This is my mother-in-law's famous turnip cake recipe that she makes every Chinese New Year, and they are the best I've ever had anywhere, fancy Chinese restaurants included.
It's so good that I made it a mission to immortalize this recipe into a YouTube video because I do not want this to ever get lost, and I want my son to be able to recreate it when his grandma is not around to make it for him.
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As with most recipes from our mothers and grandmothers, there isn't much written down, so I insisted on filming her making it so as to not miss any details. Thankfully she had all the ingredient amounts written down, so I just had to make sure I got the process right!
What is a Turnip Cake?
If you've never had it, "turnip cake" may not sound super appetizing, and at first even I was apprehensive. But after one taste, I was converted. It's a dense-but-tender savoury cake studded with dried shrimp, dried scallops, Chinese sausage and shiitake mushrooms. This is one of the most umami-filled comfort foods. There's a reason why it's a classic!
Turnip cake, or "lo bak go" in Cantonese, is sometimes called Chinese carrot cake, which is bizarre because it doesn't involve any turnip or carrot! It should actually be called a daikon cake because daikon radish is the main ingredient. It's also not a fluffy "cake" like a chocolate zucchini cake. It's just...cake-shaped.
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Ingredients
Here are all the ingredients you need, amounts are in the recipe card below.
- Chinese sausage, I always choose Chinese sausages that contain fewer ingredients and less chemicals. I find they tend to be better tasting and are less salty. If you chinese sausage is very salty you might want to reduce the amount of salt in the recipe.
- Dried shrimp, medium size works best here.
- Dried shiitake mushrooms
- Dried scallops, optional. This is a pricey ingredient so it is okay to omit them, but my MIL always adds them and I think they add wonderful umami to the dish!
- Daikon, shredded using either a julienne peeler or you can hand-chop to get little sticks like in the pic above. You can also use a large hole grater but the texture of the final cake will be smoother.
- Rice flour, make sure this is regular rice flour and NOT glutinous rice flour. It typically comes in a red bag if you buy the one from Thailand
- Tapioca starch. Though this is optional it adds a nice chew to the dough. If you don't have it you can substitute equal amount of rice flour, and your lo bak go will end up a little bit softer.
- Sugar
- Salt
- White pepper
- Neutral flavoured oil
- Optional for serving: soy sauce and sriracha-style hot sauce. This lo bak go tastes great plain, but I love it with a little hot sauce for that little kick! A Thai-style Sriracha which is a little sweeter works really well for this) If you find the lo bak go is a bit mild, a little dab of soy sauce does the trick.
How to Make Lo Bak Go (Turnip Cake)
This is just a bird's eye view of the process so you get an idea of what's involved, the full instructions is in the recipe card below. There are a lot of steps, so I recommend planning ahead and spread out the work to make it easier on you. Also, because there are many steps, I highly recommend watching the video tutorial before you cook if this is your first time to ensure success!
- At least 2-3 hours in advance (or the day before), soak the dried scallops, dried shrimp and dried mushrooms all together in 1 cup of hot water until scallops are fully hydrated, about 3 hrs (less if not using dried scallops) Do not soak the Chinese sausage! Drain the dried products and reserve all of the soaking water.
- Shred scallops with your fingers into strings, and small-dice the sausage and mushrooms. If the dried shrimp are large, roughly chop them. Cook the sausage in a large wok until fat is rendered, then add the shrimp, mushrooms and scallops and saute until they start to pop. Remove from the wok.
- Add daikon to the same wok and add the reserved mushroom soaking water.
- Toss the daikon until wilted, then cover and cook over medium heat for about 7-10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until fully cooked and soft.
- Drain cooked daikon through a mesh sieve or a colander, pushing out as much liquid as possible, reserving the liquid. Put drained daikon back into the wok, off heat.
- Measure daikon cooking liquid and you want to have 1 cup. If there isn’t enough, add cold water to make up the volume. If there is too much (there should not be that much extra), discard the excess or, for max flavour, reduce it until you have 1 cup. Let the liquid cool slightly until it's no more than lukewarm.
