Steamed Barbeque Bao (Char Siu Bao)
My very favorite dish at any dim sum restaurant are Steamed BBQ Pork Bao (Char Siu Bao). They’re fluffy buns filled with sweet and tangy BBQ pork. I just adore them. So when Bake from Scratch magazine included a recipe for them in their January 2020 issue I knew I’d have to try it out. Admittedly, I was initially a little intimidated at the idea of attempting these. They’ve alway seemed a little like magic to me. But reading the recipe I realized that these are simply a yeasted dough that’s steamed rather than baked. I’d made plenty of yeasted breads in the last year and the recipe has step-by-step instructions to walk me through the filling and steaming process. It’s now the beginning of February, and I’ve made the bao a few times already. I’m still working on getting the shape of them looking good, but they’re so flavorful I can’t wait to make them again. I even bought dim sum steamers to make it easier the second time around. If you love bao you need to try these too.
Making it vegetarian
I’m trying to cut back on meat a bit, so this last time that I made this recipe I substituted fried tofu for the pork. The second time I substituted portobello mushrooms. Both are easy substitutions. The recipe calls for 8 ounces of cooked pork, so I just substituted an equal amount of tofu & mushrooms then made the bao filling as the recipe dictates. The important thing to do if you try the same, is to cook your vegetables before you create your filling, and make sure that the 8 ounces is the post-cooking weight since any vegetable will lose a lot of water weight when cooked. The recipe does call for oyster sauce that I included, but you could just leave that out and substitute in a little extra hoisin and soy sauce if you’re not a seafood eater.
Chop up your cooked mushrooms into small pieces for the filling.
BBQ Pork Bao Recipe:
https://www.bakefromscratch.com/barbecue-pork-buns/
Special Ingredients:
These are available at most major supermarkets.
Hoisin sauce
Oyster sauce
Active Dry Yeast
Special Equipment:
Large stock pot or Dutch oven
Bamboo steamers or other steamer with a flat bottom
Parchment paper
Digital scale (optional buy useful)
Instant read thermometer for measuring water temperature
Photo by Daniel Marks
A few tips:
1. Read the recipe and allow time. You’ll need to prepare your filling, cut parchment squares for each bao, give the dough some resting time, divide the dough, shape the buns, and steam them. The first time start to finish for me was 2 1/2 to 3 hours. Also, pay attention to how some ingredients are divided like the sugar. You’ll use some of it in the filling, some of it the yeast mixture, and the rest in the dough.
2. Decide how you’re going to steam the buns before you dive in: The recipe assumes that you don’t have steamer baskets and offers a clever solution by punching holes in aluminum pie tins and placing them inside a dutch oven. Well, I don’t have aluminums pie pans either, so the first time I made these I propped a wide colander over my dutch oven and placed my bao inside that. It worked, but it was a bit of a precarious balancing act. The second time I made the bao, I bought some bamboo steamers. You can see them in the photos. I figured I’d rather invest a small amount in those then spend money on pie tins I can’t use again. They were so easy to use and were definitely worth the small amount of money since I plan to make these again. They’re safer than dealing with the aluminum pie tins over hot steaming water and they save you a lot of time since you can make 8 bao at a time instead of 3.
3. Learn how to shape your bao. The bao recipe is easy to follow but doesn’t really demonstrate the best way to shape them. I watched this video a few times to get the knack of it. Even so, this dough is pretty soft so getting the crisp pleats is a little tricky. I’m still working on the presentation part of these myself, but that’s okay, they sure do taste good.
Did you make these bao? Did you love them? If so, you should also try the Pineapple Buns or Bolo Bao. So good!
