Growing up, spending holidays on the East Coast has plenty of amazing memories for my family and I. Along with putting out crayfish pots, laying a hangi and spending hours exploring the streams near the marae, I remember the food. My gran was famous for making her fried bread, money pudding and one of my favourite Maori desserts, Kānga waru.
Kānga waru translated simply means corn steamed pudding. It’s simple, delicious and to celebrate Matariki (The Maori New Year) I thought I’d share my gran’s very own recipe. Besides tasting like my childhood, I always found it very curious that kumara was used to help sweeten this dessert. Traditionally Kānga waru used ground corn and kumara to sweeten and was steamed wrapped in corn husks rather than foil. Since corn was introduced to New Zealand by early European settlers, along with other ingredients such as sugar and flour, did this recipe begin to change from family to family and region to region. This recipe here has been passed down through generations in my own family, and today I share it with you.
I like to enjoy my Kānga waru served hot with fresh cream, there’s really nothing better. Below I’ve tried to share a couple of my tricks on how to get this dessert steamed to perfection.
Wrapping
Cut 20cm strips of foil and lay them out of a table ready for the raw mixture. Place mixture in the middle of the foil and lift short ends up to meet. Roll foil down a bit at a time, sealing well with creases until you reach the mixture. Don’t make the final fold too tight, as there needs to be some space for the mixture to rise. Fold each end a couple of times to seal and then repeat for all your parcels.
Steaming
First things first, you’ll need a very large pot with a lid, or a steaming pot large enough to fit the parcels. If you want to D.I.Y it like my family do, pick up a foil baking tray from your supermarket. Punch holes to allow steam to vent through, cut the tray in half, place inside itself and fit in the bottom of your large pot. Place on element and fill with boiling water until waterline is just below the tray. Bring to the boil and then place foil parcels on top of the tray in the spiral pattern, as if you were building a tower. Make sure there is plenty of space around them all before placing lid on to steam.
- 170g Cornmeal
- 100g Plain Flour
- 1 1/2 Teaspoons Baking Powder
- 120g Caster Sugar
- 70g Butter – Melted
- 220g Purple Kumara – Finely Grated
- 2 Tablespoons Milk
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Add all of the dry ingredients to a bowl and mix well.
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Peel and finely grate kumara, melt butter and add these to the dry ingredients.
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Add milk to the bowl and mix until it resembles a cookie dough consistency.
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Roll mixture into a log and cut into 8 segments.
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Place mixture onto foil rectangles angles and fold up into parcels (see instructions above).
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Place parcels in a steaming pot (see instruction for D.I.Y steaming above).
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Place on lid and steam for 30-35 minutes.
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Carefully remove foil and serve hot and fresh with cream!
Flashback
Below is the original photo I shot for this Kānga Waru recipe back in 2017. I decided that I’d refresh this content for Matariki celebrations 2019.
I miss the old Maori recipe cornmeal done in the corn leaves barked in the oven, I miss all our Maori puddings, hot bread, seafood hangis and more to come
As a child i would spend 3 -4 days just grating the corn. we would wrap them in corn leaves. Taste yummy. Musnt of used baking powder cause they came out pretty solid.
This is beautiful! thank you for your generosity and sharing your grandmothers recipe – I’m really curious to know what her money pudding is?
Money pudding was somewhat of a steamed pudding I believe. It had old coins baked right into the pudding. I still remember the slight metal taste of the mouthfuls full of coins (I think they were 1 cent coins). You always wanted the scoops with the most visible coins in it because my Gran would also exchange the old coins for new ones when you were finished. Dessert and money, win win!
Thank you very much for sharing your recipe.
Would you know if you can make the dough a few hours ahead of steaming it?
Thank you
Absolutely, I don’t see why not. Enjoy!
Just wondering could this be cooked in a
steam pudding bowl?
I don’t see why not! I’ve never heard of, or seen my family do it like this before. However I’m sure it could be a worthwhile experiment if it works out well. Obviously steaming time might be a bit longer, but do let me know if you try baking it this way.
Can you please clarify about the corn? I thought settlers also brought corn, but the way you’ve written this makes it sound like corn was already being used in this recipe prior to settlers arrival?
Yes, you are correct. Corn was introduced by early European settlers in the late 1700s. So to avoid any further confusion, I’ve reworded a section of my content to better reflect this. Hope that clarifies your query.
Sounds like a lovely dish! Money Pudding sounds intresting aswell.
I’m helping my daughter make a matariki booth for World Thinking Day for Girl Scouts. We’re supposed to include a sampling of a traditional food, but there is not a kitchen at the event location. Do you think I could steam these in an electric pressure cooker (instant pot) or a slow cooker?
Hi Lindsay. What a great idea, so happy that you considered using this recipe as a sample of culture. To answer your question, I’m unfortunately unsure about alternative ways of steaming/cooking sorry. But I’m a big believer in giving things a go to see what works, or what doesn’t. So best of luck and let me know.
Kia ora i am aborn and bread east coaster and i remember the kia that my kaumatuas made More so as being the tamarikis we had to do the hard yaka per say and as the saying goes kanga waru waru being the hard part your job was to grate the corn the grater was a 6in long piece of tin 6in wide and bent in half and nailed to a block of wood with nail holes in it as the graters the cooking method then was you made your mixture then wrapped it in the corn leaves that was 60 yrs ago but to this day the taste is still the same thank you for your recipe Kia ora
Wonderful recipe i did it fir book club