Hung dau sa — sweet red bean soup (紅豆沙)
Adzuki red beans slowly simmered until they melt, perfumed with dried tangerine peel and sweetened with rock sugar. A sweet, velvety soup served warm, both dessert and comfort.
Adzuki red beans slowly simmered until they melt, perfumed with dried tangerine peel and sweetened with rock sugar. A sweet, velvety soup served warm, both dessert and comfort.
You expect a French-style dessert, a fancy pastry? At home, we ended with something very simple: a soup of little red beans, warm, barely sweet. My mother would put in a piece of dried tangerine peel that she kept preciously in a jar, and it would perfume the whole kitchen. They said it fortifies the blood — I know above all that it consoles. After a day of fighting against the roles they denied me, that bowl never judged me.
- •Adzuki red beans — a good cup (soup base)
- •Dried tangerine peel (chenpi) — a small piece (characteristic fragrance)
- •Rock sugar — to taste (sweetness)
- •Water — in large quantity (long cooking)
Hung dau sa — sweet red bean soup (紅豆沙)
Adzuki red beans slowly simmered until they melt, perfumed with dried tangerine peel and sweetened with rock sugar. A sweet, velvety soup served warm, both dessert and comfort.
Why this dish? Tong sui — literally 'sugar water' — closes Cantonese meals and is also served as a nourishing treat. The version with adzuki red beans and dried tangerine peel belongs to the flavors of Chinatown that Anna May Wong rediscovered with her family: a warm, unpretentious dessert, believed to be fortifying.
You expect a French-style dessert, a fancy pastry? At home, we ended with something very simple: a soup of little red beans, warm, barely sweet. My mother would put in a piece of dried tangerine peel that she kept preciously in a jar, and it would perfume the whole kitchen. They said it fortifies the blood — I know above all that it consoles. After a day of fighting against the roles they denied me, that bowl never judged me.
Ingredients (period version)
- Adzuki red beans — a good cup (soup base)
- Dried tangerine peel (chenpi) — a small piece (characteristic fragrance)
- Rock sugar — to taste (sweetness)
- Water — in large quantity (long cooking)
Ingredients
- Adzuki beans — 200 g (soaked overnight) (base)
- Dried tangerine peel (chenpi) — 1 small piece, rehydrated (fragrance)
- Rock sugar (or brown sugar) — 60 to 80 g, to taste (sweetness)
- Water — 1.5 L (cooking)
- Sago pearls or lotus seeds (optional) — 2 tbsp (texture)
Method
- Soak the adzuki beans overnight, then drain.
- Cover them generously with water, add the rehydrated tangerine peel, and bring to a boil.
- Reduce the heat and simmer for 1 to 1½ hours, until the beans burst and the soup thickens; add more water if needed.
- Add the rock sugar (and cooked sago, if using) and cook for another 10 minutes.
- Serve warm in bowls, at the end of a meal or as a comforting snack.
How it was made : Tong sui were made with whatever the kitchen offered — beans, lotus, black sesame, taro — and varied according to season and the 'nature' attributed to each ingredient. Dried tangerine peel, sometimes aged for years, was a pantry treasure, both a spice and a home remedy for heavy digestion.
The contemporary twist : Pour it warm over a scoop of coconut ice cream, or set it into small panna cottas: Chinatown's tong sui reinvented as a frozen dessert.
Anna May Wong · Charactorium