These balls of Ondeh-Ondeh are so fun to eat. Made with sweet potatoes and glutinous rice flour rolled in coconut with a little surprise on the inside.
It is Monday and time for another Muhibbah Malaysian Monday. This time I am bringing Ondeh-Ondeh, a Nyonya (Straits Chinese) tea time favorite, to the round-up. These delightful furry balls are a joy to eat as they have a little surprise in them. They explode with sweet melted palm sugar in your mouth when chewed! It is always fun to watch the “unsuspecting” eating this for the first time. 🙂
Before we move on to the recipe, I am very excited to tell you that Roti n Rice has been selected as the Foodista Food Blog of the Day for July 11, 2011. Rose Berry Agar-agar will be featured on the Foodista homepage for 24 hours. Please do check it out. Thank you all for your continued support.
There are two versions of Ondeh-Ondeh. One is made with just plain glutinous rice flour while the other has a little sweet potato added to the dough. It is usually scented with pandan (screwpine) juice and rolled in fresh dessicated coconut. As I was not in the mood to try to extract the pandan juice from the pandan leaves and I do not have pandan essence with me, I decided to flavor the dough with a teaspoon of vanilla instead. Freshly grated coconut is not something easily found here in the north and so I used dried dessicated coconut. I toasted the coconut to bring out its fragrance.
Please use freshly grated coconut if you have access to it. Make sure only the white part is used. You can leave it fresh or lightly pan fry as directed in the recipe.
These balls of Ondeh-Ondeh are so fun to eat. Made with sweet potatoes and glutinous rice flour rolled in coconut with a little surprise on the inside.
(Makes 16 balls of Ondeh-ondeh)
- ¾ cup unsweetened dried grated coconut ** (60g)
- 1 small sweet potato (cubed) (8oz/225g)
- 1 cup glutinous rice flour (125g)
- ¼ tsp salt
- ½ tsp vanilla extract or pandan essence
- 3 tbsp water
- ½ cup gula melaka / palm sugar / brown sugar (shaved) (3.5oz/100g)
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Dry fry dessicated coconut until lightly brown, about 3 to 4 minutes. Remove and place in a shallow bowl. Set aside.
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Place sweet potato in a steamer and steam for 10 minutes until soft and mashable. Remove and place steamed sweet potato in a large bowl. Mash sweet potato with a potato masher. Add glutinous rice flour, salt, and vanilla extract. Mixed well and knead until a soft pliable dough forms.
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Divide dough into 16 equal portions and form into balls. Flatten a ball of dough in the palm of your hand into a flat disk of about 2-inch diameter. Place a teaspoon of gula melaka in the center. Gather up the sides and seal well to form a ball of about 1-inch diameter . Roll between your palms until ball of dough is smooth. Place on a plate. Repeat with the rest of the dough.
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Bring a medium sized pot of water to boil. Gently drop in formed ondeh-ondeh. Reduce heat to medium and allow ondeh-ondeh to cook until they float to the surface, about 3 to 4 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon.
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Drop onto fried coconut one at a time to coat.
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Serve warm or at room temperature.
**Freshly grated coconut may be used in place of dessicated coconut and it can either be used as is (i.e. fresh) or fried.
I am sending this to Sharon for Muhibbah Malaysia Monday #13.
Enjoy…..and have a wonderful day! 😎
These look amazing. I love the surprise inside, so yummy! I was wondering where you get your pandan leaves? Do you have a plant? Or do we have to look for screwpine here, I’ve been wanting to get one.
Thanks Lyndsey! I get my pandan leaves in the frozen section of the Vietnamese store. They call it “la dua”.
Nice looking ondeh ondeh. I normally coat them with fresh coconut. Interesting that you coat them with toasted coconut.
I would have used fresh coconut but it is not easily available here in Minnesota. I only have dried dessicated coconut and so I dry fried it to perk it up a little. 🙂
Did you try looking for them at the Indian Stores? That is where I got mine 🙂
Thanks Gertrude for the tip! I will definitely check out the Indian store the next time I go there. 🙂
Very new recipe to me. Bookmarked it.
Hi Vatsala, thanks for visitng and commenting! 🙂
Hi Biren! I love that photo with the sweet potato oozing it out- it looks so good. I have never heard of Ondeh Ondeh but it looks like an super yummy variation of mochi. Congrats on Foodista!
Thanks Lindsey! These ondeh-ondeh do look and taste a little like a mochi except for the filling. I like how the melted palm sugar oozes out in one’s mouth. 🙂
Congrat on foodista 🙂
Lovely photo and delicious ondeh ondeh.
Thanks Amelia!
My mother-in-law makes this with pumpkin but I actually like your recipe of sweet potato better. Thanks for sharing.
Hi Veronica, thanks for visiting and commenting! I’ve never tried it with pumpkin but I can see that it will work. 🙂
I would be ever so happy to have these “explode” in my mouth! Such delightful little treats. Congratulations on being featured!
These delightful little bites are fun and delicious to eat. Thanks Reeni! I am honored to be featured on Foodista. 🙂
Oh that sounds delicious. Love the combo of pandan and sweet potato. Yummy!
Never talk while eating ondeh-ondeh….kekekek.
This happens to be one of my favorite Nyonya kueh. The one I have tried is usually green – I think infused with pandan leaves?
delicious looks wonderful lovely pictures
I’m too lazy to make this as I easily get it here, hehehe..Yours look so good. Congratulations to you too.
I have honestly never tried Ondeh-Ondeh, but I’m quite fond of all the ingredients and I’d love to give it a try someday.
