Taiwan: Edible Money & Incense Concoctions
- 14 years ago
Here's something you don't hear everyday. A hotel bakery in southern Taiwan made incense and paper money from edible materials, in an effort to cut down carbon emissions. Let's take a look.
On the seventh month of the lunar calendar, or the ghost month in traditional Taiwanese belief, people often burn incense and paper money to appease straying spirits.
But in an effort to cut down the amount of carbon emissions, bakeries in Taiwan's southern Tainan City made incense and paper money from edible cookies and cakes.
Six bakeries in Tainan participated.
The bakery in the Evergreen Plaza Hotel created an edible stack of paper money with a layered mango cake, and incense sticks with chocolate glazed baked spaghetti strips.
Thin cake layers are first baked in the oven then each of the ten layers is stacked up with cream and crunched almond in between.
The layers imitate the paper money sheets, and the local specialty, mango, gives its saturated yellow color. It is then spray painted with the red words: longevity, prosperity, and good fortune, then finished with a piece of golden foil on top.
Baker Yeh Pu-shang said the key to make a successful paper money cake lies in the control of time and temperature.
[Yeh Pu-shan, Baker]: (mandarin male)
"Because it is made of thin layers, it requires baking at high temperature for a short time. If it is over baked the color can become too dark, and it does not turn out the color we want. If it is over baked even further, then it becomes tough like a cookie. The most important thing is to control the temperature and timing, that is the most difficult part."
The incense is made of spaghetti -- first soaked in sweetened water, then baked until it becomes stiff like crackers. It is then glazed with a chocolate paste, and sprinkled with chocolate powder.
For now, the cakes are available by order only, but the display of the cake among other bread and pastries has already attracted interests from bakery guests.
On the seventh month of the lunar calendar, or the ghost month in traditional Taiwanese belief, people often burn incense and paper money to appease straying spirits.
But in an effort to cut down the amount of carbon emissions, bakeries in Taiwan's southern Tainan City made incense and paper money from edible cookies and cakes.
Six bakeries in Tainan participated.
The bakery in the Evergreen Plaza Hotel created an edible stack of paper money with a layered mango cake, and incense sticks with chocolate glazed baked spaghetti strips.
Thin cake layers are first baked in the oven then each of the ten layers is stacked up with cream and crunched almond in between.
The layers imitate the paper money sheets, and the local specialty, mango, gives its saturated yellow color. It is then spray painted with the red words: longevity, prosperity, and good fortune, then finished with a piece of golden foil on top.
Baker Yeh Pu-shang said the key to make a successful paper money cake lies in the control of time and temperature.
[Yeh Pu-shan, Baker]: (mandarin male)
"Because it is made of thin layers, it requires baking at high temperature for a short time. If it is over baked the color can become too dark, and it does not turn out the color we want. If it is over baked even further, then it becomes tough like a cookie. The most important thing is to control the temperature and timing, that is the most difficult part."
The incense is made of spaghetti -- first soaked in sweetened water, then baked until it becomes stiff like crackers. It is then glazed with a chocolate paste, and sprinkled with chocolate powder.
For now, the cakes are available by order only, but the display of the cake among other bread and pastries has already attracted interests from bakery guests.