Yes, these buns were so popular, and for good reason. Indeed, everything about their preparation is unusual: unusual dough kneading, unusual molding, unusual taste of already baked buns. And how beautiful they are! So small, rosy, fluffy! Would you like to try these Chinese buns?! Bake, you can’t help but bake!
Recipe information
Cuisine: Chinese.
Cooking method: in the oven .
Total cooking time: 4 h
Number of servings: 21 buns.
Ingredients:
for test no. 1:
- premium wheat flour – 400 grams
- active dry yeast – 1.5 teaspoon
- chicken eggs – 2 pieces
- warm milk -140 milliliters
for test no. 2:
- premium wheat flour – 130 grams
- granulated sugar – 80 grams
- salt – 1 teaspoon
- water – 60 milliliters
- butter – 60 grams
for coating:
- yolk – 1 piece
- cream (10-20%) – 1 tablespoon.
Preparation:
- To knead the dough for these buns, it is best to use a food processor with a special attachment.
- Insert the dough attachment into the bowl of a food processor.
- Add all the ingredients necessary for kneading dough No. 1: pre-sifted flour, active dry yeast, beat in the eggs and pour in warm milk and turn on the food processor at minimum speed. After visually assessing, add if necessary, depending on what is missing - flour or milk, so that the dough is thick.
- Then, increasing the speed of the food processor, continue kneading the dough until the composition is homogeneous. The dough should be very elastic, springy, and easy to stretch.
- After kneading the dough, leave it in the food processor, if the processor bowl allows it, to rise for 2 hours. During this time, the dough should increase at least 2 times.
- Knead the risen dough and add the ingredients for dough No. 2.
- Turn on the food processor at medium speed, knead, adding flour or water if necessary, into a homogeneous, elastic dough that does not stick to your hands.
- Place the resulting dough on a cutting board dusted with flour and divide into equal parts weighing 45 grams.
Roll out each piece of dough on a cutting board sprinkled lightly with flour using a rolling pin in a “droplet” shape.
Start rolling the rolled out piece of dough into a roll from the narrow side.
You will get a dough roll about 8-9 centimeters long. Form the remaining pieces of dough in the same way. Place the formed dough rolls on a baking sheet, cover with a clean towel and leave to proof for 30 minutes in a warm place.
After proofing, roll out each roll lengthwise into a rectangular layer about 5-6 centimeters wide and about 15 centimeters long.
Turn the rolled out dough over to the other side.
Start rolling the rolled out dough sheet evenly into a roll.
The result is a small, neat roll. Form the remaining buns in the same way.- Place the buns on a baking sheet or in a baking dish, leaving a small distance between the buns. Using a pastry brush, brush each bun with whipped yolk and cream. other methods of greasing baked goods before baking are described. Do not melt the buns, bake immediately.
- Bake the buns in an oven preheated to 170 degrees for about 20-25 minutes, but be guided by the performance of your oven, until they are evenly browned.
- Remove the finished Wei Bo buns from the oven and cool on a wire rack. Bon appetit!
Note to the owner:
- You can also use a bread machine to knead the dough for these buns.
- If you don’t have a bread machine or food processor, knead the dough yourself, it will be more difficult, but everything is possible.
Chinese cuisine is as varied as any other. Next to savory, spicy appetizers and spicy hot soups are dishes with neutral taste. For example, steamed mantou buns. At first glance, this is an ordinary steamed donut made from yeast dough. But in fact, if you do not know the intricacies of preparation, instead of a round, elastic bun, you may end up with a wrinkled bun, the taste of which is far from ideal. It turns out that it’s all about kneading and further preparing the dough. Firstly, the dough for mantou is made stiff, like on. Secondly, Chinese steamed buns differ from ordinary yeast baked goods in the fine-meshed structure of the dough. And this is achieved by thorough kneading. When cut, such dough should contain practically no voids filled with air. If housewives, when making any dough with yeast, care for it and cherish it, then for mantou buns it is diligently beaten, and the pieces themselves are carefully rolled out between the palms or rolled on the table to release the air. Mantou buns can be prepared for future use. To do this, the cooled buns need to be wrapped in film and placed in the freezer. Before eating, the buns are steamed in a double boiler, slow cooker or pressure cooker.
