Learn how to make this auspicious Hakka hee pan that is soft and slightly chewy with this easy and delicious recipe. Variations to make other flavors and colors using natural ingredients too.
JOYFUL RICE CAKE (喜粄)
Xi Ban or Hee Pan literally translated into joyful rice cake. In Hokkien dialect, it is known as Ki Ka Ku. Hee pan is a traditional Hakka steamed rice cake that is made to celebrate joyful events like Chinese New Year, weddings, baby’s full-month birthday, etc. Traditional hee pan is made pink/red in color. The Chinese like to use red to celebrate joyful events.
Traditional hee pan back in the super old days also made with wheat flour, but over the years, to make a long history short, due to wheat shortage, the recipe has been adapted to use a combination of rice and glutinous rice flour.
The modern-day hee pan, like this recipe, is made with wheat flour like all-purpose flour and glutinous rice flour.
TASTE AND TEXTURE OF HEE PAN
If you asked me, hee pan is almost like a hybrid of steamed buns and steamed cake. It’s soft and slightly chewy and cake-like in texture. I made mine not too sweet, but you can adjust the level of sweetness to your preference.
HOW TO MAKE SOFT AND CHEWY HEE PAN
1. PREPARE THE SYRUP
Pour pandan juice into a saucepan. Add sugar and bring to a boil and then lower heat to cook until sugar dissolves. Turn off the heat and let it cool down completely. You can prepare this one day before too
2. MAKE THE DOUGH
Mix all-purpose flour, glutinous rice flour, wheat starch, and instant yeast in a mixing bowl.
Add 1/2 of the pandan juice you prepared earlier followed by cooking oil. Continue to add the pandan juice as needed. Knead into a smooth dough. You may use a stand mixer like KitchenAid or knead by hand until the dough is smooth.
3. SHAPE THE DOUGH
Roll the dough into a long log. Try not to work the dough too much.
Divide the dough into 12 equal portions (roughly about 60 gr each). Keep them covered and work with one dough at a time.
Lightly dust your palm with a bit of all-purpose flour. Roll the dough into a smooth ball.
Place on top of the banana leaf
Gently press it down with your palm to flatten slightly into a disc. Repeat with the rest of the dough and banana leaves.
4. PROOF THE DOUGH
Covered with a clean dry cloth and let the dough proof for about 30-45 minutes (or longer in a colder climate) or until they are light and puffy.
5. STEAM THE CAKE
Bring water in the steamer to a boil. Wrap the lid of the steamer with a clean cloth to prevent condensation from dripping into the cakes. Place the proofed hee pan in the steamer, leaving about 1-inch gap in between. Cover the lid and lower the heat to LOW (not medium or high). Steam for 10 minutes. Turn off the heat after and leave for 1 minute before uncovering the lid.
You can trim the banana leaves into round shape for presentation. Let the cake cool down before serving. If you wish to “stamp” the cake with cute image or Chinese characters, you may do so now by dipping the stamp in red food coloring. Dab off extra food coloring before stamp on the hee pan. My mom got me some nice stamp with Chinese characters and I was overjoyed to be able to stamp these hee pan LOL!
FLAVOR AND COLOR IDEAS FOR HEE PAN USING NATURAL INGREDIENTS
RED COLOR
Use 1/2 tsp of red yeast rice powder or beetroot powder or replace the liquid in this recipe with beet juice.
ORANGE COLOR
Use 1/8 tsp of turmeric powder or replace the liquid with carrot juice. You can also use mashed pumpkin (refer to this recipe)
GREEN COLOR
Use 1/2 tsp of culinary matcha powder. You can also use the skin of the cucumber to make a juice. It gives a really nice green color
BROWN COLOR
Replace the white sugar with coconut sugar (gula Melaka). If you use coconut sugar, make sure you cook it with the liquid calls for in the recipe and then strain it. You can also use 1 tsp of cinnamon powder, cocoa powder, or milo powder.
PURPLE COLOR
Use a purple mashed sweet potato. Like this purple sweet potato hee pan I made.
BLUE COLOR
Replace the liquid with blue pea flower juice. Soak about 3 Tbsp of dried blue pea flower with about 90 gr of hot water and let it steeps for 10 minutes then the juice is ready to be used.
Gula Melaka, Purple Sweet Potato, and Red Hee Pan
HOW TO STORE HEE PAN
REFRIGERATOR: You may store in the refrigerator for up to 1 week
FREEZER: For longer storage, I suggest placing the hee pan on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and then put hee pan on top without touching each other. Pop into the freezer for about 1 hour, they won’t be fully frozen yet. Transfer them to a freezer bag and they can be kept for 3 months there
REHEATING: Simply reheat in the steamer until heated through. If frozen, you don’t need to thaw, you can steam over high heat for 10 minutes or until heated through. Please keep in mind if you stamp the hee pan, the red will bleed when you steam the hee pan again.
