Marry girl cake

Marry girl cake
Traditional Chinese	嫁女餅
Simplified Chinese	嫁女饼
Literal meaning	dowry girl cake
Transcriptions Mandarin - Hanyu Pinyin jia4 nu3 bing3 Cantonese (Yue) - Jyutping gaa3 neoi5 bing3

Dowry cake is a traditional Chinese pastry that was once a ceremonial cake used as wedding gifts in the traditional Chinese wedding ceremony, hence the name. Today, this cake is known more as a classic Chinese pastry rather than a wedding gift because it has lost most of its original significance due to cultural change. It can be found in Hong Kong and in some Chinatowns overseas.

Production

The cake is essentially a lightly sweetened sponge cake that may take any number of shapes or appearances. It is considered large compared to the size of most pastries. The internal base of the cake may consist of lotus seed paste.

Meaning behind

Marry girl cake is a traditional wedding gift which is originally from Guangdong. According to Chinese tradition, giving wedding cakes is serious and it shows respect and importance about the wedding. The bridegroom will send marry girl cake to the bride and her family after engagement, which refers to Gwo Dai Lai(過大禮). ^[1] The bride's family will then give them to their relatives, as to share the happiness with them and tell them the wedding is approaching soon. However, for those who are not that close with the family, the family can choose not to invite them to the wedding and just giving out at least 2 marry girl cakes, meaning pair; as to present a notice about the marriage. And for cake distribution, it can be according to closeness of the friend and seniority of the family member. There are 4 , 6 or 8 marry girl cake in a pack and those numbers means the traditional thoughts of pairs and even.^[1]

History

The beginning of giving out marry girl cakes started from the era of Three Kingdoms.^[2] At that time, Liu Bei had borrowed a place called Jingzhou for a long period of time and not returning it to its owner, Sun Quan. Thus, Sun Quan had accepted the idea of "honey trap" suggested by Zhou Yu, which was pretending to make his own sister marrying Liu Bei as to get back the land, who was newly widowed. Then, Liu Bei was greeted to marry in Soochow. He knew it was a trick. However after arriving Soochow, he told his soldiers to deliver cakes and eventually turned the marriage into real. Since then, Chinese had a custom of sending marry girl cakes when there was marriage, as to share the happiness with family and friends.

Types

There are around 30-40 types of marry girl cakes, they all taste different and distinct ingredients are used to produce those wedding cakes. And here are the most popular ones.^[3]

• Colorful preserved eggs pastry(五彩皮蛋酥)
• Duck egg lotus seed paste pastry(蛋黃蓮蓉酥)
• Red lotus seed paste pastry(紅綾蓮蓉酥)
• Yellow green been paste pastry(黃綾荳蓉酥)
• Terminalia walnut pastry(欖仁合桃酥)
• Duck egg lotus seed paste cake(蛋黃蓮蓉雞蛋糕)
• Duck egg pastry(雞油蛋黃酥)

Creation

There are lots ingredients needed to make red lotus seed paste pastry(紅綾蓮蓉酥) (8 pieces). ^[4] As to make the oil skin, solid vegetable oil 15g, flour 70g, syrup 15g, water 30g, and a little pigment. For making the butter, flour 90g and solid vegetable oil 55g are needed. Lastly, lotus seed paste 300g are used to create the inside part of it.

First, mix the ingredients of oil skin and soft creamy butter separately, and then evenly divide into 8 parts. Press the oil skin into a flat shape and wrap in butter. Then, use a long stick to roll, turn 90 degrees left and right to the middle and fold into three layers. Press into cakes skin, put lotus seed paste inside and turn it into a cake shape. Put it in an oven for 25-30 minutes, under 180 degrees.

Nutritional facts

As the internal base of most popular marry girl cakes contains lots of lotus seed paste or yolk, it is not that healthy to eat much. There are 169 calories in 1 small square moon cake of oriental pastry (made with Bean or Lotus Seed Paste Filling, Baked). ^[5] Moreover, after calorie breakdown, it contains 11% fat, 81% carbohydrates, 8% protein. The content of carbohydrate is the highest and there are 677 calories in a large square (whole) of moon cake, who has a similar size as those wedding cakes. Its calories content are even more than a large french fries (500 calories). ^[6] According to recommended daily calories intake, ^[7] men's intake are 2500 calories a day; women's intake are 2000 calories a day and 2,500 in third trimester of pregnancy; children's (aged 5-10) intake are 1800 calories a day. From this data, it shows a whole piece of oriental pastry that made with lotus seed paste already exceeds 1/4 of human's daily recommended intake of calories.

Health risk

There are lots of calories in lotus seed paste and yolk, thus it will lead to health problem if eating too much of them. First of all, it contains a high content of carbohydrates, which are sugar and starch. It is also the main source in providing energy to body. ^[8] However, carbohydrates turn into sugar (glucose) in the bloodstream, meaning that carbohydrates is basically equals to sugar. Taking too much carbohydrate will lead to fat, maybe then develop diabetes, higher blood pressure or increase risk of heart disease.

Type 2 Diabetes

Carbohydrates increase insulin levels in blood. A too high level of carbohydrate intake may lead to the accumulation of glucose in blood and may eventually causes Type 2 Diabetes. ^[9]

Tooth Decay

Moreover, there is no doubt that sugar promotes tooth decay. Sugar and starch from food are converted into acids by bacteria in plaque, and the acids can dissolve the enamel of the tooth and cause cavities.^[10]

Culture

Although marry girl cake has a long history, people in modern society still keep it as a sign of "happiness" and send wedding cakes to relatives and close friends when there is marriage. There are different styles and flavors of marry girl cakes now, which shows the popularity of it. Moreover, there is a new cake in recent years called great-grandmother cake(太婆餅). ^[11] If the bride's grandparents are still there, the bridegroom will send these kinds of cakes to the girl's place to show good faith. This culture will never ends and it totally represents "marriage" in Chinese.

See also

• Sweetheart cake
• moon cake
• Chinese tradition
• marriage

Reference

1. ^ ^{a b} [1] MoonMoonLLC. URL accessed on March 21.
2. ^ [2] DDT. URL accessed on 2010-2011.
3. ^ [3] MoonMoonLLC. URL accessed on March 21.
4. ^ [4] 蠍. URL accessed on May 25,2010.
5. ^ [5] Fatsecret. URL accessed on 2010-2011.
6. ^ [6] calorie count. URL accessed on 2010-2011.
7. ^ [7] ALI. URL accessed on June 16, 2008.
8. ^ [8] T,Thompson. URL accessed on August 11 , 2011.
9. ^ [9] Jerry Wilson. URL accessed on 1999-2010.
10. ^ [10] MediResource Inc. URL accessed on 1996-2011.
11. ^ [11] Miss K. URL accessed on May 10, 2008.