Mooncake is an indispensable traditional Chinese pastry enjoyed during the Mid-Autumn Festival, which falls on the 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese lunar calendar. I’d like to take this opportunity to share with you the mooncake recipe I’ve just made.

Over time, the style and purpose of this festive dessert have evolved significantly. Today, bakeries and restaurants offer mooncakes in countless varieties and creative designs, often presented in elegant, deluxe gift boxes.

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Overpriced mooncakes

It has also become a trend to purchase mooncakes (月餅) as gifts for relatives, friends, and business associates during the Mid-Autumn Festival.

As a result, mooncake prices have escalated year after year due to high demand. In fact, the selling price is often many times higher than the actual cost of the ingredients. I find this rather absurd, which inspired me to develop a simple recipe that anyone can follow to make mooncakes at home.

Moreover, since mooncakes have become overly commercialized today, gifting your own homemade mooncakes will carry much more meaning, showcasing your sincerity, effort, and personal touch.

It is true that making mooncakes from scratch requires skill and can be quite tedious. That’s why this recipe focuses on the traditional Cantonese mooncakes, but with simplified steps and ready-made fillings to save time.

It can be completed in just about an hour. So, let’s get started! 

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Note:

• This article is long because I want to cover all aspects that may affect the results, but the actual work is quite straightforward. 
• Important: You need a kitchen scale to measure all the ingredients accurately. Other than that, the recipe has a large margin of error.

Ingredients required to make mooncakes

Tip: If you already know these ingredients, you can skip this Ingredients section and click here to jump to the next section to start making the mooncakes.

1. Golden syrup

I’ve seen some mooncake recipes that use honey instead of golden syrup. You can substitute honey, but remember to omit the lye water since honey is not acidic (lye water is used to neutralize the sourness of golden syrup).

That said, the results will differ slightly. The pastry may not be as soft as that made with golden syrup, and its color will be lighter. It will also taste a bit sweeter than mooncakes made with golden syrup in the same quantity.

The purpose of the golden syrup

Why do we use golden syrup instead of regular sugar to make mooncakes?  There are a few reasons:

• It retains more moisture and therefore produces a more tender pastry than one made with regular sugar.
• It also helps to reduce the rate of staling of starch, thereby extending the shelf life of the mooncake. 
• It helps to reabsorb the oil from the filling of the mooncake back into the pastry, therefore further softening the pastry.

2. Vegetable oil

I prefer using vegetable oils with a neutral flavor, such as corn oil, peanut oil, canola oil, or palm oil. Some people use lard, but it has become less popular in recent years due to health concerns. In addition, many people in our community do not consume pork. Pork-free products have become the trend, ensuring that everyone can enjoy them together.

3. Lye water (kansui/枧水 )

Lye water is alkaline water to neutralize the acidity in golden syrup. This way, we can enjoy the benefit of golden syrup, which creates a soft pastry, without any sour taste.

It also contributes to the pastry’s color, giving it a deeper, richer tone. If your mooncakes appear too pale after about 20 minutes of baking, you can slightly increase the amount of lye water in the dough next time.

Homemade lye water

Since the purpose of lye water is to neutralize the acid, that means other alkaline ingredients will do the trick if lye water is unavailable.  I do not suggest you do so, as lye water is readily available in the Chinese community. However, in the event you can’t find this item, you can use baking soda and water as a substitute. 

To do so, preheat your oven to 250°F (120°C). This is a low, gentle heat meant to dry out the baking soda, not burn it. Bake for one hour. After it cools, add four portions of water to dissolve the baking soda. Use this liquid as a substitute for lye water.

4. Cake flour

Cake flour is ideal for making mooncakes. It has sufficient gluten to form the dough, but not too much that it will harden the soft pastry.

Since the amount of water varies among different brands of golden syrup, the amount of flour required to form the soft dough is not the same. Because of this, I will add ninety-five percent of the flour to the oil and golden syrup mixture, then add the remainder slowly to the right consistency, if necessary. 

5. Lotus paste as the filling

You can either purchase the ready-made lotus paste or make your own. If you are willing to spend some time making the lotus paste filling, making your own is the best option, as you can control the sweetness, softness, and texture. I prefer to head to my bakery specialty shop to get the ready-made one to save time.

Note: Lotus paste is not available in every part of the world, but it is the most commonly used filling for mooncakes.  You can also use red bean paste to replace lotus paste for the traditional Cantonese mooncake.

6. Salted egg yolk

I use fresh salted eggs from the market, as they are easily available in Malaysia. Alternatively, you can also buy salted duck egg yolks with the whites already removed, which I’ve done before when I was in New Zealand.

How to Make Traditional Mooncakes Step by Step

I have read some recipes with complicated steps for making mooncakes, but I promise my recipe is easy 🙂 Look at this equation:

Pastry + Salted Egg Yoke + Lotus Paste = Cantonese-style mooncake.

1. Preparing the dough 

There are only four ingredients required – golden syrup, lye water, vegetable oil, and plain flour. 

• Measure the golden syrup, lye water, and vegetable oil accurately with a kitchen scale (according to the recipe below). Mix well until combined.
• Sift the flour, then add it all at once to the mixture.
• Use a fork or stainless steel whisk to bring the ingredients together. At first, the mixture will be difficult to combine, but after a few stirs, the liquid will start to absorb into the flour, forming a sticky mass. Continue mixing until a soft dough forms and no dry flour remains in the bowl.
• Cover the dough with cling wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes. This resting period allows the dough to relax, making it more elastic and easier to handle. A relaxed dough is less likely to crack or break during shaping and wrapping.

