Last night began the year of the Ox. Or as my Chinese co-worker says. “It’s a Bull because it is strong and represents money like a bull-market.” Yeeeeahhh, not this year, hon.
I wanted to make some bao (steamed buns) but I didn’t have a recipe for it and I was a little unsure of how to proceed. My boyfriend indulged me and so I experimented.
We picked up a pound of ground turkey and scallions. I sauteed and browned the meat in a skillet with some minced onion and added soy, mirin, rice wine vinegar, Korean red pepper paste, garlic and black pepper. I took it off the heat and chilled it. I pre-cooked the filling because I was nervous about getting poultry up to the right temperature just by steaming it in the dough. I also chopped up a ton of scallions for it right before filling the dough. I didn’t want the fresh green taste to wilt during the saute.
The aforementioned co-worker gave me a recipe for dough she got from her neighbor. It’s 2 cups of flour, a package of yeast, warm water and a spoon of sugar. Mix and let it double in size.
About an hour later I cut the dough into 8 chunks and shaped them into balls. It was really sticky dough. I should have used less water. I dropped it into some flour and flattened it with my hands. I put in some filling and pinched it closed and set it on parchment paper. I let the bun dough rise again, but I’m not sure it was necessary here. I let a steamer over boiling water and let the buns cook.
Now here was a problem, the steaming basket was not perfectly flat so the buns were getting lopsided and elongated. They still cooked alright, but they weren’t the nice shape I wanted. And because I wasn’t sure how long to cook them for, I had to keep opening the lid. After consulting some online recipes, I decided that 15-20 minutes was enough. Best way to tell is if the paper still sticks to the bun, it’s not done. The paper should come off with no dough stuck to it.
They were amazing! The dough was not as flavorful as I might have liked (maybe more salt the next time) and it was chewy, but they weren’t so bad once I made soy-sesame dipping sauce for them. The filing was great. Some of the online recipes I saw recommend making bao out of any Chinese leftovers chopped up. It’s a good way to use up leftovers.
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Sounds delicious. Let’s cook, the next time we’re in the same city.