Name: Lotus Leaf Rice
Yield: Serves 6–8 as Side Dish; 2–3 as Main Course
Cuisine: China
Ingredients: 90 ml (6 tbsp) peanut or vegetable oil; 115 g (4 oz) garden peas, fresh or frozen; 255 g (8 oz) raw prawns in the shell, without heads (13–15 prawns), peeled and de-veined; 2 large eggs, size 2; 1 large dried lotus leaf; 85–115 g (3–4 oz) cooked ham, cut into small cubes; 7.5 ml (1½ tsp) salt; 4 spring onions, trimmed and cut into small rounds; 7.5 ml (1½ tsp) egg white; 2.5 ml (½ tsp) cornflour; about 425–620 g (15–22 oz/3–4½ cups) cooked rice, firm rather than mushy in texture; 2.5 ml (½ tsp) salt

Preparation info

Serves
6–8
as Side Dish

Difficulty
Medium

Appears in

Classic Food of China

By Yan-Kit So

Published 1992

About

‘Ten miles of lotus ponds by the temple
Where early morning maidens flock, busy at picking
Not lotus flowers they pick but the leaves
Rice wrapped in lotus leaf more fragrant than the flower’

This Cantonese ditty in praise of this celebrated dish explains why lotus leaves are used to wrap rice. In Canton, where fresh leaves are used in spring and summer, cooked rice – made the more tasty wi