Hey Guys, a few notes: 1. This is not an introductory recipe. If you’re new to Chinese bun making, try your hand at Mantou first, recipe here: th-cam.com/video/R3P0OFHqv-c/w-d-xo.html Also, we’d suggest getting comfortable with making Laozao fermented rice *before* embarking on this recipe as well - video here: th-cam.com/video/szyEompz004/w-d-xo.html (in that video we used packaged Rhizopus, same same but different, we need the herbal yeast cake for making laozao starter since packaged Rhizopus is single strain and so is commercial yeast by any other name). 2. Creating the starter. The laozao activeness would vary, it would affect the activeness of your starter, which in turn affects the time of making the sponge dough. In order words, don’t just simply follow the timing provided in the video, you’ll need to observe the condition of the starter, and the sponge in the same sense. During testing, I made two batches of stater using two different batches of laozao rice wine fermented at different temperatures. The very powerful starter is made with the rice wine that’s fermented in a fermentation set-up (aka our oven with a fermentation setting), with a steady 30C environment for 72 hours. The relatively weaker starter is made with rice wine fermented at room temperature, ranging between 23-26C, and it’s undeniably weaker. This picture shows how the two starters behave differently 3 hours after first feeding. The obviously bubbly one is made with the more active laozao rice wine, and the one with little bubbles are the one made with the weaker laozao. So if you don’t have a fermentation set up and your room temperature is cooler, your laozao rice wine would likely to be weaker. After mixing the laozao rice wine with flour and water to create your starter, feed it once after 12 hours and see if it obviously bubbles up and double in size within 5-6 hours to test its activeness. If it stays relatively low and quiet, you can start feeding your starter every 12 hours for several more days so that it becomes steadier and more active. During the feeding process, the sign to look for in an active starter is basically the same as regular sourdough starter, i.e. it doubles or triples in volume within 6 to 8 hours (for me at a sub-tropical climate, the stronger one only takes 4 hrs to double in size). 3. Feeding and maintaining the starter. It’s basically the same as sourdough starter, feed it every 12 hours when storing at room temperature. (I’m lazy and only feed mine every 24 hours but it seems fine.) If you’re not planning on using it anytime soon, you can store it in the refrigerator. I follow Ken Forkish’s method in his Flour Water Salt Yeast book: add some water to create a film covering the starter, put it in the fridge. It can keep for two weeks without feeding. Feed the starter every two weeks when keeping it in the fridge, which follow the same steps of restoring the starter for baking/steaming: take the starter out from the fridge, let it sit in room temperature overnight to comeback in temperature. Discard the water that’s covering it, mix in fresh flour and water, cover and sit in room temperature for 12 hours or until it doubles or triples in size. Then it’s ready to be used or put back to the fridge. Because I hate discarding too much starter and wasting flour, so I usually do 30-40g flour feeding (2 tbsp flour + 1 tbsp water) each time and keep a relatively small stater. Kingarthur also has a pretty good discussion on how to maintain starter, here’s the link: www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/feeding-and-maintaining-your-sourdough-starter-recipe 4 Sponge dough fermentation time variation. After creating the laozao starter, we can make the sponge or levain. Depending on your room temperature, the time for the sponge to double in size will vary. From my testing using the active starter, it takes about 6 hours at 30C, 10-12 hours at ~18C, and 28 hours in our fridge. The “overnight” fermentation mentioned in the video is not a standard timeline, it really depends on your room temp. So you can use the time provided above to adjust your bulk fermentation time, and look for when the sponge is doubled in size. (cont.)