- Once daikon juice is cool, whisk in rice flour and tapioca starch until there are no more lumps.
- Add this flour slurry into the daikon mixture along with the sausage mixture, sugar, salt, pepper and oil. Toss to mix well.
- Turn the heat on medium and keep tossing, scraping the bottom, just until the mixture is thickened into a paste and the liquid is no longer separating from the daikon. Remove from heat.
- Oil and line the bottom of a cake pan with parchment paper. Add the daikon mixture to the pan and push it in, ensuring there are no air gaps. Steam the cake for 1 hour or until the internal temp reaches 200°F (more on testing doneness in the recipe card). If using a stainless steel or glass lid, cover the cake loosely with foil to prevent water from dripping onto the surface.
- Let cool completely, or chill it, before cutting into pieces about ¾-1 inch thick.
- When ready to serve, pan fry on medium high heat on both sides until nicely browned, and enjoy! You can keep the daikon cake in the fridge, for about a week, and slice it up to fry whenever you’re ready to serve.
Tips for Advance Prep
Unless you have a whole day free, I'd split the work up over two or three days depending on how much time you have each day. You can actually pause the work at several points in the process, but here's what I usually do.
Day 1, Prep Day: Soak your dried scallops, shrimp and mushrooms and shred/chop them. Chop the Chinese sausages. Julienne the daikon. Keep everything in the fridge until ready to cook. You can also measure out your flours today if you want to be extra prepared.
Day 2, Cook and Chill: Cook the lo bak go. Cool and keep refrigerated until serving time.
Day 3, Serve: Slice, pan fry and enjoy!
How to Eat and Serve Lo Bak Go
The most classic way to eat turnip cake is to slice the chilled cake and pan sear them until browned, then served with hot sauce and soy sauce.
But you can also cut them into cubes and stir fry them. A favourite of my in-laws' is lo bak go cubes stir-fried with XO sauce and beansprouts. My husband loves cracking an egg into the pan while pan frying them, then scrambling everything together.
Also, even though it is a Lunar New Year classic, it can be eaten anytime and you can get it at any dim sum restaurant year round.
My FAVOURITE way to eat it though? The Thai way, of course! In Thailand, we always stir-fry it with beansprouts, garlic chives, and eggs, and it is called kanom pakkaad. Check out my recipe for Thai-style stir-fried turnip cake recipe here.
Where to buy all these dried ingredients?
The dried shrimp, scallops, mushrooms, and Chinese sausage are absolutely key to this recipe. They're the reason this tastes like an umami-filled delight rather than a lump of steamed radish. The scallops are optional, but keep at least 2 of the dried ingredients below.
- Dried shrimp: You can find dried shrimp in the refrigerated section of an Asian grocery store; medium or large sized one work fine.
- Dried shiitake mushrooms: These are also readily available in the dry goods section of any Asian grocers, and for these I prefer to choose ones that are not too large, so they will rehydrate faster.
- Chinese sausage: Can be found in the refrigerated section, and make sure you choose the all-pork, fatty ones rather than the leaner looking ones with chicken or liver mixed in. Some brands are saltier than others, so keep an eye on the sodium content if this is a concern.
- Dried scallops: Your Chinese grocery store may carry them, but I get them from Chinatown at one of those stores that sell a whole bunch of dried products. They are pricey, but you really don't need a lot, and there's no need to get large ones which are more expensive. And yes, you can omit them.
Storing Turnip Cakes
You can keep the cakes in the fridge for up to a week, and fry them up whenever you want to eat.
You can also freeze them, but slice them BEFORE freezing so you can just thaw what you want to eat. Thaw the cake in the microwave before pan frying.
To delay freezer burn, wrap the cake in foil before placing them in a freezer bag. Let them thaw at room temp, or in the fridge overnight, and fry them up as usual. I find the texture to be a tad softer after frozen, but still perfectly fine.
The Most Common Problem and How to Prevent It
Most people have made this recipe successfully, but by far the most common issue is that the cake comes out too soft. Here's how to make sure it does not happen to you.
