
The other day, I called my mom to ask her if she or any of her friends knew a good fatt goh recipe. Every Chinese New Year, I get goodies from the Joy Luck Club such as pieces of Chinese New Year cake, taro cakes, steamed white sweet cakes, turnip cakes, and so on and so forth. She replied saying to me that no one ever makes fatt goh's anymore. They just buy them.
I never buy such things from the Chinese market because
- The canary bird color really scares me or whatever funky 80's colors they come in.
- They never taste the same as the way my dad used to make them (he misplaced the passed down recipe)
- Chinese old ladies in New York are rude as hell. Chinese New Year mean 1000 times more of them at the grocery store.
It was really hard to find recipes for Chinese fortune cakes via Google. It was like digging for one specific word in a 500 page book. I called my dad to ask him to think REALLY hard about how he used to make them. Every Chinese New Year, while my mother made fancy dishes like pig's knuckles, whole steamed fish, whole chicken, and vermicelli with 8 treasures, my dad would be playing around in front of the steamer with his PJ's still on. In the morning, my mom would be preparing for "tuen neen fan," where our family would gather on the eve for dinner, while my dad was making fatt goh's for me and my brother for breakfast. My dad told me what the basic ingredients were and how the consistency should be. Simple! Fresh rice flour, light brown sugar, water and baking powder in a watery batter. I just had to find a base recipe close enough to adjust the proportions of each ingredient. After making them a couple of times, I finally got them to split into 3-4 corners. And boy, do they remind me of my Chinese New Year's at home in New Jersey with my family.

Chinese Fortune Cake (Fatt Goh)
makes 12 cakes
380 gr rice flour* (see note below)
230 gr dark brown sugar (light brown sugar is ok too)
1 1/2 cups water
1 tablespoon baking powder
Place a wire steaming rack in a wok with water filled only to the height of the steaming rack.
Bring the water to a boil over high heat.
Heat the brown sugar with water in a medium pot over medium/low heat just until the sugar dissolves, mixing frequently. Let the mixture cool for 5 minutes and mix rice flour and baking powder into the pot. Fill the batter to the top of a glass teacup or a cupcake pan. Do not use paper baking cups or they will spread outwardly instead of pushing the batter up to split.
Set the cakes on a glass plate (if using glass teacups) and carefully put into the wok or steamer. Put the lid on and steam for 25 minutes.
*Fresh rice flour could be bought at Chinese specialty stores. It's called jeen mai fun. There is a dingy store,
Fong Inn Too on the east side of Mott St between Bayard and Pell that sells fresh Tofu pudding and all sorts of other things. They sell fresh rice flour there.
If you can't find the fresh one, it is fine. You can also buy the packaged ones sold at every Chinese supermarket. It usually comes in this not so neatly package where your hands (and clothes and everything else) get all gross and floury by the time you walk out of the store. It's a clear bag that has red printing on it. It says rice flour on the package in English.