2. Prepare the filling

• To prepare the salted egg yolk, first clean the salted egg and crack it open. Remove the yolk and wash it gently with water to get rid of any egg white, as only the yolk is needed. Pat it dry with a cloth or kitchen paper towel, then wrap the yolk with lotus paste.
• I prefer to shape the lotus paste by hand into a circle, keeping the center slightly thinner than the edges. Place the salted egg yolk in the center (you can use half a yolk if you prefer more lotus paste), then wrap the paste around it, closing the top by pushing the paste upward until it seals. Roll it into a ball and set it aside. If the mixture feels too soft to handle, refrigerate it for a while until it firms up before wrapping it with the pastry.

3. Wrap the filling with the pastry

Wrapping the filling with the pastry is more delicate than dealing with the egg yolk and the lotus paste.  A good-quality mooncake should have a thin pastry with consistent thickness.

• Roll out the pastry between two plastic sheets or cling wrap until it forms a circle about three times the size of the dough ball.
• Remove the top layer of cling wrap, place the filling in the center of the pastry, and fold the pastry up around the filling.
• Once the filling is fully encased, gently roll the mooncake between your palms to form a smooth ball. This step also ensures the pastry adheres firmly to the filling without gaps. Otherwise, the filling may separate from the pastry after baking.

4. Shaping the mooncake

• Roll the mooncake dough in a bowl filled with some flour. Shake off the excess flour. This step is to ensure the dough will not stick to the mold during shaping. 
• Similarly, plunge the piston of the mooncake mold into the flour, and shake off the excess. 
• Place the dough on the baking tray.
• Put the mooncake mold on the dough and plunge the piston downward.  The dough will take the shape of the mold, and the pattern will be imprinted on the surface.
• Plunge the mold down lightly to the dough repeatedly for at least seven to ten times to get a perfect shape. Otherwise, the mooncake will look lopsided and have a blurred pattern.

5. Bake the mooncake

• Bake it on the middle rack, 175°C/350°F top and bottom temperature for five to six minutes or until the surface starts to firm up.  Some mooncake recipes use a different temperature, but it is all acceptable. It is essential to let it firm up before removing it to apply the egg wash. Otherwise, it will end up with a blurred pattern. 
• Remove the mooncake from the oven and brush the surface of the mooncake with egg wash. 
• Use a kitchen paper towel to remove any excess egg wash trapped in the gaps of the pattern.
• Return the mooncake to the oven to bake for another ten minutes or until golden brown.

Note: 

If you find that the mooncake skin cracks during baking, try to spray some water on the mooncake before baking.  It should be only one or two sprays from a distance so that there will be no excessive water landing on any part of the mooncakes.

6. Resting

• Remove the cake from the oven to cool at room temperature.
• Transfer the mooncake to an airtight container and keep for three days. During this period, the oil from the filling will migrate to the thin layer of the pasty, resulting in a very soft and moist outer layer.

Variations

As I mentioned, this is the basic traditional mooncake recipe. You can add melon seed to the lotus paste, or use red bean paste, mung bean paste, black sesame paste as the filling, make it with five kernels 五仁月饼.

The other variation is called Snow Skin Mooncakes, in which the process does not involve baking at all. It is entirely a different mooncake recipe, which will be discussed separately.

How Much Pastry Do You Need to Wrap the Filling?

The ratio of pastry to filling is critical. A good mooncake should have a thin layer of pastry with plenty of fillings. The ratio should be one part of pastry to two parts of fillings. A skillful chef can use even less pastry to encase the filling. 

I use 18g of pastry for 35g of filling.  The weight of the filling is the combination of the lotus paste and the yolk.  Since the weight of the yolk varies, just put the yolk on the weighing scale and add the lotus paste up to 35g.

Do You Really Need to Pre-Cook the Salted Egg Yolks?

Although I prefer to wrap the egg yolk with the lotus paste without pre-cooking the egg yolk, I have carried out a simple test to validate two methods to cook the egg yolk as suggested by some mooncake recipes.

1. Steam the egg yolk with a tablespoon of wine for five minutes. Accordingly, the purpose of the wine is to remove the raw egg yolk smell. 
2. Soak the yolk in oil, then bake it for five minutes. Drizzle some cooking oil to the egg yolk, mix well and set aside for an hour.  This step is to let the egg yolk absorb the oil. Place the egg yolk on the baking tray and bake at 175°C until the surface of the egg yolk starts to turn a lighter color and oil bubbles surround the yolks. It will take about five minutes of baking to happen. Since the mooncake is baked at a high temperature, the egg yolk will be heated up, and the oil will combine with the filling. The egg yolk will detach from the lotus paste if the paste you use contains too little oil. 

The result :

The result clearly showed that the baked egg yolk separated from the filling. It may be because I overbaked it, which results in the shrinkage of the yolk. The steamed egg yolk seems overcooked a little, while the best result is from the one that was just cleaned with water and patted dry.

Needless to say, I will neither bake nor steam the egg yolk, which does not show any significant benefits. The salted egg yolk will be cooked, as these are mini-sized mooncakes.

More recipes for you

If you like this recipe, I would like to suggest other popular Asian recipes for you to try. Here are my picks:

• The best Butter Cake recipe. This recipe is used to make the most sellable cake in the cafe where I worked.
• This recipe is most useful for beginners who prepare the tempura batter. You will get all the information you need.
• Cooking eggplants can be tricky. This recipe shows how to preserve its vibrant purplish color, prevent it from being too oily, and prevent it from turning soggy.
• If you like this mooncake recipe, chances are you like Chinese pastries. I would suggest you also try the Taiwanese pineapple cake, which is my favorite Chinese dessert.