- The amounts or liquid, flour, and daikon in this recipe is EXTREMELY important in getting the right texture. Do not eyeball or estimate any ingredients. Also don't Google grams-to-cup conversion for the rice flour; it's not accurate. Get a kitchen scale, they're super useful and inexpensive, you will not regret buying it.
- The amount of daikon called for is the weight WITH skin. If you want to double check, 750 g of unpeeled daikon should yield about 720g of peeled daikon.
- Make sure you press out as much liquid as possible from the daikon when draining, otherwise you'll end up with too much liquid in the final product.
- If you're making a bigger batch or using a different shaped pan that makes the cake thicker, it will take a longer to steam. If you've let it cooled and find that it's not set in the centre, you need to re-steam it for the whole hour PLUS the extra time. Remember that the whole cake has to reheat back up before the centre will cook, so "just steam it for another 20 minutes" is not gonna work. If the centre didn't cook when you steamed it for an hour, it's not gonna cook in 20 minutes!
- Watch the video before making. It is a fussy process, so I recommend watching the whole video below to make sure you've got the process down.
Related Recipes
Recipe Card
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Dim Sum Turnip Cake (Lo Bak Go) ขนมผักกาด
- Yield: One 7-inch round pan
Description
This recipe is my mother-in-law's famous turnip cake that she makes every year. It's so good, better than any restaurants, so I HAD to get her to teach me!
Ingredients
- 1 link (~40 g) Chinese sausage, diced
- 2 Tbsp dried shrimp
- 12-15 g dried shiitake mushrooms (~3 medium pieces)
- 20-25 g dried scallops, optional
- 1 cup hot water
- 750g daikon (unpeeled weight, see note)
- 130 g rice flour
- 1 Tbsp + 1 tsp tapioca starch
- 1 tsp sugar
- ¼ tsp table salt (see note)
- ½ tsp ground white pepper
- 2 Tbsp oil
- For serving: soy sauce and hot sauce (A Thai-style Sriracha which is a little sweeter works really well for this)
- Tools: A 6- or 7- inch round cake pan, a loaf pan or another mold(s) of your choice.
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Instructions
- At least 2-3 hours in advance: rinse scallops, dried shrimp and dried mushrooms under cold water quickly, then soak them all together in 1 cup of hot water until scallops are fully hydrated and can be easily shredded by hand. Scallops the size I used in the video took about 3 hours, but if not using scallops, mushrooms and shrimp will take no more than 1 hour to soften.
- Drain the dried products and reserve all of the soaking water.
- Shred scallops with your fingers into strings, removing the little piece of chewy muscle that's attached on the side of the scallops.
- Finely dice the mushrooms; if the mushrooms are big and the stems feel super tough you may remove them.
- Roughly chop the dried shrimp.
- Peel the daikon and shred into juliennes either with a knife, a julienne peeler, or you can also grate it using the largest holes on the grater.
- In a wok or a large heavy-bottomed pot, add the Chinese sausage and cook over medium-low heat to render out fat. If sausage is too lean and there isn't much fat coming out, you may need to add a bit of oil. Keep cooking until the sausage pieces are browned slightly.
- Add mushrooms, scallops and dried shrimp and saute over medium heat for about 3 minutes until aromatic. Remove from wok.
- Add daikon to wok and toss it over medium high heat until wilted slightly. Add the reserved mushroom/seafood soaking water; if there is a bit of grit in the soaking water, be sure to not pour that part in. Toss the daikon around until wilted, then cover and cook over medium heat for about 7-10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until fully cooked and soft.
- Drain cooked daikon through a mesh sieve or a colander, pushing out as much liquid as possible, reserving the liquid. Put drained daikon back into the wok, off heat.
- Measure daikon cooking liquid and you want to have about 1 cup. If there isn’t enough, add cold water to make up the volume. If there is too much (there should not be that much extra), discard the excess or for max flavour reduce it until you have 1 cup. Let the liquid cool slightly just until it's warm.
