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Bhapa pitha
Steamed rice flour cakes
Bhapa pitha: steamed rice-flour cakes with date jaggery and coconut
When the date palm sap starts flowing in early winter, small steaming pots appear on street corners all over Bangladesh, from Rajshahi to Dhaka's Karwan Bazar, selling bhapa pitha in the dark mornings. Damp, lightly salted rice flour is packed into a small bowl around a layer of grated coconut and khejur gur (date jaggery), wrapped in cloth and steamed over a narrow-necked pot until soft, fluffy and fragrant. Eat them warm, straight from the cloth. Chef's tip: the rice flour should feel like damp sand that just holds when squeezed; too wet and the cake turns gummy, too dry and it crumbles.
- Total time
- 50 min
- Difficulty
- medium
- Serves
- 8
Ingredients
- 10 ½ oz fine rice flourideally freshly ground soaked rice; shop-bought works
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ cup warm waterabout
- 5 ½ oz date palm jaggery (khejur gur) or other jaggerygrated or crumbled
- 4 oz fresh grated coconutor frozen, thawed
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Method
0/7 doneStep 1: Dry-roast 10 ½ oz fine rice flour in a wide pan over a low heat for 3–4 minutes, stirring, until it feels warm and smells faintly toasty but has not coloured. Tip into a bowl and cool.
4 minStep 2: Dissolve ½ tsp salt in ½ cup warm water. Sprinkle it over the flour a spoonful at a time, rubbing it in with your fingertips, until the flour clumps when squeezed and breaks apart cleanly when poked. Push it through a coarse sieve to make it light and even. A common mistake is pouring the water in at once, which makes a paste instead of damp crumbs.
Step 3: Mix 5 ½ oz date palm jaggery (khejur gur) or other jaggery and 4 oz fresh grated coconut in a small bowl.
Step 4: Set up a steamer: a pan of water at a rolling boil with a lid that has a hole in it, or a steamer basket lined with a damp muslin cloth. Use a small bowl about 8 cm wide as a mould.
Step 5: Loosely fill the bowl halfway with flour, add a heaped spoon of the jaggery-coconut, then cover with more flour. Level lightly with your palm without pressing.
Step 6: Wrap a damp square of muslin over the bowl, flip it so the cake sits on the cloth, lift off the bowl and fold the cloth over. Steam over the boiling water for 6–8 minutes, until the cake is firm, opaque and springs back, and the jaggery has melted into a dark seam.
8 minStep 7: Unwrap carefully and serve warm. Repeat with the rest, keeping the water at a strong boil.
10 min
Nutrition per serving
- Calories
- 230 kcal
- Protein
- 3 g
- Carbs
- 42 g
- Fat
- 6 g
- Fibre
- 3 g
Nutrition values are estimates.
KrazyBadal
Good to know
- How long does bhapa pitha take?
- About 50 minutes in total: 25 minutes to prepare and 25 minutes to cook.
- How many people does it serve?
- 8 as written. Change the servings above the ingredients and every amount scales to match.
- Is it vegan?
- Yes. It has no meat, fish, dairy or eggs.
- Is it gluten free?
- Yes, as written. Check the labels on stock, sauces and spice mixes, which sometimes contain gluten.
- What can I use instead of date palm jaggery (khejur gur) or other jaggery?
- Dark brown or muscovado sugar, same amount.
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