The
chi in
Japanese mochi is an ancient
Chinese word,
ci2, which can be written a few different ways. Modern Chinese call mochi
ci2-ba1 in standard Mandarin, and in
Taiwanese it is called
moaN-chî”sesame
ci2”, although sesame is not necessarily used in flavoring it. A number of
Han dynasty sources describe this food as a sort of “cake” made from
rice powder and steamed, but the descriptions are somewhat inconsistent among themselves, and there are similar foods with different names in the old books.
I have seen mochi made in the Chinese countryside, in an unelectrified village, the old-fashioned way. Glutinous rice is pounded in a huge mortar and pestle with a little water, until it forms a smooth and tender dough that is then steamed to make it edible. One person pounds with the pestle, and the other periodically adjusts the position of the lump of dough in the stone mortar. The latter has the more dangerous job, it seemed to me.
Because mochi is made from glutinous rice, even when fully cooked it is considered somewhat harsh on the stomach, and most people eat only small quantities of it. People with sensitive stomachs avoid it altogether. It figures widely in offering-foods placed before gods, ancestral spirit-tablets, and so on. In some places in Taiwan and Fujian it is dyed a brilliant red for these purposes. I have also eaten it in Longyan flavored with ramie leaf, which gives it a shocking green color. I have always eaten it sweet, although sometimes savory fillings may be put into the sweet dough. The Chinese concept of what should be sweet and what should be savory differs somewhat from the Western concept
Extremely fine-textured and tender mochi is now available in many places in the southern Chinese cultural world. Enjoy it if you have the chance to! For my part, though, I think the tastiest mochi I ever had was a pink variety my wife and I found in a little shop in Kyoto. It was flavored with some delicate flower. Ah, Kyoto! how I long to return...