Did you know you can make mochi?

Remember back in 2020 when we were ordering our groceries online and then wiping them down before we touched them? Instead of risking COVID to go to the store, some poor Safeway employee or Instacart shopper was trying to figure out what to substitute for toilet paper and King Arthur flour. Well, my husband, who is a pretty serious foodie with a penchant for cooking whatever he impulse bought at the farmers market did not faire well without being able to wander the aisle of Berkeley Bowl for an oddity or visit the new Schezwan restaurant to order something he'd never seen before. So, we started trying to diversify our online food shopping ordering from the 99 Ranch Market. Very quickly, we both took full advantage of our mutual boredom with what was in the pantry and started ordering really silly stuff. 

We ordered rivers snail soup, crispy salted egg shrimp heads, and every brand of ramen and frozen dumpling they would bring us. And one day, probably after a beer to two, I impulse ordered glutenous rice flour. When it arrived, realized that I had no idea what I was thinking when I ordered it and I tucked it in the back of the pantry. Last month, trying to make space for Christmas gifts, I found it back there smashed into a corner and realized I either needed to figure out what to do with it, or toss it. 

So what do you do with glutenous rice flour to get it out of your pantry? A quick google search revealed that the best thing to do with glutenous rice flour is to make mochi out of it. Yes, thats right, according to the internet you can just make mochi. I read two recipes (that's plenty right?) and set to it, knowing we had friends coming over for dinner to enjoy our lockdown perfected Dan Dan noodles and favorite brands of frozen dumpling. 

Since I had pretty much already decided this wasn't going to go well and really committed to the project mostly to get the flour out of my pantry, I cherry picked my preferred advice from the two blogs-- going for the quick pace of this recipe and the plastic-free freezing approach of this one. Then, I did a lazy job at the whole thing (let's be real...)

I started by scooping out 2 tsp balls of chocolate ice cream (that we already had in the freezer...) I tried to round out a 1 tsp measure into a ball and just set them on a plastic try that I knew I could squeeze into the freezer easily. 

I gave the ice cream nearly a full hour in the freezer before I set to the mochi, wisking 3/4c water, 3/4c glutenous rice flour, and 1/4 c sugar together quickly in a glass bowl. I also threw in 1 tsp of cocoa power for color and a little added chocolate flavor. 

I covered it with a silicon lid and popped the whole thing in the microwave for a minute. The result after a minute looked no different than it had before, so I gave it another whole minute for the second round (our microwave is the cheapest one K-mark sold in 2004 and is notoriously slow). After 2 minutes it was starting to look dough-adjacent. I mixed it well, and popped it back in for 30 seconds. 

After a stir, it actually looked like perhaps it was done, so I dumped it out onto the cornstarch to start rolling. However, it became quickly apparent that no, it was not done. While it was starting to stick together, it was still way too wet to handle. So, I gave it two more quick blasts at 30 seconds a piece (which may have been a mistake...) and then turned it out again. 

Despite a lot of cornstarch and hands that run cold, this was a very sticky situation. I had been warned it would be sticky, so I tried to roll with it, but it was very, very sticky. I probably used more cornstarch that I should have to get it rolled out. 

Then, I used a small bowl as a cutter to make circles out of the dough. Even after downsizing to a pint glass, the rounds were still probably bigger than they needed to be to cover my little ice cream balls. Working quickly and just hoping that it wouldn't sit anywhere long enough to get sticky, I didn't put the dough in the fridge before I covered the ice cream. This, it turns out was also a mistake. 

I wrapped each ball as best I could, but about 3 balls in the ice cream started to melt. Suddenly, I was covered in ice cream and panicked. I washed my hands and forgot to re-corn starch them before going back to the project. Things fell apart. 

Frustrated, I put the plastic tray back in the freezer, I cut out a few more rounds, and gave everything 30 minutes to cool down. When I came back to the project, things went more smoothly. Covered the final ice cream balls, tossed it back in the freezer, and set to cleaning the sticky rice dough off of every surface in the kitchen.

When it was time for dessert that evening the mochi balls came right off the plastic with no fuss. The cornstarch mess seemed to have been absorbed into the dough, and aside from being lumpy and wonky shaped they looked about like mochi. 

We each ate one right out of the freezer and realized that was the wrong move. They were as hard as rocks and tasted like nothing. So, we gave them about 10 minutes and tried again. The ice cream was much softer and the mochi was somewhat softer--- although chewier than it was supposed to be. I was embarrassed, but they were good sports. Of course, in my embarrassment I forgot to take a photo, but trust me when I say they were ugly and did NOT deserve a photo... 

So, would I recommend making mochi? Absolutely not. Did I going to try it again to use up the rest of the glutenous rice flour, of course I did. 

For round 2 I decided to go with Mango Sherbet and plain mochi. I mixed up more than I would need (1 cup glutenous rice flour, 1 cup water, 1/3 cup white sugar) and popped it in the microwave. I actually found that it worked much better than my prior attempt with three separate 1 minute blasts separated by a good stir. It was easier to tell when the mochi was ready without the cocoa, and it seemed to cook more evenly. 

This time I waited for the mochi to cool a bit before rolling it out, which turns out to be critical to success. I also knew to use a lot more cornstarch than expected, and to cover the ice cream in two batches, refreezing the ice cream part way through. 

Finally, for my second attempt I used a mini muffin tin to hold the mochi together in the freezer to help them keep their round shape. Overall, it was far more successful than the first attempt. However, my mochi, particularly this second batch without the cocoa power had a strong bitter taste (maybe the cornstarch) and just generally didn't taste very good. While it's possible that this has to do with my 3 year old rice flour, I'm not going to buy another bag to find out.