It's been more than 10 years since I ate one of my favorite Hari Raya Kueh which is the Kueh Putu Kacang.
I reminisced helping my mom as a tween. I remember watching her roast green beans in a big wok, watched her sieve the grinded green beans in awe, accompanied her to a nearby small mill at Bedok Reservoir, mix finely grinded green beans & sugar and together, we would pack the mixture into their respective moulds.
In my mind, it was just like playing sandcastle and as an adult, I still do.
Unfortunately, a visit to a mill was no longer convenient which was why we stopped making kueh putu kacang all these years. Until I mentioned it again to Mak that she could try asking the small shops at Mustafa that mills spices. She did but it seems the person who does the grinding only available on weekdays. Luckily, she knew of 1 mill which is at Ulu Pandan. It was so far away but she had someone to take her so yey!
She had to wait 1 hour and paid $6.60 for requesting to mill 4kg worth of green beans and sugar.
For those who don't know what and how kueh putu kacang is made,
it is basically made of equals parts of finely grinded of roasted green beans and sugar (1kg of green beans + 1kg of sugar)
Preparing and making it is a tedious process but the end result. Oohlala... the kueh just melts in your mouth in sugary sweetness.
First step is to roast green beans in a wok, lightly grind them with a mortar & pestle to separate it's skin, sieve it by tossing and send it to the mill to grind it finely; I mean REALLY finely.
After the the green bean has turn into powder, it has to go through another sieving process to make sure there it is free of the dark particles of the skin. Spray a little of water to it to prepare it to mix with the equally powdery sugar.
The fun but almost thumb breaking part.
(The trick is to push with your shoulders, not your thumb)
We still have our old kueh putu kacang moulds; wooden and plastic. Plastic is easier to handle because the it's easier for the kueh to pop out but the wooden ones we have more traditional designs.
Teamed up with corn flour wrapped in a handkerchief to be be lightly dusted on the moulds, we worked. Packing was fun but can be tough because you need to make sure it's tightly packed or the dainty designs won't stay. We had a few imperfections but we just kept it. Nobody is going to really stare and inspect so closely anyways.
We spent about 2+hours for 3 days in the morning because the best way to 'set' the kueh is to dry it in the sun; the hotter, the better. You can dry using the oven but it will have that 'oven' smell and taste which is not desirable.
Drying it in the sun to solidify it can be tedious too. As if not so constant weather conditions wasn't bad enough, in our past experiences, sometimes we find spit in our kueh!! Not that is was intentional, it was just inconsiderate people spitting out of their corridors and it would hit our kueh.
So far, we only got hit by a couple of drops of water from neighbors watering their plants other than that, everything is good.
Here's our set up.
End result.
I reminisced helping my mom as a tween. I remember watching her roast green beans in a big wok, watched her sieve the grinded green beans in awe, accompanied her to a nearby small mill at Bedok Reservoir, mix finely grinded green beans & sugar and together, we would pack the mixture into their respective moulds.
In my mind, it was just like playing sandcastle and as an adult, I still do.
Unfortunately, a visit to a mill was no longer convenient which was why we stopped making kueh putu kacang all these years. Until I mentioned it again to Mak that she could try asking the small shops at Mustafa that mills spices. She did but it seems the person who does the grinding only available on weekdays. Luckily, she knew of 1 mill which is at Ulu Pandan. It was so far away but she had someone to take her so yey!
She had to wait 1 hour and paid $6.60 for requesting to mill 4kg worth of green beans and sugar.
For those who don't know what and how kueh putu kacang is made,
it is basically made of equals parts of finely grinded of roasted green beans and sugar (1kg of green beans + 1kg of sugar)
Preparing and making it is a tedious process but the end result. Oohlala... the kueh just melts in your mouth in sugary sweetness.
First step is to roast green beans in a wok, lightly grind them with a mortar & pestle to separate it's skin, sieve it by tossing and send it to the mill to grind it finely; I mean REALLY finely.
After the the green bean has turn into powder, it has to go through another sieving process to make sure there it is free of the dark particles of the skin. Spray a little of water to it to prepare it to mix with the equally powdery sugar.
The fun but almost thumb breaking part.
(The trick is to push with your shoulders, not your thumb)
We still have our old kueh putu kacang moulds; wooden and plastic. Plastic is easier to handle because the it's easier for the kueh to pop out but the wooden ones we have more traditional designs.
Teamed up with corn flour wrapped in a handkerchief to be be lightly dusted on the moulds, we worked. Packing was fun but can be tough because you need to make sure it's tightly packed or the dainty designs won't stay. We had a few imperfections but we just kept it. Nobody is going to really stare and inspect so closely anyways.
We spent about 2+hours for 3 days in the morning because the best way to 'set' the kueh is to dry it in the sun; the hotter, the better. You can dry using the oven but it will have that 'oven' smell and taste which is not desirable.
Drying it in the sun to solidify it can be tedious too. As if not so constant weather conditions wasn't bad enough, in our past experiences, sometimes we find spit in our kueh!! Not that is was intentional, it was just inconsiderate people spitting out of their corridors and it would hit our kueh.
So far, we only got hit by a couple of drops of water from neighbors watering their plants other than that, everything is good.
Here's our set up.
We temporarily set up bamboo holders just to dry these bad boys. After the front is dried, we flip them to dry the base. We didn't have the opportunity to dry them the entire day because we just don't want to take the risk of random water droplets from unidentified places so it took us about 3 days for every new batch. That is about 9 hours under the blasting noon sun.
End result.
Personally, I like the cuter and smaller ones because I just like to pop 1 in and let it melt in my mouth. 1 kueh down!
