Prep time: 10 min
Cooking time: 50 min
Servings: About 4 of what you see in the picture above.

1. Yam (peeled and cut) x 500g

2. Gingko nuts (peeled) x 250g, cut into half, centre pit removed

3. Pandan leaves x 7-8, washed and cut into strips as shown above

4. Rock sugar

5. Ayam Brand Trim Coconut Milk

6. Pink salt x ¼ tsp

1. Prepare the ginkgo nuts. Cut each ginkgo nut in half and remove the centre pit.

2. Prepare pandan leaves. Wash and cut your pandan leaves into strips. Cut away the portions that are yellowing or brown.

• Pandan leaves can have sharp serrated edges. Always wash in this direction to avoid being cut: fromthe base of the leaf to the tip.

• Use a fruit and vegetable soap to wash pandan leaves as the commercially bought ones can be pretty dirty.

3. Prepare pandan sugar syrup.

• Put about 150g of rock sugar, 6-7 cut pandan leaf strips into a saucepan (20cm diameter). Fill with 600ml water, and boil for around 10-15min, or until the pandan leaves wilt.

• Add ¼ tsp of pink salt and stir to dissolve.

• When done, take it off the stove and allow it to cool. I add around 100ml of room temperature, boiled water at this stage to help it to cool faster, and also to dilute the sugar solution as I don't like my orh nee too sweet.

• You should have around 500ml of pandan sugar syrup after this.

4. Cook the yam.

• Arrange the yam on a bed of around 10-12 strips of pandan leaves.

• Steam, covered, for 40 minutes.

• You should be able to poke a fork through the yam very easily when it's fully cooked.

• Set aside and allow to cool for around 20 minutes.

5. Boil ginkgo nuts with around 70g of rock sugar and 7-8 strips of pandan leaves.

• Boil until the ginkgo nuts are soft. This usually takes around 30 minutes.

• When soft, strain them and run tap water through them to cool, then leave them in a strainer to let the water drip out.

• Add more sugar if you want your ginkgo nuts sweeter.

6. Blend the yam paste.

• Place all the yam pieces inside a blender. Add 250ml pandan sugar syrup and 60ml coconut milk.

• Blend on high until the yam paste is smooth.

• You may need to open the lid and push down the yam pieces that remain unblended once or twice.

• The final consistency should be thick and will coat a fork as shown in the picture below.

• If you don't own a blender: Use a potato masher to mash the yam.

7. Store the yam paste.

• The traditional method of storing yam paste is to cover the yam paste with a thin layer of scallion oil or lard, but this obviously adds a lot of calories. This is done to prevent the top layer of yam from dehydrating and forming what Chinese call a "skin" on top.

• What I do instead is to scoop the yam paste out into an airtight container, cover it with clingwrap and then seal again with the airtight container lid.

• Press down on the clingwrap to make sure the surface of the yam is completely covered with clingwrap.

• The yam should be reasonably cool before you do so, as clingwrap has a lot of nasty chemicals that will come out if your yam is hot.

8. Assemble the dessert.

• This can be served hot or cold.

• If you're serving this hot, you can steam or microwave to reheat the yam paste.

• Put a dollop of yam paste in a bowl, arrange as many ginkgo seeds as you want on top, and add 1-2 tablespoons of coconut milk.

9. Enjoy!

You're going to find that the bottom and sides of your blender are full of yam pasty gunk when you're done blending the yam. I'll share a method of getting it off easily.

1. Fill your dirty blender half with tap water.

2. Blend on high for 30 seconds.

3. Pour the water away.

4. Fill your dirty blender again, this time a little less than half with tap water and add a squirt of dishwashing liquid.

5. Blend on high for around 30 seconds again, then pour away the foamy water.

6. Most of the yam paste should be out. Wipe the rest off with a kitchen towel and wash as per normal.