Eight unique mooncakes and where to find them

The Mid-Autumn Festival is just around the corner. 

With this year’s celebrations falling on September 13, you’re most likely looking for an especially memorable set of mooncakes to impress your boss, parents, or in-laws. We’ve got you covered. 

Check out some of these unique and fancy mooncake flavours that would definitely set you apart from other mooncake givers.

VEGAN MOONCAKES

For those feeling a bit more health-conscious, Soirette has the perfect mooncake for you! They offer both unique and traditional flavours, like toasted walnut and dark chocolate, and black sesame. And if you’re feeling particularly adventurous, you can even make your own vegan mooncakes — try traditional, pineapple snow-skin, or green tea and black sesame.

If you want to be super extra, there’s also their Deluxe Box set which contains eight mooncakes (one of which is a bonus, large mooncake!) all with distinctive fillings. That includes: 

• Vietnamese Coffee & Salted Cream
• Pineapple & Lime Leaf
• Durian & Gula Melaka Lotus Paste
• Milk Candy & Blueberry Tea
• Burnt Coconut & Thai Milk Tea
• Kaya Toast (featuring a durian ganache center and gula melaka lotus paste) 
• Salted Duck Egg Cookie & Curry Leaf
• Ruby Cognac & Pistachio (this large mooncakes has a cognac jelly center, roasted pistachios, and Soirette’s brand new ruby chocolate — all topped with 24K gold leaf and hand-painted koi) 

Soirette
1433 W Pender Street, Vancouver B.C.

ICE CREAM MOONCAKES

Like ice cream cakes, but better? For the past 22 years, Häagen-Dazs has been creating ice cream mooncakes that tout an outer layer of chocolate instead of traditional thin dough or flaky crust.

The interior is filled with Häagen-Dazs ice cream, and the “yolk” in the middle is made of mango sorbet. 

Häagen-Dazs Online

BANANA MOONCAKES

Taiwanese bakery Sheng Kee boasts a playful, fruity octet of small mooncakes that features four different flavours made from freeze-dried fruit.

This collection includes mango, lychee, mulberry, and perhaps most interestingly, banana.

Sheng Kee Bakery
1941 Irving St. San Francisco, Calif.

ROSE MOONCAKES

We all know Lady M as an upscale boutique famous for its delicious crepe cakes, but did you know they also make mooncakes?

Their 2019 collection touts eight mooncakes in four different flavours inspired by their popular Mille Crêpes cakes: rose, earl grey, green tea, and chocolate.

Lady M Confections, Flagship Boutique
41 East 78th St, New York, N.Y.

CHOCOLATE BUTTERNUT SQUASH MOONCAKES

Wild Sweets By Dominique & Cindy Duby is an award-winning chocolate shop. This year, they’ve curated a limited edition Chocolate ‘Moon Cakes’ Bouchées Series, which offers a playful twist on the Taiwanese pineapple cake. It’s coated with a dark chocolate ganache and topped with embossed discs made of almond paste.

Some of their fillings are more traditional, like the red bean paste, but others are more unconventional, like the butternut squash, kabocha, and sweet potato fillings.

Wild Sweets
Unit 2145 – 12191 Hammersmith Way, Richmond, B.C.

DURIAN MOONCAKES

This uniquely flavoured mooncake holds a paste made from the notoriously stinky fruit popular in Southeast Asia — and you can find an eight piece set from Saint Germain Bakery in Richmond.

Note: Snowy mooncakes are a recent development in the mooncake world — their outer skin is made from glutinous rice flour and therefore has the consistency of mochi.

Saint Germain Bakery
Unit 2000, 6060 Minoru Boulevard, Richmond, B.C.

SHANGHAI SAVORY MOONCAKE

Savory mooncakes are a little harder to find. If you’re ever in Alhambra, be sure to visit Kang Kang Food Court to try their savory, meat-filled mooncake. Now you know what to get that friend who always needs to protein up.

Kang Kang Food Court
27 E Valley Blvd, Alhambra, Calif.

PIG MOONCAKES

We’re cheating a little bit with this one, since it’s neither shaped like a mooncake, nor does it have the traditional filling inside, but take a look at this adorable, pig-shaped “mooncake”!

Their website advertises it as a popular choice for children, but we think it’s great for the kid in any of us.

Kee Wah Bakery
1010 S Baldwin Ave, Arcadia, Calif

So the next time you’re feeling up for a mooncake that’s a bit more out-of-the-box, be sure to check out some of these delicious options. And since you’ve made it to the bottom of our list — assumedly having drooled all over your keyboard or phone — take a look below for a bonus mooncake!

CANNED MOONCAKES

This weird innovation first appeared on Weibo in 2014 in a bizarre attempt to preserve mooncakes. Here’s how you do it: put mooncakes of your choice in a jar and fill it with 3/4 liquor and 1/4 vinegar. Simple, really. 

Take them out to enjoy next fall, or the next, or perhaps save them for your grandchildren 20 years down the line.