Ondeh ondehs are one of my favourite Malaysian snacks! But i’ve never tried one with sweet potatoes before.. it must taste fabulous!
I love Oneh-Oneh and I remember the first time I made this was in my secondary school and I love to pop the whole piece in my mouth and I totally agree with Tiger – never talk while eating Oneh-Oneh 🙂
Very good! We’ve attempted onde-onde a couple of times, with less than stellar results. But practice makes perfect, I guess. Good on ya!
Biren, these look absolutely magical. I’m going to add “Ondeh-ondeh” to my list of discoveries and bear in mind that they will explode in the mouth. So much to learn about Malaysian food! Great going on Foodista – well deserved!
Nice looking ondeh-ondeh…
When I was young… I didn’t quite like the gooey glutinous rice texture… but now… I love it, keep popping like pop-corn and can’t stop ..hehehe 😀
Sounds delicious! I love sweet potato, and I think I might have had something like this when I was in Singapore… I bet it’s yummy with that melted palm sugar in the center! Yum! Great recipe 🙂
I wish I could try a few of them….they are gorgeous!
They look absolutely amazing. At first – I thought they were Ladoos but on reading the recipe – I find they are a new dish for me. wow!
Congrats on being the food blog of the day yesterday! These look absolutely scrumptious!
I love glutinous rice sweets. What a sweet surprise inside this one. Sounds so delicious, Biren. Congratulations on the Foodista feature.
I never had anything like this before and would love to try it since I love glutinous rice. Looks delicious!
Hope you are having a great week Biren 🙂
These look so delicious! What a great recipe!! 🙂
Congratulations on being food blog of the day! Wow, these look delicious. I’ve seen them at asian supermarkets before but never had the courage to try them *hehe*
This is such a different kind of dish I have come across 🙂 Looks delicious.
Hi…these look so delicious! Yum!! 🙂
Ondeh-ondeh is my daughter’s favourite. And using the roasted coconut sounds really interesting!
I read somewhere that desiccated coconut can be reconstituted by soaking in water for 10 minutes or so, I have not tried it, so I don’t know how it taste like.
Congratulations on being Foodista Food blog of the day! 🙂
I’d love to pop one into my mouth and taste the burst of sweet palm syrup! Yummy! Another old time favorite!
These look wickedly delicious, Biren. I’ve never had Ondeh Ondeh before. Thanks for introducing me to them. Congrats on being selected as the Foodista Food Blog of the day!
Oh Biren, another yummy dessert!!! I love coconut around the balls… I don’t know this particular sweets, but from ingredients and the method of cooking, I am already in love. Hehee. BIG CONGRATS on your recipe being featured at Foodista! YAY! Sorry for my late congrats…I’m a bit behind in pretty much “everything” now. Ugh. Looking forward to your next yummy recipe! 😉
I think I came across these when I was in Asia, but I can’t remember where. The name seems very familiar.
Congrats on being chosen! Always love your photos and recipe. I love ondeh ondeh. It’s just so therapeutic just biting into them 😀
Yum Biren! I love the surprise in the middle. I really need to come and eat at your house one of these days. You always make my tummy grumble.
Great recipe Biren! Great little surprise in the center.
oh this is neat and what a cool texture congrats on being featured proud of you
I love these ondeh-ondeh.
Thanks for a great submission Biren. This is one of my favourite kuih and I love the sweet potato version 🙂 The best bit is the squirt of the filling when bitten into, so true.
You are most welcomed Shaz. Thanks for hosting! Oh yes, the sweet palm sugar in the mouth is just the best. 🙂
This looks like a wonderful recipe I have not tried ever, Biren. Lovely dessert!
Wow, these look delicious! I’ve never heard of them, but I live the name:-)
What a beautiful treat, Biren. I’ve never seen anything like this. It’s like a little surprise inside a moist donut.
Congratulations on the feature…very cool 🙂
These look delicious and they sound like allot of fun to eat 🙂
Sweet potato and coconut! YUM!
You know, I’ve never tried sweet potato ondeh-ondeh? Can you believe it?! Jakun LOL I LOVED ondeh-ondeh when I was really, really young. The gula melaka squirting out the ball when I bit into it used to make me laugh so much my mother thought there was something wrong with me 😀 My cousins and I used to try to ‘shoot’ each other with the projectile gula melaka LOLOLOL So naughty we were, and so WASTEFUL!!! Aiyoh!
Haha…I am trying to picture you and your cousins trying to shoot each other with gula melaka projectiles. Those were the days of carefree abandon.
You should try sweet potato ondeh-ondeh. The sweet potato provide a nice flavor and makes the ondeh-ondeh a little less “floury” in taste. 🙂
Beautiful ondeh-ondeh! Those added with mashed sweet potato are the best! *Slurp* 😀
Some will also add a little dessicated coconut inside together with the shaved palm sugar and I love those! 😀
I am going to try to make this one with our next home-grown sweet potato harvest! We been searching for many sweet potato recipes lately to try since we harvested some tubers last month. I tried once making sweet potato onde-onde from a recipe book but did not went well due to too much water. But I will have a go again with yours. Wish me luck!
They look soooo great!
After kneading into balls and inserting the palm sugar, can i freeze the ondeh ondeh a day before cooking?
I have never tried it but I don’t see why not. Uncooked tang yuan (tong yuen) are sold frozen and they turned out fine when cooked.
Hi Linda,
Thank you for sharing the recipe. I never tried ondeh-ondeh using sweet potatoes. Would love to try but unfortunately I don’t have glutinous rice flour. Is there a substitute for it?
Thank you and keep on sharing amazing recipes.
Glutinous rice flour is needed to give it that slightly chewy texture.