Steamed BBQ Pork (Char Siu) Bun (叉燒飽)

I had extra BBQ pork this weekend and it was way too much food to eat as leftovers plus it was pretty fatty. So I decided to make steamed BBQ pork buns. The best recipe is the one my mom used to make using Bisquick. It was a "cakey" dough. Unfortunately that recipe has been missing since 1990s and could not be found. My mom asked my grandmother and my aunt but no avail. (To my relatives in SA, if you read my blog, please ask your mom if she has a BBQ bun recipe. It's important because it came from our grandmother and don't want to lose that recipe).

Anyways, I was going to use the recipe I got from my cooking teacher but I couldn't find it either, so I used this book's recipe.



This book was a gift from a good friend many many years ago. She stated that it was pretty authentic. I agree. I haven't tried a lot of recipes because many are from other parts of China, I have so many recipes from my mom and grandmother to perfect plus I'm taking cooking classes that it's hard to try so many recipes.


The Dough:
I made the dough first since it had to rest for 3 hours which is a long time.

I put yeast, sugar and warm water together.



Then let it bubble which takes about 10 minutes.




Then I added flour.



Then oil.


If I was to do this again, I would mix the oil with yeast mixture first then flour.

Knead the dough for 8-10 minutes. This time, I manually kneaded the dough until it formed a ball and let it rest for 3 hours.



I then made the filling. I'll just finish talking about the dough so it's less confusing to follow the recipe.

After the 3 hours, I took the dough out.



I flattened the dough and put baking powder in the middle. It's suppose to activate immediately though I didn't notice anything so I'm not sure what activated.



The I folded the dough.



And then continued to knead until it was soft.



I divided the dough into equal pieces. With each piece, I made it flat.



Then I put the filling in and pinch to seal.



This recipe doesn't need a second rise. Maybe that's why the first rise was so long. I put it I to my steamer and steamed.



After steaming, it rose quite a bit. I thought I gave enough spacing before steaming but I guess barely enough.



The Filling:

It was very easy. Dice the BBQ pork.



Pan fry with seasoning. The seasoning include sugar, oyster sauce, light soy sauce, sesame oil and shao xing cooking wine. I had to use dark soy sauce as well because I ran out of light soy sauce.



After frying, let it cool before using.




Final Thoughts:

It was a easy and delicious recipe. I like my BBQ pork filling to be a little sweeter but this was still good. I realize that previously I didn't knead my dough enough so it looked ugly. Today I kneaded it for a long time and it looked smooth.

I would make this dough again as it tasted good and was easy to make. What I didn't like was the 3 hour first rise which is double the rise time for bread. But I liked that there was no second rise AND that I could store the dough away until I am ready to bake. So if I start late and run out of time to make my buns, I can store the dough in the fridge and make them the next day. When I'm ready to make them, I would then add the baking soda.

Anyways, a good yeast dough for Chinese buns like pork and vegetable buns (菜肉飽). With BBQ pork bun, I still prefer cakey dough.