Syrup-Coated Glutinous Rice Dumplings 糖不甩
Syrup-Coated Glutinous Rice Dumplings is featured among the local specialties of Hong Kong.
Syrup-Coated Glutinous Rice Dumplings (糖不甩) are balls of glutinous rice dough cooked in hot syrup and scattered with crushed roasted peanuts. The sweet is said to come from Dongkeng (东坑镇) in Dongguan (东莞), Guangdong; the Dongguan city government notes that it has spread to towns and villages across the province and Hong Kong, and Hong Kong's Wen Wei Po (文匯報) describes it as reputed to be one of Hong Kong's ten great sweets.
How it is made
In the Dongkeng method described by the Dongguan city government, glutinous rice flour is cooked, kneaded and rolled into balls, which are then boiled in scalding syrup in an iron wok. They are served sprinkled with crushed roasted peanuts, or with strips of fried egg. Chinese Wikipedia lists peanut powder, sesame and brown sugar powder as the usual toppings. The Cantonese name, pronounced tong bat lat, means sugar that sticks and cannot be shaken off. The Dongguan government describes the result as crisp yet smooth, fragrant and sweet, refreshing the appetite without cloying.
Where it comes from
Dongkeng ties the sweet to a legend set in 1839, when opium smoking was widespread around the town: the immortal Lü Dongbin (吕洞宾) hid a cure inside cooked glutinous rice balls, simmered them in syrup and went from street to market as an old peddler, half selling and half giving them away.
The name also carries a marriage custom from the Dongkeng area. When a matchmaker brought a young man to meet a girl's family, a bowl of tang bu shuai meant the parents agreed, since the match could no longer be shaken off. A sweet soup of beancurd skin with beaten egg stirred in meant the proposal had come apart. Wen Wei Po reported in 2012 that more than 80 Hong Kong people from Dongkeng returned to the town for its Maishen Festival (卖身节), held on the second day of the second lunar month, when men once came to Dongkeng to be hired by landlords.
Sources & reading
Written from the linked sources and checked sentence by sentence against quoted extracts by a separate reviewer on 2026-09-24. Recipes and servings vary between kitchens.