Jiangnan · Breakfast

Sheng Jian Bao

Advanced
55 min
roughly 2 of 4 for cost

nutty-toasted · aromatic · fiery · umami-deep Leads with toasted, nutty warmth throughout, aromatics blooming from the first bite, finishing long and savory.

Ingredients

300 g plain flour
3 g instant yeast
5 g sugar
180 ml warm water
300 g pork shoulder, minced, about 30 percent fat
150 g pork skin aspic (pi dong), diced 5 mm
60 ml cold ginger and spring onion water
15 ml light soy sauce
10 ml Shaoxing wine
4 g salt
1 g white pepper
30 g spring onion, finely sliced
30 ml neutral oil
150 ml water, for steaming
10 g white sesame seeds

The skills inside

Kneading dough Steaming: basket, leaf and lid

The words inside

Doneness by Touch, Sight & Sound

Allergen screen

Found: gluten · soy · sesame · alcohol

Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.

Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.

Method

Work the flour, yeast, sugar and warm water into a firm dough, knead it smooth, and rest it 40 minutes only: you want it half risen, still springy, slow to fill a thumb dent. 40 min
Beat the soy, wine, salt, pepper and cold ginger water into the pork a spoonful at a time, always turning one way, until the mince is sticky and drags at the spoon; fold in the spring onion and the diced aspic and chill it hard.
Roll 25 g discs thicker in the middle than at the rim, pleat 25 g of filling shut and pinch the seam properly closed; the seam is a weld, not a decoration.
Set the buns seam down in a cold oiled pan a thumb apart and fry over medium heat for 3 minutes, until the bases are deep gold and sound hard under a chopstick. 3 min
Pour in the water, lid on at once, and steam 9 minutes until the pan runs dry and starts hissing again and the tops are matt and dry to the touch; scatter the sesame and spring onion and give the base 1 minute more. 9 min
Rest them 2 minutes before anyone bites, because the soup inside is at boiling point. 2 min

How to tell it is going right

This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the techniques it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.

Kneading dough 57 recipes

The work changed it: what began shaggy and rough is one smooth, cohesive mass, with nothing raggy hanging off it.
The surface has gone satin and barely tacky, releasing cleanly from hands and board instead of leaving a trail.
Worked to the point this dough asks for and no further: springy and elastic where structure is wanted, just brought together where tenderness is.
Torn or cut open, the inside is uniform: no dry streaks, no unmixed pockets, no core of flour that never met the water.
After its rest it rolls and shapes without snapping back. A dough that fights the pin needed more rest, not more force.

Where it goes wrong Sticking was fought with flour instead of technique or patience, stroke after stroke, until the dough had taken in far more than the formula asked; it turns tight and dry under the hands, and bakes dense however well everything else goes.

Steaming: basket, leaf and lid 130 recipes

Steam was running before the food went in: the water at a rolling boil and vapour coming steadily through the basket, rather than the whole thing warming up together.
Nothing touches the water at any point: the food sits clear of it throughout, and the level neither drops enough to boil dry nor rises enough to wet it.
The lid stayed on. Every lift costs the chamber its heat, and the number of lifts should be as close to none as the dish allows.
Lifted out, the surface is glossy and plump with its colour heightened rather than dulled: greens brighter than they went in, not olive.
Cooked through with the shape intact: it yields at the centre without having slumped or split, and there is no more than a spoonful of clean condensate beneath it.

Where it goes wrong The lid was loose or dripping and the condensate fell back onto the food, so it arrives waterlogged and pale with its seasoning washed down into the bottom of the dish.

At the Table

The Pour: Mimosa (weekends only)
Also Right: Cava, straight
From the Taps: -
Zero-Proof: Fresh orange juice & café au lait

Morning food wants brightness and bubbles, or honest coffee: nothing that argues before noon.

Family notes

Saved on this device and kept across visits: export from My Menu to move them.

Film school

This dish, cooked on camera Search films of Sheng Jian Bao The cuisine, deeper Technique films from the Jiangnan kitchen