Vegan MoFo Day #11!
Yes, you read that right. Savory mochi (rice flour gnocchi). We’re talking garlic, onions, peppers and olive oil, kids. Get ready. Some of you may remember my foray (read: obsession) with the rice gnocchi I could buy in Prague. I was really skeptical of this stuff before becoming addicted to it. For something that was commonplace in the Tesco in Prague, it is basically non-existent here. In fact, when trying to Google recipes, the closest I found was mixing rice flour into potato gnocchi, which just sounded, well…gross.
With no recipe in hand, I basically threw some stuff in a bowl and hoped for the best! Luckily, my result came out pretty similar to the stuff I ate in Prague. Whew! The only things I’d do differently next time are to make the mochi balls smaller and to not boil them as long (a.k.a. pay attention to the pot instead of wandering aimlessly around my kitchen getting distracted by food). Often a problem.
Savory Mochi or Rice Gnocchi
Ingredients
- 2 1/3 cup glutinous rice flour I used this one
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 cup water
- vegetables of choice ex: peppers, onion, broccoli, kale
- salt pepper and garlic to taste
Instructions
- Combine the dry rice flour, salt and sugar in a bowl.
- Add the water and stir until it forms a smooth dough ball.
- After some initial stirring, I covered my hands in dry rice flour and kneaded it outside the bowl until it was smooth.
- Break some pieces off, roll them in your hand to make gnocchi shapes (ovals), roll them in some more rice flour to keep them from sticking and stored them on a plate as you go.
- Bring a large pot of water to boil, sprinkle some salt in the water. While the water was coming to a boil, I dusted a ziplock bag with rice flour and put half of them in there and froze them for later. This is obviously not necessary, but there were too many for me and I love freezers.
- Once the water is boiling, put in your mochi and stir.
- KEEP AN EYE ON IT! They will only have to boil for 2-3 minutes, tops. As soon as they float to the top, they're done! Take 'em out promptly once they float or they'll be a bit mushier and not as fabulous.
- Once those are boiled up nicely, throw some olive oil, veggies and lots of garlic in a pan and fry up with the mochi. I like 'em nice and browned.
- Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste. You did it!
Rice flour gnocchi dough.
Some photos of the process:
This is my setup. Dough to the left, the mochi in my hand pre-shaping and the rice flour to roll it in on the right. I made mine too big, so I’d suggest making level teaspoon size mochi. You don’t actually have to measure it, but make yours a little smaller than mine. They get a little bigger when you boil them. You’ll end up with lots of mochi on a plate like this:
And up close:
Mine looked like this after boiling:
No idea why the photo is sideways. It’s normal on my computer, but Blogger has decided this is how it should be. Well, you get the idea.
Savory mochi! I was joking as I made them that it was rice for giants. Rawr!
I’m glad that my bizarre eating habits from living in Korea have somehow spread to your flat! Congratulations on the hacking of mochi!
Rice flour is a mysterious being. I have plans to make truffles out of it next, to take a complete 180. New medium for cookery!