Ingredients:
- water – 1 tbsp.;
- sugar – 2 tsp;
- dry yeast - 1.5 tsp;
- flour – 400 g;
- salt – 1 tsp;
- vegetable oil for greasing the bowl.
For the sauce:
- garlic – 4 cloves;
- paprika – 1 tsp;
- red pepper - to taste;
- soy sauce – 2 tbsp. l.
Pour water heated to body temperature into a bowl, add yeast, salt and sugar. Stir until the yeast is completely dissolved. Add flour.
Using a wooden spatula, stir the flour and water until it has absorbed all the liquid. Stir in a circular motion in one direction, then in the future it will be much easier for you to knead the dough.
Then start kneading the dough with your hands, trying to make it homogeneous, without lumps of flour.
Leave the dough in a bowl, cover it with cling film, and place in a warm place to rise. The dough is steep, so it will take at least two hours to rise.
Then punch down the dough, knead it again, and let it rise again.
Place the risen dough on the table, divide into pieces the size of a large chicken egg. From this amount of dough you will get approximately 14 pieces.
Knead each piece of dough in your hands, making a flat cake out of it.
Fold the edges of the flatbread towards the middle, gathering the dough into an improvised knot.
Then turn the crumpet over with the folds down. Thus form all the blanks, cover them with a towel so as not to dry out, and proceed to the next stage - forming the buns.
Take the donut in your palm and cover it with your other palm. Start rolling the ball between your palms, using as much effort as possible so that the dough gets rid of air and becomes dense.
Do the same with the rest of the dough.
Place the buns in a steamer bowl, pre-greased with oil, leaving gaps between them, since the buns will increase in volume during the cooking process. Cover the container with a towel and leave for half an hour to rise.
Fill the tank with very hot water to the maximum level. Place containers filled with semi-finished products on top of each other and close with a lid. Steam the buns in a steamer for 25 minutes.
While the products are cooking, prepare a delicious sauce.
Place the pressed garlic, red pepper and paprika into a cup. Add soy sauce. Mix well.
When the steamer turns off, do not remove the lid for another 5-7 minutes, otherwise the temperature change may cause the buns to wrinkle.
The surface of the freshly prepared buns is a little sticky, but then they dry out and stop sticking to your hands.
To prevent the buns from becoming chapped and to remain soft, remove them from the steamer as needed.
If the blanks are made in the form of a bun, then the finished Chinese buns have a perfect round shape. They come out firm on the outside but soft on the inside.
They can be served with tea, dipped in honey or condensed milk, or with soup instead of bread.
Soy sauce with garlic goes great with these buns. Bon appetit!!!
Sincerely, Alina Stanislavovna.
The recipe for Chinese steamed pork buns is adapted from a culinary site dedicated mainly to Asian cuisine, My Kitchen. I left the dough recipe almost completely unchanged, I just added less sugar in the dough and instead of wheat gluten I used starch, instead of Hong Kong flour with low gluten content, I used regular wheat flour, I adjusted the filling a little, since I have quite a few sources of Chinese cuisine and all of them contain these fillings. buns are different. It’s like with borscht, everyone has their own secrets :-). After reading, I adjusted it to my taste.
By the way, the dough recipe is so good that it can be used for buns with different fillings, even with potato or jam. They turn out very tender thanks to the starch in the dough.
I also came up with a sauce for them that perfectly complements these buns. Originally, Chinese steamed pork buns are served without sauce. They are also good without sauce, but my Polish husband needs sauce for almost everything.
By the way, these steamed buns with pork are often served for breakfast in many hotels in Asian countries where there are many Chinese. Without false modesty, I admit that these turned out to be much tastier than those that I have ever tried.