5 The risk of over-fermentation. As much as we want a strong and active starter, it may present problem as well, which is over-fermenting. As we discussed in the video, acid proteases break down the gluten in flour. Over fermentation means the protease is having a party and there’s not much gluten left. When the sponge has already doubled in size and you don’t use it relatively soon, but instead let it sit for several hours or even overnight, it won’t have enough gluten and it will affect the main dough. There are two tell-tale signs of over fermenting and lack of gluten: a. when kneading the main bao dough, you can’t really get to that beautiful smooth “skin” (like this: th-cam.com/video/xsAyiXUm77s/w-d-xo.html , and it’s kinda similar to the bubble in the Lanzhou hand pulled noodle, but of course, less intense th-cam.com/video/6DgITQSonv4/w-d-xo.html ), Instead the dough would always have some small raggedy ripped openings. b. when wrapping the baozi, you can’t really pinch and close the pleats, it tends to break very easily and you end up with holes in the pleats even if you manage to close up the pleats. That’s because the dough can’t stretch enough to wrap around the filling when there’s not enough gluten. And during steaming, the pleats will break and expand, the end result would be something like this. It’d still taste good, it’s just not a baozi but a mantou with stuffing sticked on top of it. 6 Why not packaged yeast? I tested with just commercial yeast from very early on and the texture is just different. Commercial yeast is single strain, it’s powerful but it lacks the flavor that laozao starter provides. It lacks Rhizopus as well, that means it doesn’t not have protease that breaks down the gluten, which I think may be the main reason why the texture is so different. For the very few Posu Bao recipes you can fine online, they all use commercial yeast, which also creates that layered in a baozi, but it does just taste like a normal baozi, nothing special. However, if you want to make sure that your bao is fluffy, you can try adding 0.1% yeast (to the weight of flour) when mixing everything to make the final bao dough. But DO NOT add any commercial yeast to your starter, it’s so powerful that it’ll end up dominating other microbes in the starter and becomes a single strain.
7 Lengthen the roll up log In the video, I forgot to mention that you’ll need to lengthen the rolled-up log, apologies. So basically, after rolling up the whole log, you’ll need gently squeeze and roll with both hands to slightly lengthen the log so that you’ll have a big enough piece for wrapping. I believe we include that in the uncut video, please do check it out. 8 Different fillings In addition to sanxian three delicacies, there’re some other classic fillings for the Guizhou Posu Bao: potato + pickled vegetable, just pork, toasted peanut + granulated sugar, perilla seeds + granulated sugar, toasted black sesame paste, washed bean paste, pork fat cubes + sugar. The two classic ones I see everywhere in Yunnan are minced pork + mushroom and Yunnan ham + some toasted nuts + granulated sugar (btw, this is an awesome filling, one of our favorite mooncake filling as well). 9 Amount needed when using herbal dried yeast ball So the amount we used in the video is calculated according to the dried yeast ball we got. When using the one you can get, do check out how much rice you can make using one ball, and do the calculation according to the actual rice amount that you’re using. 10 Using rice beans If you can find actual rice beans, you’ll need to up the oil quantity when frying as rice bean is starchier and take up a lot more oil. I tested it and ended up using about 160ml oil for 250g beans. The oil mostly functions as the heat conductor for frying and releases back after it sits a bit, so no worries. 11 How to make your sodium carbonate Spread out some baking soda on a plate, bake at 150C for 1 hour. The thermal decomposition will turn baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) into sodium carbonate. After it’s done, store in an air tight jar and keep for future uses. 12 How to use up your Laozao Laozao stays well in the fridge for at least a month. Here’re some ideas for you to use it: in place of sugar for seasoning; add in spicy dishes to balance the heat and add depth; thicken it like a sugar and water mixture to make sweet and sour sauce; in drinks with yogurt and milk, one popular mix here is laozao + milk/thin yogurt + Osmanthus flower + green tea; lightly flavored desserts like yogurt mousse cake, lemon bar, key lime pie…(have fun with it); make mantou and kuihs; use the laozao or the starter to make bread, I’ve done it and it tastes and smells great; and of course, use it as a yeast.
13 Make sure all your containers are clean when making laozao fermented rice wine and the starter. It should not have the slightest touch of oil. I swapped container for one of the batches of laozao, the lid of that Tupperware box probably got some oil on it, then the whole batch just gone bad with a strange bitter after note. So yeah, keep all your container clean and oil free for fermentation. About the "7-month testing" time, well, it's not like constant not-stop testing all the time, lol. It's more on and off, like you keep doing it for a week or two, get frustrated and discouraged, then take a rest, maybe do some more research and digging around, in the mean time work on other recipes... Then come back to it, test again. That's why it took that long, haha. But yeah, not gonna lie, it was a long and painful testing. This is what I got so far, may edit a bit more if I think of something else. Apologies for bumping into the TH-cam comment character limit lol. Meanwhile, have fun with baos!
This looks more like a graduation thesis 😊 you deserve so much respect and appreciation for this unique professionalism and care for details. Your work here lives forever ♥️
Your admonition to “not knead like Pusheen” is settled in my brain. I’ve caught myself saying it the last few times I’ve worked with a dough, even when not following along with one of your recipes
That's why we like you guys so much: You don't go the extra mile, you go the extra 20 times around the country to make sure, then question it all again, then perfect it some more, then we are served. You guys rock big time!
