Bibingka Galapong / Filipino Baked Rice Cake (Ube Flavor)

If you enjoy a sweet and savory cake and dessert, you will absolutely love this Filipino bibingka galapong. It has an amazingly rich taste without being overly sweet and a nice soft chewy texture and nice ube (purple yam) aroma. It is a naturally gluten-free cake you will love to make often because they are so easy to put together too. Bibingka is just a general term for Filipino baked rice cake. Galapong refers to fermented glutinous rice paste, though more than often just called rice flour. Bibingka is very popular in the Philipines and I can totally see why. It is absolutely out of this world. It is considered one of the popular Filipino Christmas cakes eaten on the Christmas eve. Some said that the origin of Filipino bibingka can be traced to the Indonesian bibingka, particularly in the regions close to the Philipines border where Christian communities are mostly found. There are bibingka kelapa (coconut version), bibingka ubi (cassava version), bibingka abon (meat floss version), bibingka nenas (pineapple version). Wingko babat/wiwingka/bibika, which is popular in the East Java, is a popular pancake version of bibingka. Traditional bibingka galapong is made with fermented glutinous rice that has been grounded into a paste-like texture, which gives a slightly sour after-taste, eggs, and water. It is quite a time-consuming cake to bake if you do it the traditional way. The cake is topped with slices of salted duck eggs and then baked in a terracotta container lined with banana leaves over an open fire and the cake is covered with another piece of banana leaves on top. In this modern-day, bibingka is made with non-fermented glutinous rice flour (mochiko flour) or some just use regular rice flour, coconut coconut milk and eggs. The batter is then baked in the oven using a cake pan or muffin pan lined with banana leaves. Toppings such as butter, slices of salted duck eggs, grated cheese, and grated coconut are added on top.