Dango Tanghulu
Tanghulu is a popular Chinese street food made by skewering fresh fruits and dipping them in a hot sugar syrup. Dango is a traditional Japanese rice ball made from glutinous rice flour. When we combine these two treats, we will get "dango tanghulu": chewy puppy-shape dangos coated with a sweet and crunchy tanghulu coating.
Equipment
- Measuring cups
- 1 Large mixing bowl
- 1 heavy bottom saucepan
- 5 bamboo sticks
Ingredients
- ½ cup rice flour
- 1 cup glutinous rice flour
- ½ cup milk (You may need ½ cup + 2 to 3 tbsps of milk. Can substitute the milk with soy milk, coconut milk, oat milk, or water.)
- ¼ tsp black food coloring
- 10 strawberries
- 2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup water
Instructions
- Add 1 cup of glutinous rice flour, ½ cup of rice flour, and ½ cup cold milk (can also use soy milk, oat milk, or water) in a large bowl. You can also add ½ cup powdered sugar if you want to skip the tanghulu coating. Since the crunchy sugar coating is sweet enough, I would skip the sugar in my dango dough.
- Use clean hands to combine all the ingredients and knead them into a smooth dough. (Add 1 to 3 extra tbsps of milk/water if the dough feels too dry or fall apart.)
- Take a small piece (about ⅛) of the dough, add ¼ tsp of black food coloring (*see note 1) to the small dough. Knead the dough until the color is evenly distributed.
- Divide the white dough into about 11 equal pieces, roll into round balls. Each dango ball should weigh about 30g. Use the black dough to make eyes, ears, and noses, stick them to the white balls to make puppy dangos,
- Bring a pot of water to a boil, reduce heat to medium low. Simmer the dangos for about 15 minutes or until floating.
- Use a slotted spoon to transfer the cooked tricolor dango balls to a large bowl filled with ice water.
- Add 2 cups of granulated sugar and 1 cup of cold water to a heavy bottom saucepan, turn on medium heat, stir occasionally until the sugar has dissolved. Stop stirring once the sugar has dissolved.
- Wash and thoroughly dry the strawberries, cut each strawberries vertically into 3 pieces. Insert cooled dango balls and strawberry pieces onto a bamboo skewer in the order of: bottom part of a strawberry, dango, middle part of a strawberry, dango, and top part of a strawberry.
- Continue boiling the mixture over medium heat for about 20 minutes until the mixture has thickened and turned slightly yellow. The syrup should reach a temperature of about 150 °C (302°F) on a candy thermometer.(*See Note 2 if you don't have a thermometer.)
- Holding the skewered strawberries and dangos by the sticks, dip into the syrup, swirling it around to coat it evenly. Hold the dango tanghulu over the saucepan for a few seconds to allow any excess syrup to drip off.
- Place the dango tanghulu on a parchment-lined baking sheet to cool and harden for about 5-10 minutes.
- Enjoy immediately once the tanghulu has hardened.
Video
Notes
1. Black food coloring
Ideally use edible charcoal black powder to dye the dango dough, so that the dango's color is less likely to fade during the cooking process. I only had gel food coloring at home, which is also fine to use. However, as you could see, the dango puppies' eyes were faded a little, and the water turned gray after 10 minutes of simmering.2. Test tanghulu syrup temperature
If you don't have a candy thermometer, you can still test the tanghulu syrup to see if it has reached the correct temperature by using the cold water method:- Fill a small cup with cold water.
- Once the sugar syrup has turned slightly yellow, dip the tip of a chopstick or a spoon into the syrup, then soak the tip of the chopstick into the cold water.
- Wait a few seconds until the syrup has cooled and solidified in the water, then remove it from the water and feel it with your fingers.
- If the syrup has turned hard that cracks when bitten, the syrup has reached the temperature you want for making tanghulu.
- If the syrup still feels soft or sticky, continue boiling for another minute or two, then test again.