Chinese steamed buns can be frozen after cooking. Once cooled, wrap in a plastic bag and place in the freezer. Defrost slowly in the refrigerator. Heat by steam. They will be like freshly cooked!
16 servings
For the test:
- 16 grams fresh yeast (or 8 grams dry)
- 160 ml water, slightly warm
- ½ tsp.
- vinegar 280 grams
- wheat flour (low protein cake flour is best) 100g
- potato starch
- 60 grams of powdered sugar 30 ml
- sesame oil
- 10 grams baking powder
10 ml cold water
- For filling:
- 250 grams 30 ml
- 2 tbsp.
- 1 tbsp. Sahara
- 250 grams 1 small
- onion, finely chopped
- oyster sauce
- 4 tbsp.
- soy sauce 100g
- 2 tbsp.
For the sauce:
- onion, finely chopped
- hoisin sauce
- 250 grams 30 ml
- 150 ml cold water
- 1½ tbsp.
1) 1 tbsp.
rice vinegar
1 tbsp.
honey
Dough fermentation: 1 hour 30 minutes
2) Cooking time: 1 hour
Total cooking time: 2 hours 30 minutes
Knead the dough:
In a deep bowl, mix flour, starch and powdered sugar.
In a separate bowl, mix water, yeast and vinegar until smooth.
3) Pour into the dry ingredients along with sesame oil and knead into an elastic dough. Knead for 5-6 minutes using a planetary mixer or 10-15 minutes by hand, until smooth.
Cover the dough with a kitchen towel and leave for 1 hour at room temperature. The dough should double in size.
Prepare the filling:
Only I know how much I was tormented by the question... how do the Chinese make such dough. How do they make the baozi dough so smooth, white and finely porous? I tried to make such dough at least five times according to a variety of Chinese recipes and all in vain - the result was ordinary yeast steamed buns, which immediately became wet from the steam and their appearance was completely unpresentable. And then, quite by accident, I bought a book in an ordinary supermarket. The book is called "Simple Kitchen". And I had a revelation :) - before steaming, the yeast dough is kneaded so that not a single bubble remains there. In general, first things first. First, I will share the recipe for the basic dough for simple steamed buns - 馒头 (mántou) mantou. All steamed baked goods (if you can call it that) are made from this basic dough. Classic baozi with meat filling are also made using this dough. The Chinese came up with a lot of buns of different shapes and colors from it. Well, you can’t add much flavor, the dough is a little bland, but you can come up with different shapes and color combinations (adding pumpkin puree as a dye, for example) is very possible.
The recipe is extremely simple. You need 500g flour, 220g water, 6g dry or 8g fresh yeast. I added another pinch of salt so that it wouldn't be too bland. But there are nuances in preparing the dough.
First you need to take 100g of water and stir the yeast in it until it is completely dissolved. Then pour this yeast mixture into the flour and stir. Add the rest of the water little by little and knead the dough. Knead until all the flour is absorbed. The dough is very steep and difficult to knead. But there is no need to add more water. Once kneaded, leave to rest for 15 minutes in a bowl with a lid.
Then take out the dough, knead well again and leave to rise for 2-3 hours. Or until it doubles in volume (it took me about an hour).
The next step is to get rid of any bubbles that have formed in the dough. To do this, you can use a noodle cutter - in the dough rolling mode, you need to pass the dough through the press 5-6 times. If you don’t have a noodle cutter, you can simply roll out the dough thinly several times with a rolling pin, folding the layer and rolling it out again. The dough turns white and becomes smooth. The result should be a ball of dough with almost no bubbles. I still had some bubbles. I didn't know the exact stage. Next time I will knead longer. The fewer bubbles in the dough, the better the result.
Next, roll out the dough into a long rope and cut into 16 pieces. Or we weigh the buns, as I did - 44-45 grams each. We form the buns, leave them to proof for about 20 minutes on a board (to prevent them from becoming airy, cover them either with film or with a light, slightly damp towel). To proof, I immediately placed the buns in a steamer, having previously lined the bottom with baking paper.
