Sweet bean paste
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Sweet bean paste is a food used in Chinese cuisine, primarily as a filling for sweet desserts such as baozi and tangyuan.
[edit] Production
The beans are boiled without sugar, mashed, and diluted into a slurry. The slurry is then strained through a sieve to remove the bean skins. The resulting sandy liquid is then filtered and squeezed dry using cheesecloth, and then finally sweetened. Oil in the form of either vegetable oil or lard is usually added to the relatively dry paste to improve its texture and mouthfeel. Oiled sweet bean paste is mainly found as fillings for Chinese pastries, while un-oiled sweet bean pastes are more often used in Japanese pastries.
[edit] Types
There are several types of sweet bean paste:
- Black bean paste - made from black soy beans, dark brown or black in colour
- Mung bean paste - made from mung beans dull yellow in colour
- Red bean paste - made from azuki beans and dark red in colour
- White bean paste - made from navy beans, greyish off white colour
Although not made from beans, lotus seed paste and black sesame paste are very similar in flavor and texture and are used in the same manner as the above forms of sweet bean paste.
