Welcoming Year of the Dragon with Lunar New Year Desserts

This year of the Dragon, I’m drooling over Lunar New Year Desserts! It’s a sweet way of making wishes for the year ahead, and the most fun part of New Year Dinner! I’ve collected 5 Lunar New Year dessert recipes to share with you guys, focusing on classic Chinese New Year symbolisms that I’ve heard every New Years growing up. No matter how stuffed I was at New Year’s Eve Dinner…I have room for dessert!

What Are the Lunar New Year Dessert Symbolisms?

Lunar New Year dessert symbolisms center around sweetening your year, wishing for health, wealth, and happiness for your family. Like our New Year’s Dinner, every dessert on the table has its own symbolism. The shape, color, and even the sound associated with these desserts have evolved to represent various blessings: good luck, wealth, or longevity.

Here’s a few classic ones:

• Tangyuan (湯圓): Reuniting Family (圓圓滿滿)
• Nian Gao – Sticky Rice Cakes (年糕): Better and more prosperous every year (年年高昇)
• Candies: Happiness for the New Year (甜甜蜜蜜)
• Sesame Balls: House full of accumulating riches and children
• Pumpkin Seeds: Having plentiful resources that grows

Bringing Families Together with Tangyuan

Tangyuan, or sticky rice balls, are dessert staples for various holidays, especially Lunar New Year. It’s round shape gives it the symbolism for reunion, but this recipe is also an easy way to engage the whole family before your feast. I remember rolling little Tangyuan next to my grandma and making fun shapes with them like play-doh!

Not only is this recipe fun, it’s also SUPER versatile. You can use this recipe as a base to get creative with color, shape, or even fillings like sesame, peanuts, and more! Serve this delightful dessert over shaved ice, in a light ginger syrup, or even in milk tea!

Tangyuan Ingredients

• 250g of Glutinous Rice Flour 
• 100g of Sugar 
• 140 ml of Water

Grandma’s New Year Tradition: Deep Fried Sesame Balls

This Deep Fried Sesame Ball recipe is such a classic lunar new year dessert, you can’t miss it! They’re so popular during New Year festivities because they look like piles of golden spheres, symbolizing plentiful riches. These sesame balls are so delicious-looking when they’re piled high and steaming hot in a plate, it’s hard to resist.

My grandma’s Deep Fried Sesame Balls recipe is so easy, and SO SO GOOD! Every time she makes this sweet treat, we’re fighting over the last one! You and your family will LOVE the crunchy rice flour dough and Sesame Seeds around the sweet, fluffy red bean filling.

Deep Fried Sesame Ball Ingredients 

• 1 cup of Glutinous Rice Flour 
• 2.5 tbsp of Sugar 
• 100 ml of HOT Water (Make sure it’s HOT**) 
• ¼ cup of RAW Sesame Seeds 
• ½ cup of Red Bean Paste or Filling (Optional)

Gems of Good Wishes: Lunar New Year Fruit Jelly

Fruit Jelly isn’t the first thing you’d think of when it comes to Lunar New Year Desserts, but I think they’re a great way to modernize New Years tradition. Every New Years, I see my family stocking up different fruits based on their meaning. With this recipe, it’s a great way to include them ALL! Besides, these fruit jellies will look JUST LIKE little gems – perfect for entertaining guests for New Years! Served alongside other desserts, this Fruit Jelly recipe will bring a pop of colors to your dinner table.

Fruits are such a big part of New Year blessings, they have their own associations. Here are a few great fruit options for your fruit jelly that are ALSO super meaningful for New Years:

• Apples: Safety for the family (平平安安)
• Oranges: Lucky and Prosperous (大吉大利)
• Dragonfruit: Bustling, busy business (紅紅火火）
• Pomelo: Protection and Health (保佑平安)
• Pineapple: Riches are coming (旺來）

Fruit Jelly Ingredients

• Any fruit of your choice, chopped into bite-size pieces 
• 2 cups water 
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice, optional 
• 2 tablespoons honey or sugar 
• 2 tsp Agar Agar powder 

Candied Delights: Tanghulu for A Sweet New Year

Tanghulu (糖葫蘆) – candied fruits on skewers, are traditionally popular in the winter months because the cold weather makes the sugar crystallize rapidly. It’s historically made with hawthorne fruit, giving it a round, ruby-like appearance that fits right into the New Year season. Tanghulu has been popularized in recent years for any fruit you’d like: strawberries, apples, grapes, you name it! Like our fruit jelly, you can choose your own blessings with the fruit you decide to use!

“But Tiffy, It’s Lunar New Year, why are we making Santa-shaped desserts?”

That’s because there’s a different jolly old man in red that we celebrate in Taiwan during the New Year: the God of Riches (財神爺)!

Tanghulu Ingredients 

• 12 Strawberries 
• 2 Banana, sliced 
• 2 cups Sugar 
• 1 cup Water 
• 24 Black Sesame Seeds 

Celebrating Prosperity: Sticky Rice Cakes with Red Bean (Nian Gao)

Sticky rice cakes – Nian Gao (年糕) are a MUST HAVE for Lunar New Year, symbolizing families sticking together and growing together! I definitely feels life gets sweeter whenever I make these Sticky Mochi Pancakes with Red Bean Paste. They’re great as a New Year dessert…but also perfect as breakfast the next day. They’re sticky, sweet, and crispy – and so satisfying! It feels like every pancake packs in all the good stuff the New Year brings, and I believe it!

Sticky Mochi Pancake Ingredients

• 2 cups of Flour 
• 1 cup of Warm Water 
• 4 Red Bean Paste Balls 
• 8 tbsp of Mochi 
• 2 tbsp of Black Sesame Seeds 

Lunar New Year is not the same without sweets! Here are a few more to sweeten up your festivities: