Hawthorn Soft Crisp by Bao's Pastry

Hawthorn is an unusual fruit that is not seen often in Singapore except for some niche traditional childhood sweets and snacks, so it was interesting to see it as a pastry filling at this trending bakery, Bao's Pastry. What's even more interesting is how they are sold in a big resealable bag, almost like you are supposed to binge on them.
Hawthorn Soft Crisp by Bao's Pastry - packaging
The first thing I noted is that the ingredients list was only available on their in-store price display (click to enlarge image below), and it wasn't printed on the packet itself. Also, it doesn't list all the ingredients, just some "core" ones, which are all probably the better ingredients from the full list. For example, expected ingredients such as sugar or salt aren't listed, so we don't really know if there were artificial additives.
Hawthorn Soft Crisp by Bao's Pastry - partial ingredients list and price
Nonetheless, I thought it was of decent quality for the price overall after the taste test. It was S$7.90 for 9 pieces.

The first thing that struck me is that it was a cross between a typical Chinese pineapple cake or pineapple pastry (like those rectangular ones with pineapple filling) and a Cantonese char siew pastry (char siu sou or char siew soh) commonly found in dimsum. The size is also similar to these two traditional pastries, but slightly smaller, so perhaps 2 mouthfuls for most, but potentially bite-sized for for some.
Hawthorn Soft Crisp by Bao's Pastry
The filling was similar to the pineapple cake filling in texture and taste, but the main difference was that it was not as fragrant or fruity as pineapple. Unlike other hawthorn snacks that may taste tart or sour, this filling wasn't sour either, and seemed even slightly less sour than the typical pineapple filling.

Despite it being slightly less flavourful than pineapple filling, it was less sweet as well, which was a good thing to me and for health purposes. So overall it felt a bit more toned down in taste as opposed to cloyingly sweet, which also means that you could indeed eat more than 1 piece at a go despite them being larger than other Chinese cookies or tarts in size. Perhaps this explains the resealable bag as opposed to individual wrapping.

The pastry itself was interesting. It also felt like a cross between the typical shortcake crust pastry which uses butter and is somewhat crumbly, and the char siu soh pastry which uses cooking oil and is somewhat flaky. This leaned towards the crumbly side, but there were hints of flakes on top where the glazing was.

The taste of the pastry definitely had butter, but I was also very sure that it wasn't full butter. The other fat used also did not seem like cooking oil, which has a more neutral and non-waxy taste and mouthfeel. Instead, it felt a tad waxy and had a bit of the Japanese commercial biscuit taste (like Pocky), so it comes across as closer to margarine or shortening. I think this is probably why their ingredients list was incomplete - because they wanted to leave out potential artificial ingredients such as these. Nonetheless, this artificial fat was probably very small in amount because the taste was very faint. (The next time I purchase it again, I will reheat it in the oven and see if the artificial additive taste becomes more prominent, as they usually do after reheating.)

On balance, it is definitely cheaper, lighter and less sweet than a similar serving of Chinese pineapple cakes, so it might be more economical to binge on this compared to pineapple tarts during Chinese New Year or other festive periods if you absolutely need your fill of such snacks. 

However, I would probably recommend getting the cheaper individually-wrapped all-butter pineapple cakes from Chinese marts such as Scarlett, which cost just S$2.50 for a pack of (I believe) 6 pieces.

Finally, they do have a similar snack using Jujube Paste instead, which I hope to try eventually. (Click to enlarge the ingredients list.)
Jujube Paste Soft Crisp by Bao's Pastry - price and partial ingredients list
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