Savoury Yam Cake

This is a savoury breakfast food, snack or even tea time treat that is very popular in Malaysian-Chinese cooking. It is made out of a batter consisting of yam and rice flour which is then steamed and topped with a range of savoury toppings including crispy shallots, sesame seeds, and scallions. Best eaten with sriracha sauce!

Hello!

This Monday I am sharing a recipe for Yam Cake.

Yam cake is a savoury breakfast food, snack or even tea time treat that is very popular in Malaysian-Chinese cooking. It is made out of a batter consisting of yam and rice flour which is then steamed and topped with a range of savoury toppings including crispy shallots, sesame seeds, and scallions. Best eaten with sriracha sauce.

I absolutely love yam cake and when I was a child I used to eat it for breakfast every Sunday morning.

If you like yam and have not tried this before, you should definitely try this. I bet you will be hooked!

If you are an old hand at making yam cake, I also urge you to give this recipe a try as the texture is very nice. Smooth and just soft enough, without being mushy. It is also relatively easy to prepare.

I have a very small steamer so when I made this I had to pour the batter into two separate 6” cake tins and steam them one at a time. It is well worth it though as we had this delicious yam cake to eat over the whole of last weekend.

Recipe for Yam Cake

Prep Time: 40 minutes (including time to steam the yam cubes)/ Cooking time: 50 – 60 minutes / Serves 8

Ingredients

900gm Yam (peeled and cut into 1” cubes)

250gm Rice Flour

720ml Water

250gm Minced Pork

200gm Chinese Shitake Mushrooms (soaked till soft and cut into small pieces)

5 cloves Garlic (finely diced)

2 tsp Salt

1 tsp White Pepper

1 tsp Five Spice Powder

4 Tbsp Vegetable Oil

80gm Dried Prawns (soaked and drained)

1 stalk Scallions (sliced finely)

1 Red Chilli (seeds and inner core removed, sliced finely)

3-4 Tbsp Crispy Shallots

1 Tbsp Sesame Seeds

Sriracha Sauce to serve

Method

1. Grease and line a casserole dish or cake tin with parchment paper. Here I used two 6” round cake tins.

2. Steam the yam until it is soft enough to be mashed. This should take between 20 to 30 minutes. Once steamed, place in a bowl and mash (while the yam is still hot). Leave some bigger chunks if you like your yam cake to have some bigger pieces.

3. In another bowl, mix the rice flour and water together.

4. Pour 2 tablespoons of oil into a wok, once hot, add in the garlic and sauté. Next, add in the mince pork and mushrooms. Follow this with the salt, pepper and five spice powder.

5. Once the pork and mushrooms have cooked taste and adjust the seasoning, adding more if you like. Now, lower the heat and add in the mashed up yam followed by the rice flour and water mixture. Stir evenly until the batter is well mixed.

6. Pour the batter into the greased and lined casserole dish or cake tin. Knock the dish or tin lightly to even out the batter and smooth out the top. Steam until the mixture reaches a firm consistency. This should take about 50 minutes.

7. While the mixture is steaming, fry the dried prawns in the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil. Remove from heat.

8. Once the yam cake is ready, sprinkle the fried dried prawns, crispy shallots, scallions, cut red chilli and sesame seeds on top. Serve with some sriracha sauce.