Tiny cakes, big surprises

Mini-cakes packed with flavours and served on auspicious occasions is a must-have this Chinese New Year.

HYDERABAD: Mini-cakes packed with flavours and served on auspicious occasions is a must-have this Chinese New Year. Called mooncakes, the dessert is given to people while greeting them and is considered to bring good luck.

“These cakes are had with tea or coffee. It is a small piece of cake with a filling comprising expensive items such as bean paste and lotus seed paste. It is made in moulds,” says chef Kailash Gundupalli, Director of Culinary, Novotel Hyderabad Convention Centre.

The hotel is hosting a Mooncake Festival to celebrate The Year of The Tiger at its pastry shop, La Café. This piece of art is baked in such a way that when it’s sliced, it does not have any creases or folds. The entire process takes about two-and-half hours.

Varieties on display

• Purple snowy mooncake with sweet potato stuffing
• Bamboo charcoal sesame walnut mooncake with black sesame paste and macadamia nuts
• Lotus mooncake with lotus paste and five nuts paste which we place in the centre
• Triple chocolate mooncake with hazelnut filling
• Green tea vanilla crème custard mooncake has a green tea custard with berries inside
• Angeer Kalakan with motichoor laddu. This is filled with angeer kalakan and laddu, and cover with kalakan. When you cut it, you can see the rich yellow colour