Traditional Chinese Desserts

Many Chinese restaurants in America or other western nations will provide their customers with a free gift of fortune cookies as a dessert upon the end of a meal. However, as many lovers of Chinese food may be surprised to find out, fortune cookies really are not any type of traditional Chinese dessert at all. Instead, this delectable and crunchy little sweet nibbles of dessert are really only found at more westernized Chinese (and sometimes other types of Asian) restaurants, provided solely for the entertainment of their more American guests. However, it is not that all Chinese restaurants do not serve desserts at all. There is actually a fairly set menu of dessert items to expect with a package-ordered banquet style meal at a traditional Chinese restaurant. These items are actually far more delicious than the cheap little fortune cookies that you normally get at Chinese restaurants, although they are definitely considered "abnormal" dessert items for American customers. Here is a list of different items that a traditional, high class Chinese restaurant may serve for dessert if customers order them.

1) Red Bean Soup: Perhaps the most common item to be found on a banquet style dessert dish at a Chinese restaurant, this hot and sweet soup is certainly a unique tasting experience for first-time diners. The soup has a red bean base to it and is a reddish-brown tint in color. The consistency is somewhat thick and sticky feeling; most of the soup is a sweet broth, but there is also chunkier pieces of red bean and red bean's skin floating around in the soup. Red bean is actually commonly used in dessert items for Chinese cuisine; besides red bean soup, grocery stores often offer "red bean popsicles," which are fairly similar to western-style popsicles only they are less sweet and have chunks of red bean in them.

2) Almond Paste Soup: This sweet white pasty soup is perhaps my favorite of all Chinese desserts. The semi-opaque almond flavored broth is also somewhat stickier on consistency, probably from the small portion of rice flour that is used in the ingredients for this soup. Chinese almond soup is normally sweeter than red bean soup, and it is also served as a hot dish.

3) Almond tofu/jelly with fruit: Although often called almond "tofu," this sweet dessert is not really a tofu dish at all; instead it is just a sweet cubed almond gelatin dish that is normally served with chopped or canned fruit around it. Unlike the afore mentioned two dishes, this dessert is served chilled.

4) Mango pudding: This is another Chinese dessert that is served chilled and is quite delicious. Somewhere between a pudding and gelatin dish, mango pudding is fairly thick and sweet and obviously mango favored. Usually this dish is served with a little bit of sweetened milk on top of it.