Glutinous Rice Flour

This mochi waffle recipe creates a breakfast pastry with a delightfully bouncy chew and a crisp crust that lasts way after it comes off of the iron.

These chewy, lightly sweet, sesame-filled rice cakes are a star of the Korean mid-autumn festival known as Chuseok.

This rustic, subtly sweet Korean rice cake gets its deep roasty-toasty flavor from roasted soybean powder.

In the spirit of Hawaiian butter mochi, this head-turning cake requires minimal cleanup and no fancy equipment.

These mochi-stuffed jujube dates in syrup are the Lunar New Year dessert that’s (almost) too adorable to eat.

Mochi that’s this soft and chewy (the key is coconut milk!) is practically begging to be paired with a delightfully crunchy peanut filling.

Glutinous rice flour gives these coconutty waffles (inspired by the Filipino cake bibingka) their delightfully chewy texture. And although it seems paradoxical, they’re gluten-free, too.

Attention, lovers of squishy and chewy foods! This moody-glam dessert packs tons of bold sesame flavor into one super simple one-bowl cake.

The sesame balls will float to the surface before they’re done frying. Use a spider or a slotted spoon to keep them submerged until they’re golden brown and puffed up. This recipe is from Mister Jiu's in San Francisco, CA.

On the outside, this cake looks like any other Bundt cake, but inside, it has a vibrant shade of green and a beautiful honeycomb pattern.

The best tsukune, or Japanese chicken meatballs, are nicely caramelized, well seasoned, and juicy—and served straight off the grill.

Glutinous rice flour, also known as mochiko or sweet rice flour, makes an excellent gluten-free gravy for Thanksgiving or any holiday feast. Like wheat flour, mochiko can be toasted in fat to create a roux, which lends the finished gravy robust flavor that other starches, like cornstarch, just can’t match. This gravy also has a silky texture and great body like any gravy should. Here miso and apple cider vinegar extend the flavor, making it both brighter and more savory. Start by adding half the!…

Butter mochi is a mainstay at any island party: a perfectly chewy, slightly sticky, and just-dense-enough coconut-custard glutinous rice cake.

Shanghainese enjoy rice balls in both sweet and savory preparations. I love both, so I included them here. All Shanghainese buns and pastries have simple identifiers for telling the difference between sweet and savory. Sweet versions are always round and smooth, while savory ones will have a tail hinting at the filling inside.

Sweet rice flour makes this super-adaptable cake gooey-bouncy on the inside and crispy-chewy on the outside. Even better, this particular recipe can go in any flavor direction you want: Add cocoa, matcha, or malt powder; throw in some cinnamon, cardamom, or turmeric.

Millet flour and rice flour are bolstered by tapioca starch, cornstarch, potato starch, and guar gum in this gluten-free all-purpose flour substitute.

Just as American children anxiously await their Christmas gifts months in advance, I anxiously awaited this scrumptious cake. Nian-Gao, New Year's cake, is one of the most important holiday dishes in many Asian countries. Eating Nian-Gao during the New Year's celebration is said to bring safety and fortune to the entire family for the coming year, though I now make it for family gatherings throughout the year.

In Korea, this popular starter and snack is served at home, in restaurants, and on street corners. (It’s also one of the most popular dishes in Korean restaurants in the States.) At its most basic, it’s a large egg batter scallion pancake, but other vegetables, meat, and seafood are often added to make it a fancier and more substantial dish. Glutinous rice flour creates a wonderfully chewy texture, but if you can’t find it, all-purpose flour is perfectly fine. Serve these immediately after making them.

Here , simple dough made of glutinous rice flour, water, and salt is shaped into small, round disks and steamed on banana leaf circles, which impart fragrance and prevent sticking. The result is bánh day, eggshell-white cakes that are eaten in pairs with slices of Viet sausage slipped between them. The cakes are sweet and chewy, while the sausage provides a savory counterpoint. If you don’t have time to make the sausage at home, pick some up at a Viet market or deli.

Soft and chewy sticky rice dumplings have a nuanced natural sweetness that is savored by fans of East and Southeast Asian cuisines. As the recipes in this book show, they lend themselves to many occasions, cooking techniques, and fillings. Regardless of type, sticky rice dumplings never fail to please. Old-fashioned cooks pound just-cooked sticky rice to create their dough. Modern cooks like me reach for convenient glutinous (sweet) rice flour for our favorite sticky rice dumplings. Preparations involving poaching the dumplings and serving them in broth (like a sweet soup) are common in Asia. I grew up with this classic Vietnamese rendition, not realizing that fried shallots contributed to their richness until my mother revealed it to me one day. The intersection between sweet and savory contributes to these dumplings’ allure.

One of the most beloved Asian sweet dumplings is crisp-chewy fried sesame seed balls. A Chinese New Year specialty that may have originated during the Tang Dynasty as palace food, they have been adopted by cooks of countless cultures to be enjoyed year-around. At Cantonese dim sum houses, this treat is called jin deui and usually contains sweetened red bean paste. In Vietnam, the filling typically features buttery mung beans. Ground peanuts are a quick and tasty filling option; if you select the peanut filling, use an electric mini-chopper to grind the nuts, sugar, and salt, and aim for a sandy texture. Sesame balls can be made without a filling, though I find those to be a tad lacking. The sugar used in the rice dough makes for a golden brown skin that slightly shatters with the first bite. Slab brown candy, called peen tong in Cantonese and sold at Chinese markets, looks like pieces of parquet flooring. It has a complex flavor not unlike maple sugar and lends a glorious rich brown color to the finished dumplings. When it is unavailable, light brown sugar is a fine substitute. Pressing on the balls during frying is the trick to getting them to expand, resulting in their signature hollow center.

Use this short crust pastry to make a deep dish apple pie or all your other gluten-free pastry needs.

One mention of a food that interests us, and we're off. Our friend Luisa, who writes a food blog called The Wednesday Chef, spent a good part of her summer in Italy, with her family there. Clearly feeling nostalgic for her time there, Luisa spent weeks trying to replicate her grandmother's focaccia bread. The photographs of her last, successful attempt left us both a little dazed. We wanted some. Of course, we had to change it quite a bit, since hers contained gluten. I was shocked to find that most authentic Italian focaccia breads contain a potato. But it makes sense. Boil the potato and then put it through the ricer and you have a light-as-air starch. Focaccia breads are lighter than other breads. The egg white, beaten to stiff peaks, adds lightness here too, like a soufflé. Try this bread with rosemary or oregano. It's a little taste of Italy, right in your kitchen.

This recipe's a family favorite from my Auntie Delores. It's actually a version of bibingka, a Pilipino dessert. I call it coconut cake, because I don't know how to translate "bibingka" into French, and Laurent and I mostly speak French. At home we simply cut it into squares. For a fancy restaurant-style presentation, you can cut it into various shapes using cookie cutters. If you want to cut out shapes, lining the cake pan with parchment paper will make it easier to unmold the cake. Packages of coconut are usually 14 ounces, but an ounce or two more or less won't make a difference.