- Meanwhile, add mushroom mixture to daikon in the wok (heat still off), along with sugar, salt, pepper and oil. Toss to mix well.
- Once daikon juice is warm, whisk in rice flour and tapioca starch until there are no more lumps. Add this flour slurry into the daikon mixture and toss to mix well.
- Turn the heat on medium and keep tossing, scraping the bottom, until the mixture is thickened into a paste. Remove from heat.
- Grease your pan generously with oil, and if you want the whole thing to come out easily in one big piece, line the bottom with parchment paper. Add the daikon mixture to the pan and even out the surface.
- Steam the cake for 1 hour over boiling water, making sure there is PLENTY of water in the steamer to last the hour. Tip: If your steamer has metal or glass pot lid, shield the daikon cake loosely with a piece of aluminum foil to prevent condensation from dripping onto the cake, or wrap the lid in a tea towel to help catch the drips. If using a bamboo steamer, there’s no need to do this.
- To test doneness, use a thermometer and you want a minimum of 200°F internal temp. Or you can use a wooden skewer to poke the center, and if stuff that comes up is translucent and not pasty white, it’s done. If making a bigger pan, or a larger batch with multiple pans, you may need to steam for longer.
- Let cool completely, or chilled, before cutting. You can keep the daikon cake in the fridge, for about a week, and slice it up to fry whenever you’re ready to serve.
To serve
- Run a knife around the mold to free it from the sides, then flip it out onto a cutting board and cut into desired size (preferably no more than 1-inch thick).
- Pan fry them over medium heat in a little bit of oil in a nonstick pan or a well-seasoned wok until hot throughout and browned on both sides.
- Serve with soy sauce and hot sauce (like Sriracha) on the side. A sweeter Sriracha, like a Thai style one, works better for this recipe I find. Enjoy!
Notes
Do not eyeball the amount of daikon, please actually weigh it (with peel). It's essential to getting the right texture for the cake.
If you're omitting dried shrimp or Chinese sausages, you will need to increase the salt slightly.
Bradley says
Looks great! Have to get some daikon from the farmer's market this spring to try this.
As far as "how to describe" goes: I wonder if other points of reference could be "potato kugel" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potato_kugel; https://www.alisoneroman.com/recipes/crispy-potato-kugel?rq=kugel) or "potato pavé" (https://www.brianlagerstrom.com/recipes/potato-pave, https://www.poppycooks.com/recipes/the-15-hour-potato/). They both hit on that idea of a savory casserole of root vegetables, with the contrast of crispy exterior and tender interior.
Diane K. says
I love this! Even my husband who hates mushrooms loves it! Thank you for this delicious recipe!
Jen says
Thanks for the recipe, my family has asked me to make it again but my grandmother found it abit too salty.. should I reduce the salt and dried shrimp only, or do I need also reduce the dried scallops too?
Pailin Chongchitnant says
You just need to reduce the salt, keep everything else the same 🙂 Glad they liked it!
Nicole says
Hi!
I was wondering for how long do you think the turnip cake will stay good in the freezer, or how do you know if it has gone bad?
Btw awesome recipe, i'll try making it. This is usually my favorite dim sum item and all the recipes i have seen till this one seem very complicated, but I think i'm able to do this one especially if I can freeze it and store for eating later on! Thanks a lot!! <3 <3
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Hi! The cake will last a long time in the freezer but do wrap them in foil then then put in a freezer bag. It won't "go bad" in the freezer. The only thing that will happen is the cake will get freezer burned (dried in edges, but still edible) and/or absorb too much freezer smell. Shouldn't happen if you foil+bag is, so I'd say it's good for 6 months.
BrendaH says
Was looking for a new recipe to use up some turnips. This popped up in my search, but I see you use daikon and not turnips. Would turnips work?🤔
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Yes, the confusion is real! Daikon is used for this, but the common (mis)translation of this dish is turnip cake. In theory, I think turnips should work, but turnips are not as watery as daikon and take longer to cook, so you'll need to make some adjustment using your own judgement as you go.
