Category: Bao & Dumplings

Bao & Dumplings / Pork / Restaurant Classics

Cha Siu Bao (叉烧包) BBQ Pork Buns: From Scratch

Red Chasiu Without Red Yeast Rice Powder or Food Dye~~ Guangdong’s famous 叉烧包 (chāshāo bāo/caa¹ siu¹ baau¹), aka cha siu bao or “char siu bao,” are a dim sum staple!  Soft, fluffy buns envelop the chasiu—barbecue/roast pork—in these steamed bao that ooze with juicy filling. Although I didn’t grow up in a family that made or ate chasiu, we always bought cha siu bao from Chinese bakeries. (Especially the “pineapple” bun version that took me 25 years to figure out had no pineapple whatsoever.) At home, Ma’s humble 包子 (bāozi)...

Bao & Dumplings / How to Cook With Huajiao / Pork

Zuzu’s Savory Sichuan Zongzi (粽子)

Five Generations of Zongzi~~ In the national Chinese battle of sweet vs. savory 粽子 (zòngzi), my family’s heirloom Sichuan zongzi recipe straddles a different border of savory. It’s nothing extravagant—six ingredients including rice, salt and oil. (A far cry from the mouthwatering cured egg yolk, meat-stuffed, nut-filled, mushroom-frequenting zongzi beloved in some savory southern regions). But one bite and anyone could guess its origin: Besides unassuming red bean and a touch of cured pork, the sole flavoring is freshly ground 花椒 (huājiāo), the mouth-numbing and citrusy “Sichuan pepper.” Growing up sprinkling huajiao...

Bao & Dumplings / Plant

Changzhou’s Small Foot Zongzi (Xiaojiao Zongzi, 小脚粽子)

Duanwu Jie with a Taste of Jiangnan~~ This Duanwu Jie, we are introducing two special zongzi stories: Changzhou’s small foot zongzi and Sichuan’s savory zongzi. You may sense a theme in our blog with this entry, because after starting it as a mother-daughter effort in 2014, we brought on Kathy Yuan and Mala Mama to contribute their family recipes from Sichuan in 2021 and are now welcoming Zoe Yang and her mom, Iris Zhao, to share their stories and recipes from Jiangnan—the area south of the Yangtze River, including Shanghai...

Bao & Dumplings / Pork / Poultry / Soups & Stews

Danjiao (蛋饺) Egg Dumplings ft. Pork and Ramps

Taste of Jiangnan: Egg-Skin Dumplings~~ 蛋饺 (dànjiǎo), or egg dumplings, have long been a mainstay of Chinese New Year banquets across the southeastern regions of China. Elders will tell you it’s because danjiao look like lucky gold ingots/”sycees”(金元宝, jīn yuánbǎo). I think the practical reason is that they demand so much attention and time! See, to make danjiao, you basically have to make a tiny omelet in a ladle, lay a tiny quenelle of pork filling in the middle, and then oh-so-gently fold one edge of the omelet over the...

Posu Bao

Bao & Dumplings / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Pork

No Sweet Sour: Yunnan Posubao (破酥包)

Yunnan’s Flaky Baozi~~ Iconic 破酥包 (pòsūbāo), literally translated as “crumbly bun,” is a unique steamed 包子 (bāozi) from Yunnan province. Its flaky layered skin is stuffed with either sweet or savory fillings. The origin tale dates back to 1903, when the pastry chef 赖八 (Lai Ba) of Yuxi invented posubao by adding lard to his baozi dough. The addition of lard made the wrapper cloud-like, with a loose and mouth-melting texture. Unlike neatly folded 小笼包 (xiǎolóngbāo), or soup dumplings, posubao has almost no folds. Instead, it has a fragile appearance,...

Bao & Dumplings / Pork / Restaurant Classics / Soups & Stews / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan)

Sichuan Chili Oil Wontons (Hongyou Chaoshou, 红油抄手)

A Taste of Childhood These Sichuan Chili Oil Wontons (红油抄手, hóngyóu chāoshǒu) take us back to slurping down a bowl of chaoshou at our fave Chongzhou noodle shop. For authentic texture and hometown flavor, traditional technique is everything. Whether you know them as everyday 馄饨 (húntún), Sichuan 抄手 (chāoshǒu), or Cantonese-derived wontons, these soup-friendly meat parcels are a hole-in-the-wall mainstay. Unlike 饺子 (jiǎozi) or 水饺 (shuǐjiǎo), aka boiled dumplings, chaoshou are served “wet” in bowls of broth or, in this case, hongyou dressing. Moreover, the delicate, crossed wrappers trap sauce by...

Three Umami Dumplings by No Sweet Sour

Bao & Dumplings / Chinese New Year / Fish & Seafood / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Non-Spicy / North (Shanxi, Beijing) / Pork

No Sweet Sour: Three Umami Dumplings in Emerald Jade Wrappers (Sanxian Jiaozi, 三鲜饺子)

Dumpling Lessons If you have followed this blog for long, you have probably noticed a conspicuous lack of dumplings. It’s not that we don’t like dumplings, but more that we’ve never mastered making them from scratch. We almost always use pre-made dumpling wrappers in our house, to less-than stellar effect. (Though we usually serve them in a Zhong dumpling sauce, which makes anything taste good.) Besides being less fresh and tasty, they are also drier and significantly harder to work with in folding and pleating dumplings than freshly made dough....

Bao & Dumplings / Chinese New Year / How to Cook With Chinese Spices / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Pork / Restaurant Classics / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan)

Chengdu Zhongshuijiao (钟水饺) Concocted Soy/Red Oil Dumpling

Chengdu Challenge #15: It’s All About the (Zhong) Sauce If you’ve ever had 钟水饺 (zhōngshuǐjiǎo) dumplings in red oil at a real Sichuan restaurant then you know it’s all about the sauce. While every Chinese cuisine can claim a wonton, jaozi or siumai of its own, only Sichuan floats its famous zhongshuijiao in a sweet-hot special sauce. As such, it kind of blows all other dumplings out of the water. It’s hard to guess exactly what’s in that special sauce, besides chili oil, but you know it when you taste it. You also...

Bao & Dumplings / Non-Spicy / Plant / Restaurant Classics / Vegetarian

Steamed Bao (Foldover Buns, Guabao, 割包)

Chengdu Challenge #9: Bow to the Bao In my constant quest to fatten up my daughter without resorting to junk food, bao has been a go-to recipe. As a child who shuns all fried foods, most dairy and anything sweet, about the only fattening thing she loves is soft, yeasty bread. We discovered this at her first Thanksgiving dinner, when the only things she put on her plate were turkey and the Sister Schubert yeast rolls. She dug out the middle of the rolls, leaving the crusty exterior behind, and ate through...