Dough (from Dim Sum by Ellen Leong Blonder)
Ingredients
Starter
- 2 tsp active dry yeast
- 1 cup lukewarm water
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 1/2 cups flour
Dough
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tbsp rice vinegar
- 2 cups flour, plus additional of dusting board/countertop
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp baking soda
- 1 tbsp vegetable shortening
Directions
- In a large bowl, mix the yeast with the lukewarm water and sugar and let the mixture stand for 10 minutes.
- Stir in the flour until well blended.
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let the mixture rise in a warm, draft-free place for 1 hour, or until puffed and bubbly.
- Stir the salt and vinegar into the starter.
- In another bowl, sift together the 2 cups of flour, baking powder, and baking soda.
- Stir the flour mixture into the yeast mixture. When combined, add the shortening and work it in with your fingers. The dough will become a sticky, somewhat shaggy mass. Turn the dough out onto a well-floured board and knead for about 5 minutes, or until smooth, adding flour as necessary.
- Grease a clean, large bowl with a little shortening, place the dough in the bowl, and cover it with a damp cloth or plastic wrap. Let it rise in a warm, draft-free place for 1 hour.
- Lightly punch the dough down, and then proceed to add filling (recipe below).
- Adding the filling can be a little tricky, I usually make a circle (that’s still quite thick in the middle) then add a glop of filling. I then stretch the dough out and around the filling. This takes a bit of practice to get good at and to get a feel about how you like to do it.
Custard filling
Ingredients
- 2 tbsp flour
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 cup milk (warm)
- 2 egg yolks
- 1 tbsp of melted butter
Directions
- Mix egg yolks and sugar in a pan
- Add flour and mix well
- Place pan on low heat and stir constantly until thickened (this takes a while)
- Stop the heat and add melted butter and stir well
when do we add the milk in the custard filling?
You add the milk once you have finished mixing the egg yolks and sugar, then you start heating up the mixture.
how thick does the mixture have to be when u take the custard off the heat?
It should be quite thick, I’d say if you scoop some up in a spoon and then pour it out again, it should go in blobs, not as a stream of liquid. It will thicken a little more when it cools, but not a whole lot. You basically want it to be thick enough that it will sort of hold its shape as you wrap the dough around it.
Good to find a recipe where “custard powder” isn’t listed for the filling. How many bao does this recipe produce? How many tablespoons of filling per bao? I assume the bao are steamed, but for how long?
Also, do the bao have to rise again after filling and before steaming? If so, how long?
They don’t need to rise before steaming, but depending on how many you can fit in the steamer at one time, some will rise a little bit more.
Thank you so very much for posting this recipe. I remember the first time I ate this was at a restaurant and afterwards I was longing for it. I’ve made it twice so far and they turned out beautifully and tasted absolutely delicious.
What kind of flour would you recommend using for this recipe?
I would probably recommend cake flour or a bleached all purpose flour.
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