This is a local sweet treat that has a long tradition, but is slowly being swept aside by the Mentos generation.
"Deuk Deuk Tong (Chinese: 啄啄糖), or mistakenly Ding Ding Tong (Chinese: 叮叮糖), is a type of traditional candy in Hong Kong. It is a hard maltose candy with sesame and ginger flavours. The sweet is made by first melting maltose, then adding to it various ingredients and continuously stirring the mixture. Before the mixture solidifies, it is put on a metal stick and pulled into a line shape, then coiled into the shape of a plate.
In Cantonese, deuk means chiselling, breaking things into pieces. When street hawkers sold the candy, it was necessary for them to break apart its original shape with a pair flat chisels, namely "deuk". Chiselling makes noise and attracts children to buy. Deuk Deuk Tong was thus named (Tong means "candy" or "sugar" in Cantonese). Today, in order to cater to young people's tastes, different flavours of Deuk Deuk Tong are also made, including coconut, chocolate, mango, banana, and strawberry flavours." (Wikipedia:
Deuk Deuk Tong)
The lucky ones in HK get all these fancy flavours while we Singaporeans only get the original. Hopefully i'll get to try them one day.
