By Request

By Kekoa Catherine Enomoto

Wednesday, May 13, 1998

Serve homemade cookies and festive soup for good luck.

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Crisp cookies enfold
Good fortunes

READER Laurie Ching seeks fortune if not fame. She wants to know how to make Chinese fortune cookies.

During this coming season of weddings, pair Chinese fortune cookies with red bean and lotus seed soup (hung dau lin jee tong).

Eileen Yin-Fei Lo, author of "The Chinese Way -- Healthy Low-Fat Cooking from China's Regions" (Macmillan, 1997, $24.95) says red bean and lotus seed soup is a tradition at wedding banquets as well as New Year's feasts.

Lo says red beans (hung dau) represent strength, while lotus seeds (lin jee) symbolize the newlyweds being blessed with a child each year.

"Even if you are not so inclined," she writes of frequent childbearing, "I believe you will enjoy this festive soup."

Special homemade fortune cookies

From Panda Express executive chef Andy Kao

1/4 cup sifted cake flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
Dash salt
2 tablespoons cooking oil
1 egg white
1 tablespoon water
Vegetable oil nonstick cooking spray

Sift together flour, sugar, cornstarch and salt.

Add oil and egg white; stir until smooth. Add the water; mix well.

Make 1 cookie at a time by pouring 1 tablespoonful of batter on a skillet or griddle misted for 1 second with vegetable oil nonstick cooking spray. Spread batter to 3-1/2-inch circle. Cook over low heat about 4 minutes or until lightly brightly browned. Turn with wide spatula; cook 1 minute more.

Working quickly, place cookie on a pot holder. Put paper strip printed with fortune in center (fold fortune strip in half so ink doesn't touch cookie); fold cookie in half and then fold again over edge of bowl. Place in muffin pan to cool. Makes 8 cookies.

Note: Before starting cookies, write fortunes with predictions of good health, prosperity and/or happiness on small strips of paper for enclosing in the cookies as instructed above.

Approximate nutritional analysis per serving, based on 1/8 teaspoon total added salt and 8 seconds total cooking spray: 70 calories, 4.5 total g fat, no saturated fat, no cholesterol, 40 mg sodium.*

Red bean and lotus seed soup
(Hung dau lin jee tong)

From "The Chinese Way -- Healthy Low-Fat Cooking
from China's Regions" by Eileen Yin-Fei Lo,
Macmillan, 1997, $24.95

7 cups cold water
14-ounce package red beans (see note), washed 3 or 4 times to remove grit, drained
1/2 of 3-ounce package lotus seeds, washed and drained
1 piece dried tangerine skin, soaked in hot water 10 minutes until soft
3 bricks sugar-cane sugar ("rock sugar"; or use 3/4 cup brown sugar)

In a large pot, combine water, red beans, lotus seeds and tangerine skin. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce heat and simmer -- covered, with pot lid slightly ajar -- for 1-1/4 hours to 1-1/2 hours or until beans become tender.

When beans are tender and open, and lotus seeds soften, add sugar; stir. Raise heat to medium and cook 5 minutes or until sugar dissolves and blends. (If using brown sugar, there is no need to cook 5 minutes; simply stir to blend.)

Turn off heat, pour into a heated tureen and serve. Makes 6 servings.

Note: Dried red beans, dried lotus seeds, dried tangerine skin and "rock sugar" are available at Chinese stores, such as Bo Wah Trading Co. in Chinatown.

Approximate nutritional analysis per serving: 149 calories, less than 1 g fat, no cholesterol, 2 mg sodium.*

Send queries along with name and phone number to:
By Request, Honolulu Star-Bulletin Food Section,
P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu 96802.
Or send e-mail to features@starbulletin.com

Asterisk (*) after nutritional analyses in the Body & Soul section indicates calculations by Joannie Dobbs of Exploring New Concepts, a nutritional consulting firm.