Cook on low for a couple of minutes 15-20. I have a regular bamboo steamer. I put the pan on the fire. As soon as the water boils, I start the fire small. On top of the pan I place a bamboo double boiler with the buns already placed. Cover on top. While cooking, do not open the lid. After 15-20 minutes, turn off the heat.
Open the lid 3-5 minutes after turning off the heat. This is a must. Otherwise, the buns may become wrinkled. Let cool completely. When hot, they are slightly sticky, like the crumb of hot fresh bread.
Another convenience is that these buns can be frozen. Once cooled, stand for 10 minutes, place on a board, cover with film, and place in the freezer. Then just take it out of the freezer and steam it for literally a couple of minutes.
In restaurants, the Chinese sometimes serve these buns along with a saucer of condensed milk. You tear the bun into two parts and eat it, dipping it in condensed milk. Simple and tasteful :)
Baozi are steamed Chinese pastries with a variety of fillings. Like most Chinese dishes, this dish has a centuries-old history.
According to legend, the dish was invented by a Chinese military leader back in the 2nd-3rd century AD. According to one version of the legend, while on a military campaign in southern China, the military commander’s army suffered greatly from illness. The sages decided that only a human sacrifice, offered as a gift to the gods, can save from this scourge. But the military leader decided to act mercifully and ordered a pie made from dough with meat filling, which was offered to the gods instead of his people.
Prepare your ingredients. Baozi can be prepared with different fillings, but today we will prepare the classic meat filling of pork and green onions.
Cut the meat into small pieces and chop. For the filling you can use either ready-made minced meat or chopped meat.
Grate the ginger root. Heat some vegetable oil in a frying pan and add grated ginger.
After a few seconds, add the minced meat to the pan.
Mix ginger with minced meat and add a little water to the pan. Water is needed so that the minced meat separates faster and better.
Add soy sauce, mirin (or sherry, white wine), salt, pepper to the pan. If using dry white wine, add an additional 1-2 pinches of sugar.
Simmer the meat over the fire until it is softened and the liquid has almost evaporated.
Chop 1-2 cloves of garlic. Dissolve starch in 1 tbsp. cold water. Add starch and garlic to the filling and mix well.
Once the remaining seasonings and juices have thickened and been absorbed, turn off the heat and leave the filling to cool. Taste the meat and add seasonings and spices to taste if necessary. In China they add a flavor enhancer, but I preferred to add 1 tbsp. Worcestershire sauce.
While the filling is cooling, let's make the dough. To make Baozi pies airy and light, they are used for steaming, the recipe for which is on our website.
Knead the dough prepared according to the basic recipe and divide it into 4 parts.
Roll each part into small sausages with a diameter of 2-3 centimeters and divide into 6 parts.
Roll out each piece of dough, holding it in the center with your fingers, into a circle with a diameter of 12–15 cm so that the middle of the circle is thicker than the edges.
Add chopped green onions to the cooled meat. It is important that the meat is cool enough before you add the onions and start shaping the baozi. If the filling is too hot, the onions will release juice and the dough may become soggy.
Place 1 tbsp. filling into the center of the rolled out circle and, pinching, connect the edges of the dough, and give the pie a “bag” shape. I won’t lie: only a chef experienced in working with dough can give baozi a traditional shape, which, unfortunately, I am not yet. Fortunately, no matter whether you get a traditional Chinese or a simpler “pouch”, this will not negatively affect the taste of the dish.
Cut the parchment paper into small squares.
Place the formed pies on pieces of parchment paper and place in a steaming pan. Leave some space between the pies as they will increase in size during cooking.
Do not rush to put the pies into the steamer; let the dough rise again, leaving the baozi to stand for 20 to 60 minutes. Here, as long as you have enough patience, the better the baozi rises, the more porous the dough will be and the airier the pies will be.
Steam the Baozi cakes for 15 minutes, and then leave for another 5 minutes with the lid closed.
Chinese Baozi cakes are ready. You can serve.
