Almond Cookies 杏仁酥

杏仁酥 hang jan sou are crumbly crunchy almond cookies with a salty-sweet contrast in flavour that I adore. These cookies could pass off as western snacks (西餅) but they are very much considered Chinese (中餅).

Hang jan sou are often handed out as gifts during festive periods, such as Chinese New Year, which is why I guess they come in the most environmentally unfriendly packaging ever.

I bought these cookies at Loon Fung supermarket in London's Chinatown, where a single pack of ten cost £1.59, or you can do as I did and buy two packs for £2. If you see them then I do recommend buying a pack – they make a great snack.

For those keen bakers out there, Pig Pig's Corner has a great recipe for these cookies. If you like almonds then there's another famous Chinese snack you could try called 杏仁餅 hang jan beng. And finally, if walnuts are more your thing then there's a similar cookie called 合桃酥 hap tou sou.

Chinese Bakery

I was first introduced to the delights of Chinese bakery sometime in the last century when my mum would occasionally buy treats from Ho's Bakery in Manchester. By Chinese bakery, I guess I mean the cakes, pastries and buns that were developed by the Cantonese through exposure to western influences in Hong Kong and Macau.

There are couple of places in Chinatown that I go to for Chinese bakery; the first is Wonderful Patisserie on Gerrard Street. The photo below shows a couple of my faves pineapple bun (bolo bao) on the left and baked bbq pork bun (cha siu chaan bao) on the right.

The pineapple bun contains no pineapple and is so called because it has a crispy almost biscuit-like topping that looks like a pineapple. The soft bread in both these buns have a slightly sweet taste which is very moreish.

The baked bbq pork bun should not be confused with the steamed cha siu bao that is served as dim sum although as you can see below the filling is very similar. I could have sworn there was more filling when I was little !

Other faves include banana cake (hong ziu gou) pictured left and wife's cake (lao pao beng) on the right. The banana cake is made of glutinous rice flour, banana and the red bit is red bean paste – it's very fragrant although it is an acquired taste.

The wife's cake is a flaky pastry traditionally with a winter melon and almond paste filling – sounds weird but I love it. There are some faddy versions with red bean paste or lotus seed paste but I'm firmly of the view that you shouldn't mess around with the original.

I sometimes visit the Golden Gate Cake Shop on Macclesfield Road (off Gerrard St) where I sampled their cocktail bun (gai mei bao) and coconut roll. Both consist of the slightly sweet tasting soft bread featured in the bbq pork bun and pineapple bun.

The coconut roll (pictured right) is a new one on me and had a shredded coconut whirl - I was largely indifferent to this roll. The gai mei bao (pictured left) is one of my all-time faves with its dense sweet coconutty filling – the 1st photo below is Golden Gate's version but I prefer Wonderful’s version in the photo below that.

On a recent visit to Wonderful, I sampled a couple of new pastries - sesame red paste pastry (left) and green tea pastry (right). I guess I'm a bit old school and can't say I'd buy either of these pastries again although the green tea pastry was OK.

Of the two places I prefer Wonderful Patisserie as the baking is of a higher quality and the staff are more helpful. Now when writing this post, I thought it was an original idea but I should've known better. After drafting this post, I see that Bellaphon (come back soon old boy!) had already written about Chinese bakery. You can check out his thoughts here - he went to different places and tried some different stuff.

Lastly, I'd love to hear from you about your favourite Chinese cakes, pastries or buns and any tips on where to buy them from. And yes I know I've omitted egg tarts (dan taat) - it's not that I don't like them but these are best served warm as dim sum.

Almond Cakes

Whilst traipsing around Chinatown doing a bit of food shopping, I came across a packet of 'hang hen beng' or almond cakes (although they're actually biscuits). I try not to eat too much sweet stuff nowadays as I have to make some sacrifices for my six-pack but I couldn't resist popping these in the shopping basket.

I'd love to say that these were a childhood favourite but truth be told McVities were more common in the Noodles household. Although that's not to say we didn't have the occasional treat of Chinese cakes and biscuits when I was little. My favourite was sachima but I do remember almond cakes with their crumbly texture and fragrant nutty flavour.

I couldn't wait to rip open the packaging when I got home but when I did, I was disappointed. The biscuits were too crumbly and the almonds had been ground to obliteration. They were also too sweet with a synthetic taste probably from the preservatives that stretched the shelf life to a year.

Sadly, these were a pale imitation of the almond cakes, my Mum brought back from China a couple of years ago. If anyone knows of a better brand of almond cakes then let me know. Otherwise, I'll have to wait 'til the next time I see my parents when they'll mock me about my inadequate Chinese biscuit buying skills.