Hello, Steph and Chris! I made Anshun broken bao following your recipe. Thanks to the precisely described recipe, I managed to follow all the process and the trial turned out unbelievably lovely. I didn't even know the existence of Anshun broken bao until I watched your video. I was impressed by the deliciousness of three delicacies filling as well. It's very difficult to express my deep emotion against this experience... Thank you for your devotion.
I give you lots of RESPECT for 7months of reverse-engineering that dough. Those techniques can be a lost art because the Sifu at the shops don't share any info on their techniques. Sometimes their recipes and techniques die with them without ever passing it on to the next generation. I love your channel.
@@Jumpoable Even then, not everywhere has *active* laozao, which's what you need for this recipe (the stuff in the bottle's long been dead). For us, there's one Sichuan shop at the wholesale market which carries it, but they're the only shop in our district that has it.
Holy heck this garners respect. Seven months for a single recipe? That's some impressive dedication right there. I'm definitely going to look into learning how to make these, because the satisfaction on your face at finally getting it right must mean it's a *really* good recipe
As a native Guizhouer immigrated to the US for 30 years, I love your channel and admire your effort of promoting my home town cuisine. Just did the chuishao脆哨 following your other video. It was a success and I am inviting friends over to have Guiyang style Chuishao rice noodle tomorrow! Thank you and keep up the good work!
I love watching these dishes being made. I will never make them, because I have the attention span of a gnat and prepping one dish over the course of a week is a bit beyond the pale for me, but I am immensely impressed at the amount of effort and the clear instruction you both provide.
The dedication alone is so fucking admirable! The recipe is well explained, and while not for beginners, it's presented with enough information if some one felt particularly motivated and has no experience, they probably could pull it off. Seriously, well done.
When engineers take over the kitchen. And I thought making croissants was challenging enough. Absolutely fascinating. Definitely will go on my bucket list. Thank you for the heroic efforts, time and energy that went into this recipe. Appreciate so much the knowledge you share ... how to make sodium carbonate and so much more! I work with engineers as part of my job ... you're next level because you explain the what, how, why, when and where ... Not much of a subscriber but just subscribed!
I am so impressed by your dedication! Anshun is where my family lives and I miss its food every day. Can you please do a video on anshun beef noodle soup??
I traveled to Anshun some years ago on a tour of Guizhou. Pretty out there place, I was definitely the only foreigner around most of the time. I never thought I’d see any mention of the town again, least not in English. Thanks for the reminder.
Wow, you guys are amazing! Introducing a new dish to the world is no small feat! The research, time commitment, and unwavering determination to explore and discover a hidden Chinese gem is incredible! Cuisine is the primary export of any culture and you guys are doing just that, unadulteratedly. Thank you for the video and keep up the good work!
Absolutely marvellous. Truly a work of adoration for the art of food. Thank you for pouring almost a year of your life into this, and sharing it with the world!
Here's to hoping that this TH-cam video will stand the test of time! The fact that you had to invest 7 months of trial and error into figuring out a recipe whose success depends on "experience" even according to native chefs, says to me that this is something that needs to be catalogued and preserved for the future, or it will be lost and forgotten in the next decades.
I love you two. Your videos have improved my understanding of Chinese cuisine so much. But the time involved in this one has just reinforced why I do not bake. It is, however, very interesting. Thanks again for everything you two do!
I succeeded. Made them two days in a row. Got 12 nice big, fluffy and delicious 包子 both days. I don’t know if the perilla seed is worth it. I got a bag from a Korean grocer for like $11. I’m not sure how the flavor would change without it. The pounded, minced meat definitely is better than ground meat. Don’t substitute that.
You guys rock. Please keep up the great work. I can tell this project was a labor of love. My wife is chinese so I’m always looking for recipes to impress her family.
My first time trying these was in YunNan, and despite the competition in terms of the other varieties of BaoZi, I understand the reason for the video title.
Your hard work making these videos is so so appreciated! I eat primarily Chinese food now and it's mostly because of you both. You've introduced me to my ideal style of cooking and it's incredible!!!