Look at that soft and slightly chewy texture. I plan to make more with mashed pumpkin and mashed purple sweet potatoes soon. My kids love hee pan A LOT!
DID YOU MAKE THIS PANDAN HEE PAN (XI BAN) RECIPE?
I love it when you guys snap a photo and tag to show me what you’ve made 🙂 Simply tag me @WhatToCookToday #WhatToCookToday on Instagram and I’ll be sure to stop by and take a peek for real!
*UPDATE: After many rounds of testing again with different flavors, I decided to update this recipe that yields soft, yet slightly chewy (but not so chewy). When I used 50-50 ratio of all-purpose flour and glutinous rice flour, the result wasn’t as good compared to this most current version where I’ve reduced the amount of glutinous rice flour slightly and add Chinese wheat starch. The texture improves quite a bit!
Pandan Hee Pan (Xi Ban) - Hakka Steamed Rice Cake
Ingredients
- 180 gr pandan juice see notes 2
- 120 gr sugar
- 2 tsp instant yeast
- 200 gr all-purpose flour plus more for dusting. See notes 1
- 20 gr wheat starch or use cornstarch
- 120 gr glutinous rice flour
- 30 gr cooking oil neutral taste like vegetable oil, grapeseeds oil (plus more for brushing)
- 12 pieces banana leaves cut into about 10x10 cm pieces, or just use parchment paper instead of leaves
Instructions
- Pour pandan juice into a saucepan. Add sugar and bring to a boil and then lower heat to cook until sugar dissolves. Turn off the heat and let it cool down completely. You can prepare this one day before too
Make the dough:
- Mix all-purpose flour, glutinous rice flour, and instant yeast in a mixing bowl. Add 1/2 of the pandan juice you prepared earlier followed by cooking oil. Continue to add the pandan juice as needed. You may not need all or you may need a bit more liquid if the dough is dry. Knead into a smooth dough. You may use stand mixer like KitchenAid or knead by hand
Shape the dough:
- Oil the cut banana leaves with some cooking oil. Set aside. Divide the dough into 12 equal portions (roughly about 60 gr each). Keep them covered and work with one dough at a time
- Lightly dust your palm with a bit of all-purpose flour. Roll the dough into a smooth ball. Place on top of the banana leaf and then gently press it down with your palm to flatten slightly into a disc. Repeat with the rest of the dough and banana leaves
Proof the dough:
- Covered with a clean cloth and let the dough proof for about 30-45 minutes (may take longer if in a colder climate) or until the dough is light and puffy. Take care not to overproof the dough too
Steam the hee pan:
- You may need to steam in batches as your steamer may not be big enough to steam all at one go. DO NOT let the hee pan proof for too long or they will not be smooth after steaming. You may put the rest of the hee pan in the refrigerator to slow down the yeast activity until they are ready to be steamed
- Bring water in the steamer to a rolling boil. Wrap the lid of the steamer with a clean cloth to prevent condensation from dripping into the cakes. Place the proofed hee pan in the steamer, leaving about 1-inch gap in between. Cover the lid and lower the heat to LOW (not medium or high heat) and steam for 10 minutes
- After 10 minutes, turn off the heat and leave the hee pan in there for 1 minute and then uncover the lid and then remove the hee pan to a cooling rack to let them cool down completely. Bring water in the steamer back to a boil and place the next batch for steaming. Remember to lower down the heat to LOW again after that and steam for 10 minutes
- Remove the hee pan to let them cool on the cooling rack so the bottom won't get all wet and soggy
Notes
- You can use all 220 gr Hong Kong or Vietnamese bao flour and omit the wheat starch
- Simply use water or other flavor if you do not want a pandan flavor. You can add other powdered flavoring like matcha powder, cocoa powder, etc.
5 comments
Hi, if we use sweet potato what would the measurement be? Also for the gula melaka,
Thanks , your recipes are awesome btw
Hi Clare,
Thank you for your kind words. I do plan to make the gula melaka and sweet potato/pumpkin version. The measurements will be different from this.I’ll keep you posted once I have those recipe posted soon. Cheers, Marv
Hi again Clare, just to let you know that I’ve posted the recipe for purple sweet potato hee pan (you can use regular sweet potato/pumpkin too) and also updated this post if you want to use gula melaka to make hee pan. Hope they help and please let me know if anything is unclear. Cheers!
Is there a substitute for the banana leaf?
Hi Linda,
If you don’t want to use or don’t have banana leaves, just regular parchment paper like when you do regular steamed buns will do. Banana leaves do impart a bit of aroma to the xi ban, but no big deal if you don’t want to use it. Hope it helps!