Num Plae Ai

Boiled glutinous rice dumplings filled with palm sugar and rolled in grated coconut.

Illustration inspired by Pchum Ben at a Houston temple.

Dish details
Khmer name	នំផ្លែអាយ
Other names	Nom plae ai; Num plae aiy; Nom somlap pdey
Dish types	Dessert; Snack
Subjects	Food & Foodways; Literature & Storytelling
Related dishes	Num Kom; Chek Ktis

Num plae ai (នំផ្លែអាយ, num plae ai) are boiled glutinous rice dumplings filled with palm sugar and rolled in grated coconut. They are eaten as a dessert or a snack.

Cultural context

In Khmer, num covers cakes, cookies and many desserts, and plae means fruit. The name comes from the round shape, which looks like a fruit. In English the dumplings have been called "rice sugar pearls," "sweet rice dumplings" and "cakes of forgiveness." Other spellings include num plae aiy, num plae ay, nom plae ay, nom plaiy aiy and nom plai ai.

Khmer people often buy sweets as a snack rather than eat them only after a meal. Roadside vendors fill the streets of Phnom Penh selling num plae ai, and the dumplings are sold at street stalls and markets across the city. In Phnom Penh markets they usually come in a banana-leaf cone with a toothpick. A market package holds five to seven pieces wrapped in banana leaf, topped with young grated coconut. Traditionally, they are served in small bowls made of banana leaves. In villages, sellers still offer them from bicycles, and at markets they sell mainly in the morning.

The dough is soft and a little rubbery or chewy, and the palm sugar inside melts as it cooks. The filling has a rich, caramel-like taste.

Names and stories

Num plae ai has several other Khmer names, including nom samlab bdey (នំសម្លាប់ប្តី), nom bongkob skor (នំបង្កប់ស្ករ), nom bampuon skor (នំបំពួនស្ករ) and nom kaet kdei (នំកើតក្តី). In some regions it is also called nom kham skor (នំខាំស្ករ). Older names include num bampuən skaa, num bongkob skaa and num kham skaa, which refer to sugar hidden or set inside. The different names come from translation and local usage, not from different ingredients or methods. The Khmer dictionary of Samdech Preah Sanghareach Chuon Nath gives the original name as nom bampuon skor, a cake with sugar hidden inside, and records three names in all: num plae ai, nom kaet kdei and nom bampuon skor. Khmer speakers rarely use nom kaet kdei and generally say nom bampuon skor or num plae ai.

The nickname nom somlap pdey means "the dessert that kills husbands." In the Khmer fable told by 196 Flavors, a newlywed husband ate the hot, sticky cakes too fast, choked and died. In another telling, a newlywed bride made the rice balls to surprise her husband when he came home from work, and they stuck in his throat. A third version says a betrayed wife made the sweet to take revenge, and the chewy, slippery coating is believed to have stuck in his throat. The name "kill husband cake" is still in use today.

A different legend explains the name nom kaet kdei. Two close friends were eating the cakes together when one bit into the middle and sprayed the sugar syrup onto the other's face. The two fought and took each other to court, and the judge gave the dessert that name.

Ingredients and preparation

Num plae ai is made from glutinous rice flour, filled with palm sugar and garnished with grated coconut. The palm sugar comes from palmyra trees. Glutinous rice flour, also called waxy or sweet rice flour, gives the dumplings their sticky, chewy texture, and regular rice flour cannot replace it without changing the sweet.

The dough is glutinous rice flour kneaded with salt and warm water. It is shaped into small discs, each with a piece of palm sugar in the middle, then sealed and rolled into a ball. The balls are boiled in water, cooled and garnished with grated coconut before serving. The dumplings float to the top when they are cooked, and they are soaked briefly in cold water before they are drained. A Khmer-language recipe calls for glutinous rice, palm sugar and a moderately mature coconut, and it tops the plate with long shreds of grated coconut.

In the 196 Flavors recipe, validated by Chef Pisith Theam, executive chef at the Park Hyatt in Siem Reap, palm sugar is boiled with water until it melts and thickens. It is then formed into balls about 1 centimeter (½ inch) across. Hot water is added a little at a time to the flour, and the dough is kneaded for three minutes. Each sugar ball is closed inside a flattened piece of dough and smoothed into a ball. The hot cooked dumplings are rolled in coconut oil and then in grated coconut.

Another recipe uses one cup (about 200 grams) of sticky rice flour, 100 to 150 grams (3.5 to 5.3 ounces) of palm jaggery, a pinch of salt and grated coconut, and it is served on banana leaf. The flour is mixed with salt and room-temperature water. The jaggery is cut into small pieces, one for each ball. The filled balls are dropped gently into simmering salted water over low heat. They rise after five to ten minutes, and then they cool in water before they are rolled in coconut. The dumplings are served hot or cold. A cup of flour makes about 15 to 20 balls, and 500 grams (about 1 pound) makes nearly 50. Cooked dumplings keep in the refrigerator for a few days or more. For freezing, the coconut is left off and added after the dumplings are thawed and steamed again.

History and origins

In the early method, cooks flattened sticky rice dough into a pancake, set palm sugar inside, formed a ball and boiled it. The finished cake was placed in a bamboo knot on a slice of banana peel and sold in the village market. The ball shape and the seed-like center led people to call it a tree fruit cake, though it is not made from fruit, and the name has lasted. Because the thin crust sometimes let the sugar syrup leak out, household cooks changed the method for a time. They cooked only the rice dough, grilled it and served it in a banana leaf, to be dipped in honey or liquid palm sugar and sprinkled with coconut. More recently, cooks have gone back to putting the palm sugar inside, but no longer serve it in a bamboo knot.

An old oral account dates the name to the reign of King Ang Duong. People then tied the cakes to branches or bamboo sticks set on sections of banana trunk, so that they looked like a tree bearing fruit.

Families have passed the recipe on by word of mouth, mostly from mothers to daughters. Dine With The Locals holds that the tradition is fading and at risk of dying out, because many young women are less interested in cooking.

Regional and household variations

The outer dough may be tinted in bright colors with food coloring. A garnish of dry-roasted, lightly pounded sesame seeds mixed with the grated coconut is also common. Some versions work pandan leaf juice or coconut milk into the dough, and others blend grated coconut into the palm sugar filling. One account has the balls steamed rather than boiled before they are coated in coconut.

Num plae ai is similar to klepon and khanom kho. 196 Flavors compares it with the Vietnamese bánh ít trần, the Indonesian klepon and the Japanese shiratama dango. It also closely resembles Vietnamese floating rice cakes.

Preparations and recipes

• 196 Flavors, validated by Chef Pisith Theam

  Glutinous rice dough wrapped around palm sugar balls, boiled until they float and coated in grated coconut.

References