An idea thats a little easier instead of ripping the pieces of dough to seal the ends; use butchers twine to wrap around the dough, and tighten until it pinches off.
This channel is next level. I'm Chinese and I've never heard of this bao. Thank you for introducing me to Guizhou foods, although I won't be able to make any of them 😂
In the Philippines there's an old Restaurant whose owner was from that Chinese province who makes bao like that although the filling is the same but the last filling you mentioned is fill in by a fermented salted duck egg instead.
Loved the video! My favourite baozi although I’m very biased, is from Tianjin my hometown! We’re famous for our 水馅 aka watery filling. Essentially a large amount of liquid gets mixed into the meat, making the finished baozi super juicy, comparable to a southern style soup dumpling but larger. It’s the best meat baozi in the whole world imo! We also have a special vegetarian baozi where the filling contains many different types of vegetables, and seasoned with fermented tofu. It’s sooooo good and just thinking about it makes me drool. Yum. 😋
Question: Is there any issue with using a straight-up sour dough starter? I've got a like 4-year-old one I've started and maintained, but it was just started the traditional European way with flour. I'm curious what the difference between a normal starter and a rice-induced starter would be. (Disclaimer: I'm going to try this recipe with my starter anyway).
The texture would be different - the laozao starter (likely due to the acid protease? just spitballing though) gives the bun a unique softness & fluffiness that's a bit hard to describe. You could certainly try to make the bun with a sourdough, but you might need to add a bit more sodium carbonate to balance the the sourness. It would likely be better than a yeast bun, but the laozao starter *is* sort of its own thing :)
This just popped up in my recommended and I am so happy to finally see the bao I use to get in grad school when I was in China! Can’t wait to try to make it.
Hey, guys! I just recently found this channel, and I'm LOVING everything you've been showing us. I was a professional cook for 16 years, and I'm always looking to expand my technique and recipe repertoire, especially if I can find good, authentic instruction and execution, such as you seem to provide! Thank you for all your hard work! I was wondering: given that the Northern Hemisphere is heading in to the cooler months, would you be interested in doing a short series on various broth based soup recipes? I feel like, despite how ubiquitous soups seem to be in Asian cooking in general, and Chinese cooking in particular, it's often difficult to find actual soup recipes in an easy to access format. I would be very grateful! Whatever you choose to do, I'm sure I'll enjoy your next videos! Have fun, and thank you again!
Since COVID lockdown, I’ve been learning how to bake (I’m an American, so bread products made from wheat grains). It’s fascinating to see similar dough techniques from other grains like rice. Thanks for sharing, I’m hoping to learn much more!
This kind of knowledge must be great for restauranteurs who want to offer something special. It helps to raise the quality of Chinese food available everywhere!
You guys are amazing.... if you would make a cookbook I would definitly buy it, but I dont even know if everything you bring here on the channel could ever be put in to words and not moving pictures. Chapeau! :D
I remember seeing these baozi on the Goldthread TH-cam channel and looking in vain for a recipe. You guys have answered the wish that I thought would never be!!!!!
You guys usually put in more effort than most of creators nowadays. But this one and some of your other videos, these are all in a DIFFERENT LEAGUE OF YT CONTENT. You deserve the praise and I hope you get more. I personally wanna try this recipe but it's just difficult for a broke guy like me, not to mention, getting alternatives is difficult from where l live. So I'll just be here and do what I usually do: learn your wonderful techniques. I've learned a lot already over the past years from following your channel and I can't thank you enough for it. 😊
And another recipe I'm never going to do. Don't get me wrong, I love the insight your videos give into chinese culture and cuisine but this is just so overwhelming. It's great that you are so thorough and dedicated in your food research.
As an alternative to tearing your dough, a trick i learned while making cinnamon rolls is that you can lay down a (unflavored) line of dental floss, lay the dough on it, cross the floss over itself, and pull. It will cut through the dough cleanly without squishing together the layers.
Economies of scale, make for whole neighborhood, get viral on social media, then sell at discounted prices, thereby displacing the corporations with attractive, best-in-class, homemade product experiences. Bonus points for consistency. Be the Dicks's Burgers of Anshun Broken Bao.