Kat says
I have two kinds of rice flour - one is glutinous rice flour and the other is non-glutinous rice flour. Does it matter which one I use?
Adam from HTK says
Hi Kat, and Adam here! Regular rice flour in this case as tapioca starch is added for the "springiness". Cheers!
Milanya says
Do I need 750g daikon before peeling or after? In the ingredients it says pre peeled and in the description it says weight it with the peel. Is is ok to use this long skinny daikon instead of the thick one( is it Korea radish that you used?)
750g daikon (pre-peeled weight, note)
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Hi Milanya, "pre-peeled" means before peeling or unpeeled, so that is weight with the peel. Skinny ones are fine to use.
Pailin Chongchitnant says
I think I see your confusion now, I will change it to "unpeeled" to clarify.
Cecilia Woo says
This is absolutely a keeper. I have tried a few of your other recipes and they have never failed me so far. Really appreciate your generosity in sharing these gems.
Thank you, Pailin.
Am says
End up with very good result. Thank you so much!!
Catherine says
Hi,
Can you tell me what sort of soya sauce you use? Dark, light or Kikkoman?
Thank you
Adam The HTK Intern says
Hi Catherine! Re https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/soy-sauce-101/ I think the regular Kikkoman would work fine if you have it 🙂 Cheers! Adam
Katy says
Can you substitute daikon with zucchini?
Tan Bee Aun says
The only rice flour available here is the Thai elephant brand blended (rice+corn) flour. The last time I made it, it was a bit too soggy. Do you think I should omit the tapioca flour?
Pailin Chongchitnant says
You should definitely not omit the tapioca. The rice+corn blend is not going to produce the same result, so you need to look for pure rice flour.
Helen says
I made a veg version with dried shitake mushrooms, carrot, onion, garlic and veg meat. I am wondering why my lo bak go came out brownish in colour after steaming. It was actually white after mixing in the slurry, before steaming...
June says
Hi! This looks amazing! I’m going to attempt this for the upcoming CNY, however do you know if I can substitute 1tbsp 1tsp tapioca flour for the same amount of corn starch? Would be very helpful to know!
Pailin Chongchitnant says
You can, it won't be quite the same texture but it's a small amount anyway so it should be okay.
Moon says
Hi Pailin
I followed the same recipe but not sure why my cake a bit soggy. Any idea what went wrong?
Jenn says
I am so excited to try this recipe for Chinese New Year. If I want to double the amount, would I also double the amount of water? I scoured the Asian supermarkets and couldn't find the dried scallops, so I will just imagine more umami taste inside. 🙂
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Yes, if you want to double the amount, be sure to double everything.
Ct says
Followed recipe- too wet! Help
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Hi, I've addressed this problem in the written post above under "common problems", have you taken a look at that?
Aprilkq says
I made it! It was yummy! Thanks for sharing your mum’s amazing recipe!
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Thank you! So glad you enjoyed it!
Angie says
Thank you for sharing this recipe! I love Thai food, I love your page and all your videos, and I also Lo Bak Go
and always order them at my fave dim sum restaurant along with siew mai, har gow etc.
I was wonfering if I could use the InstantPot to steam this (to cut down steaming time).
Do you know how long it would take to steam in the InstantPot?
Thank you 🙂
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Hi! Thanks for your kind words! I don't know how it will do in the IP as I've never tried, but if you want to try I would GUESS 20 minutes should do it.
Stephen Chan says
As a Hongkonger, it feels like my mother's recipe! Long live the Lo Bak Go!
Pailin Chongchitnant says
Thank you! Means a lot coming from a Hongkonger 🙂
LayChin Nicholson says
Great recipe! I made half of the recipe just for myself. Turns out great & oh.. so delicious!
Pailin Chongchitnant says
A mini lo bak go! Glad it turned out well! Thank you!
Tan Bee Aun says
The only rice flour available here is the Thai elephant brand blended (rice+corn) flour. The last time I made it, it was a bit too soggy. Do you think I should omit the tapioca flour?