List of Chinese desserts Facts for Kids

Chinese desserts are yummy sweet treats from China. People often enjoy them with Chinese tea, during meals, or at the very end of a meal. These desserts use many different ingredients common in East Asian cuisine, like sticky glutinous rice, sweet bean pastes, and a jelly-like ingredient called agar. Because China has such a long history and many different cultures, there are tons of unique and delicious desserts!

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Popular Chinese Desserts to Try

Jelly and Pudding Delights

Annin tofu: This is a popular almond-flavored jelly dessert. It's often found in dim sum restaurants all over the world.

Annin tofu is a popular dessert, often found in dim sum restaurants worldwide.

Bingfen: A clear, jelly-like dessert from Sichuan, China. It's often served cold with toppings like nuts and fruit.
Coconut bar: This is a cool, sweet dessert often served in dim sum. It's sometimes called coconut pudding, but it's more like a firm jelly.

A coconut bar is a refrigerated dim sum dessert that is sometimes referred to as coconut pudding, despite not really being a pudding.

Douhua: A very soft tofu pudding. It can be sweet or savory, but the sweet version is a popular dessert.
Grass jelly: A dark, jelly-like dessert made from a special plant. It's often served cold with fruit or syrup.
Guilinggao: A dark, slightly bitter jelly, often served with honey or syrup to make it sweet.
Mango pudding: A creamy, sweet pudding made with fresh mango. It's usually served cold and is very popular in Hong Kong.

Mango pudding is a Hong Kong dessert usually served cold.

Tapioca pudding: A sweet pudding made with small tapioca pearls, often with coconut milk or fruit.

Cakes and Pastries

Chongyang cake: A special cake eaten on the 9th day of the 9th month in the Chinese lunar calendar.
Crystal cake: A traditional pastry from Xi'an, China, known for its clear, crystal-like filling.
Custard tart: A small pastry cup filled with a sweet, creamy egg custard.
Egg tart: A very popular Chinese pastry with a flaky crust and a smooth, sweet egg custard filling.

Egg custard tart is a popular Chinese pastry.

Huangqiao sesame cake: A crispy, flaky flatbread with sesame seeds, originally from Huangqiao town.

Shaobing or Huangqiao sesame cake originated from Huangqiao town in Taixing, Jiangsu.

Mooncake: These round cakes are traditionally eaten during the Mid-Autumn Festival. They have rich fillings like lotus seed paste or red bean paste.

Mooncakes are traditionally eaten during the Mid-Autumn Festival.

Nian gao: A sticky, chewy rice cake, often eaten during Chinese New Year for good luck. It can be sweet or savory.

Popular Guangdong deep-fried sweet nian gao

Osmanthus cake: A sweet, clear jelly cake flavored with osmanthus flowers, which have a lovely, fragrant scent.
Red bean cake: A sweet cake filled with a smooth, sweet red bean paste.
Sachima: A sweet, fluffy pastry made from fried dough strands, similar to a crispy treat.
Song gao: A steamed rice cake, often light and fluffy.
Sweetheart cake: A traditional Cantonese pastry with a flaky crust and a sweet filling, often made with winter melon.

Sweetheart cake is a traditional Cantonese pastry with flaky and thin skin filled with winter melon mixed glutinous rice flour and sugar. Coconut, sesame, almond, star anise or Chinese five spice may also be added.

White sugar sponge cake: A light and fluffy steamed cake, sweetened with white sugar.

Soups and Drinks

Black sesame soup: A warm, thick, and sweet soup made from black sesame seeds. It's often eaten as a dessert.
Bubble tea: A popular drink that comes in many flavors, often with chewy tapioca pearls at the bottom.
Double skin milk: A creamy, sweet milk pudding with two "skins" on top, usually served warm.
Egg tong sui: A sweet soup with eggs, often served warm.
Ginger milk curd: A warm, sweet dessert soup where milk curdles (thickens) when mixed with ginger juice.
Red bean soup: A sweet, warm soup made from red beans, often served as a dessert.
Sweet potato soup: A comforting, sweet soup made with sweet potatoes, often served warm.
Tong sui: This is a general term for any sweet soup or custard served as a dessert in Cantonese cuisine.

Unique and Fun Treats

Dragon's beard candy: A very delicate, floss-like candy made from many thin strands of sugar. It often has fillings like peanuts and coconut.
Fried ice cream: A scoop of ice cream that's coated in breading and quickly deep-fried. The outside is warm and crispy, while the inside stays cold!

Fried ice cream is a dessert made from a breaded scoop of ice cream that is quickly deep-fried, creating a warm, crispy shell around the still-cold ice cream.

Fried milk: A crispy on the outside, creamy on the inside dessert made from fried milk custard.
Jian dui: A fried pastry made from glutinous rice flour, covered in sesame seeds, and often filled with lotus paste or red bean paste. It's hollow inside.
Sugar painting: A unique form of Chinese folk art where artists use hot, melted sugar to "paint" two-dimensional figures, often animals or flowers. You can eat the art!

Sugar painting is a traditional Chinese form of folk art using hot, liquid sugar to create two-dimensional figures.

Tanghulu: A traditional Chinese snack of candied fruit, usually hawthorn berries, on a stick. The fruit is covered in a hard, clear sugar syrup.

Tanghulu is a traditional Chinese snack of candied fruit.

Tangyuan: Small, round balls made from glutinous rice flour, often filled with sweet fillings like black sesame or red bean paste. They are usually served in a sweet soup.

Taro ball: Chewy balls made from taro, a starchy root vegetable, often served in sweet soups or with shaved ice.
Zongzi: While many are savory, some zongzi are sweet and dessert-like. They are sticky rice dumplings wrapped in bamboo leaves, often eaten during the Dragon Boat Festival.

Zongzi is a tradition snack usually eaten during Dragon Boat Festival. Many styles tend to be sweet and dessert-like.

Images for kids

Ginger milk curd is a hot dessert that originated in Shawan Ancient Town of Panyu District, Guangzhou in the Guangdong Province in southern China. Its main ingredients are ginger, milk, and sugar.
Grass jelly is a jelly-like dessert that is prepared with Mesona chinensis.

List of Chinese desserts facts for kids