Best Almond Savories

Today finally arrived the best savory place at Rua do Gamba.

God parents from Hong Kong urged for ten boxes of almond cookies as souvenirs on their last day in Macau. When we arrived at the door that morning, a long queue was formed waiting.

Well, no worries at all – just want to get it done anyway. Today’s weather is perfect. Its a good time visiting the old districts of Ponte de Horta under the blue cloudy sky;

On the same side too, revisiting the nearly 100-year-old arched-tunnel building at the end of the street Gamboa. It is also a great place for private snap shots too. Definitely worth to take a look around other small streets and alleyways of Macau; to feel the tiny little bits of the local’s day to day life experiences; Such highly treasured, historical districts of old blocks that still exists in a bustling city like Macau; start diminishing or even went all disappeared one day; Definitely worth spend some time in person to review these valuable sceneries.

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Opened for almost sixty years, Chui Heong have used the most ancient hand-made charcoal firing method; to flag start their first almond cake business. Egg yolk stuffed with pork almond cookies and Egg yolk almond cookies are their best known for. The tiny mini almond cookies in small boxes are also their best favorite picks.

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The making of Mini almond cookies

Made of green bean flour with various filling such as: Almond grains, vegetable oil, peanut butter, sugar, cured pork, etc. They firstly crushed all almonds and mix it together with other ingredients in the traditional wooden mold; all roasted with chinese ancient charcoal making styles. Hence it has a unique charcoal aroma and is the most iconic, must-buy cookies in Macau. When put in the mouth, it melts fairly quickly. The taste is so rich, without the strong weird, unprocessed almond flavors. I’m not over exaggerating. After eating such fragrant savory items, you probably won’t go back to other gigantic stores buying the same items again.

Salted egg yolk stuffed with pork almond cookies

It is the most classic and stunning treasure item! The manufacturing process is quite complicated; they are all extracted from a secret stuffed pork recipe; that is the shimmering, transparent pork lard having marinated all day. After that, combined with a translucent salted egg yolk, that rubbed evenly and cut it into thin slices. With the first bite, the outside layer was so crunchy, with a bit of saltiness in sweetness tastes in between, with a rich, unique taste.

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Salted egg yolk almond cookies

In general, once the salted egg yolk pork almond cookies have sold out, many customers will go for this option. The outside layer are so soft and crispy, having the charcoal fragrant taste remained. The half sweetness and slight salty bitterness enhances the original taste to even a more appealing, leading ingredient taste.

The cookie packaging were based on the design of the old yellow carton copied from the 1970s look and feel. It also has a unique mini packaging sizes, extremely convenient to carry as a fancy souvenir for kids or youngsters.

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In recent years, such traditional technique were put in a small dilemma. Related local government officials prohibit the use of charcoal stoves inside the store. Hence, the bakery changed their method slightly. They bake cookies with a machine till is half-cooked and gradually placed them all on the charcoal stove until finished. Such method not only help reducing the carbon ashes, but also retained the charcoal final taste incense.

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Almond cookies are readily available at any Macau souvenir shop. But I still highly recommend Chui Heong; They insisted using traditional, handcrafted ancient method to make strong, carbon- fragrant, crispy almond cookies. Though the bakery is far away from the city center; the rich aroma from the freshly baked almond cookies is worth definitely a return back!