Chinese New Year is here! And to celebrate, we're sharing a quick and delicious dessert you can make in honor of Lunar New Year. This year—the Year of the Tiger—falls on Tuesday, the 1st of February 2022. The Chinese New Year celebrations continue for 15 days and food festivals, epic feasts and menu preparations are widespread, along with thousands of well-lit lanterns, street performers, entertainers and people reliving age-old traditions.

Related: 26 Authentic Recipes to Celebrate Chinese New Year and the Year of the Tiger

Chinese dessert is usually an important part of the Chinese New Year meal, and Tang Yuan is an auspicious recipe that symbolizes harmony and reunion. Keep reading for how to make the best Tang Yuan recipe.

Tang Yuan (or tangyuan) are rice balls made with sweet or glutinous rice, and filled with a sweet filling, which could have many variations. The most common ones are sesame and peanuts.

In the olden days, making tang yuan was a laborious task, since everything was made from scratch, with little equipment to aid the process. Sesame seeds were hand-ground, glutinous rice was soaked overnight, hand-ground to a batter out of by hand grinding, and kneaded to a smooth dough. It would take well over two days to get everything ready. But these days, the task is incredibly easy since it involves a few handful of ingredients and less than a couple hours to put these together.

You start by making the filling, which is usually sesame or peanuts. Make sure to roast and cool the seeds, then grind to a fine powder, mix with sugar and oil (or melted butter) and mix to form a thick filling. Refrigerate the filling so that it's easier to handle it. Then make balls out of it and let it harden.

Meanwhile, make the dough with some glutinous rice flour and water. It shouldn't be too sticky or too  hard. Knead to form a smooth and soft dough. Then divide to equal portions, flatten it out, place filling in the center and roll into a neat ball.

Then cook the balls in hot water for 2-3 minutes or until they float to the top. And that's it! Serve them warm.

You can consume tangyuan as is warm, or with some delicious ginger tea.

Here's a useful TikTok video on how to make Tang Yuan with Sesame filling:

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