mochi is just plain rice cake (read about the process of making mochi). One use of the mochi was to make confectionary and stuffed with different sweet fillings. These are then known as daifuku. The ones that were on sale were red bean, green tea, peanut and yam. I had bought 2 of each flavour except yam. I didn't get to try the green tea ones as my colleagues had taken them. Between red bean and peanut, I prefer the peanut flavour :P

Red for red bean, green for green tea, white for peanut

Go try them when you see them on sale :)