One afternoon, I happened to encounter with a puffed rice maker/seller on the street of Tianmu in Taipei. The master chef(?) and his assistant -probably his wife and son- drove a special car down to the street and started to make "Pongashi".
He scooped three cups of rice and pour them into a cannonlike puffed rice cooker. It automatically keeps rotating while the fire from the stove below heats it up.
After 10-15minutes or so, the sounds from an alarm clock had gone off, let us know the rice was ready. The master chef didn't waste his time. He prepared syrup for the puffed rice while waiting.
Black, shiny, cannonlike Puffed rice cooker spinning over the fire
The master prepares special syrup for puffed rice
After the "Explosion", he raked out all the puffed rice from the special box attached next to the cannon, then mixed them in a huge iron pot with the syrup he had made earlier.
After mixing them well, he pour them on a flat surface board on his special car, spread them evenly. Let it cool down for a little bit, cut it into blocks and pack them with different flavors.
Mixing puffed rice and special syrup in a pot
Spread it flat and cut it into blocks evenly
Packed puffed rice comes with over dozen of different flavors
Nowadays, it is hard to find this traditional Asian snack sold on the streets. In Japan, this can be seen only on special occasions, like summer festivals or food promotions.
I didn't think the tradition was still alive and I was so happy to see it in Taiwan!
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