Butter Mochi - my first try

Some time ago I had purchased a box of mochico flour and decided today was the day. I didn't really research many butter mochi recipies, and relied on my favorite recipice site, recipezaar.com. I didn't have any evaporated milk on hand, so here is how I went about it.

Butter Mochi

• 1 16-ox box mchiko flour
• 2-1/2 cups sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 12 oz. half-and-half*
• 1 13.5 oz. can coconut milk
• 3 eggs
• 1 stick butter

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees
2. Grease up a 9x13 pan
3. In your trusty Kitchen-Aid mixer, add in the mochiko flour, sugar, baking powder, and run on low speed to mix dry ingredients without making a huge dust cloud. I use the mixing paddle instead of the wire wisk, but that's just me.
4. In a separate bowl, add the half-and-half*, coconut milk, eggs, and vanilla. Mix well with a spatula.
5. With the mixer still running, carefully pour in the contents of the bowl, using the spatula to scrape out the stuck bits in the bowl. Don't stick that spatula in the mixer while it's running, though.
6. Melt the stick of butter. I melt it by placing the stick into a Pyrex measuring cup and microwaving, but you do whatever works for you. Be careful. Once done, carefully add the melted butter to the mix.
7. After the stuff is mixed up nicely, pour into the greased 9x13 pan. Tap the pan to even out the batter.
8. Bake for 45 minutes or so. I did 50 minutes, and it was a bit too long. Anyhow, if you smell a yummy smell, then a burning smell, you did like me and went too long.
9. Allow to cool for 2 hours before cutting, then avoid eating it all at once.

*Ah, the half-and-half. The original recipe called for a can of evaporated milk. I didn't have any. I did, however, have a bunch of those individual serving half-and-halfs in the little foil-top capsules. I used twelve. If you got a 12oz. can of evaporated milk, you might want to use that instead.

Overall, the mochi came out nice, with that wonderful gooey texture that you just can't describe to non-mochi folks. After two hours, the stuff was still pretty warm, as I used a Pampered Chef stoneware pan, and it really held the heat. The recipe shown here isn't as sweet as one would expect, you might want to consider cranking the sugar level up to 3 cups if you want a really sweet mochi. Anyhow, for my first shot at butter mochi, I'm happy. My picky daughter Rachel really liked it, so that's a good sign. Justin ate it up, too. Deanna is out, but I think she'll be consuming her fair share. Yeah, I'll be making this again, maybe with a few tweaks, and no apologies for the complete reckless abandon to any diet plans. It's mochi, for cryin' out loud. Enjoy it!