Lamington, a Chinese version

I just recently encountered Lamington, which was introduced by my colleague as "an Australian dessert". It is basically a sponge cake wrapped in a thin layer of chocolate and then shredded coconut.

Not sure if that is how I got inspired. Today I made Yuanxiao (or Tanyuan as they called it South China) and then rolled them in both coconut and toasted sesame seeds. Served in colorful paper cups, they look a lot cuter than in soup, which is normally what we do in China. MM was impressed with the presentation and also said they were "very tasty".

I tested several fillings to see which one works best: red bean paste (traditional), peanut butter (American touch), fresh mango cubes (inspired by Thai mango sticky rice), raspberry jam (raspberry is supposed to be MM's favorite fruit) and dark chocolate and raisin (raisin was to add sweetness to the 70% dark chocolate, the only kind I have).

The raspberry one was a disaster--the jam was too runny to be hold properly. The chocolate one was, to use MM's words, "confusing", and he reported he wasn't sure which flavor that was. In retrospect, dark chocolate and raisin probably don't go well anyway. But once again, nothing could stop me when I am in an experimental mood.

The mango one was OK but it is not sweet enough of course. Next time I probably have to concentrate the flavor first by making a mango jam of some sort.

Luckily both the red bean paste and peanut butter worked very well. Another filling will work is black sesame paste, which unfortunately I don't have today. I reckon (a word Australians use a lot) Nutella will also do the trick as it has the similar texture as peanut butter does.