@@neilthecellist wait this is smart. In Sydney Australia burnt basque cheesecakes are all the rage right now and there are heaps of home bakers selling it to local neighbourhoods! I can imagine one can just keep making these until the idea is popularised
The dry feeling of the dough without sodium carbonate can be traced to the gluten being degraded by the enzyme protease. The Australian TH-camr Ann Reardon explained in a video about gluten that gluten-free products tend to feel drier in the mouth and that food manufacturers try to overcome that by adding fat, sometimes more than what the regular products have.
Thank you very much! I really want to try some of these at one of these points, I really love all the lovely recipes you all have on your channel. It's a lovely thing, denkischee!
![[Sub] Steamed Pork Bun Recipe(Baozi)](/img/n.gif)
Hey Guys, a few notes:
1. This is not an introductory recipe.
If you’re new to Chinese bun making, try your hand at Mantou first, recipe here: th-cam.com/video/R3P0OFHqv-c/w-d-xo.html Also, we’d suggest getting comfortable with making Laozao fermented rice *before* embarking on this recipe as well - video here: th-cam.com/video/szyEompz004/w-d-xo.html (in that video we used packaged Rhizopus, same same but different, we need the herbal yeast cake for making laozao starter since packaged Rhizopus is single strain and so is commercial yeast by any other name).
2. Creating the starter.
The laozao activeness would vary, it would affect the activeness of your starter, which in turn affects the time of making the sponge dough. In order words, don’t just simply follow the timing provided in the video, you’ll need to observe the condition of the starter, and the sponge in the same sense.
During testing, I made two batches of stater using two different batches of laozao rice wine fermented at different temperatures. The very powerful starter is made with the rice wine that’s fermented in a fermentation set-up (aka our oven with a fermentation setting), with a steady 30C environment for 72 hours. The relatively weaker starter is made with rice wine fermented at room temperature, ranging between 23-26C, and it’s undeniably weaker.
This picture shows how the two starters behave differently 3 hours after first feeding. The obviously bubbly one is made with the more active laozao rice wine, and the one with little bubbles are the one made with the weaker laozao.
So if you don’t have a fermentation set up and your room temperature is cooler, your laozao rice wine would likely to be weaker. After mixing the laozao rice wine with flour and water to create your starter, feed it once after 12 hours and see if it obviously bubbles up and double in size within 5-6 hours to test its activeness. If it stays relatively low and quiet, you can start feeding your starter every 12 hours for several more days so that it becomes steadier and more active.
During the feeding process, the sign to look for in an active starter is basically the same as regular sourdough starter, i.e. it doubles or triples in volume within 6 to 8 hours (for me at a sub-tropical climate, the stronger one only takes 4 hrs to double in size).
3. Feeding and maintaining the starter.
It’s basically the same as sourdough starter, feed it every 12 hours when storing at room temperature. (I’m lazy and only feed mine every 24 hours but it seems fine.)
If you’re not planning on using it anytime soon, you can store it in the refrigerator. I follow Ken Forkish’s method in his Flour Water Salt Yeast book: add some water to create a film covering the starter, put it in the fridge. It can keep for two weeks without feeding.
Feed the starter every two weeks when keeping it in the fridge, which follow the same steps of restoring the starter for baking/steaming: take the starter out from the fridge, let it sit in room temperature overnight to comeback in temperature. Discard the water that’s covering it, mix in fresh flour and water, cover and sit in room temperature for 12 hours or until it doubles or triples in size. Then it’s ready to be used or put back to the fridge.
Because I hate discarding too much starter and wasting flour, so I usually do 30-40g flour feeding (2 tbsp flour + 1 tbsp water) each time and keep a relatively small stater.
Kingarthur also has a pretty good discussion on how to maintain starter, here’s the link: www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/feeding-and-maintaining-your-sourdough-starter-recipe
4 Sponge dough fermentation time variation.
After creating the laozao starter, we can make the sponge or levain. Depending on your room temperature, the time for the sponge to double in size will vary. From my testing using the active starter, it takes about 6 hours at 30C, 10-12 hours at ~18C, and 28 hours in our fridge. The “overnight” fermentation mentioned in the video is not a standard timeline, it really depends on your room temp. So you can use the time provided above to adjust your bulk fermentation time, and look for when the sponge is doubled in size.
(cont.)
5 The risk of over-fermentation.
As much as we want a strong and active starter, it may present problem as well, which is over-fermenting.
As we discussed in the video, acid proteases break down the gluten in flour. Over fermentation means the protease is having a party and there’s not much gluten left.
When the sponge has already doubled in size and you don’t use it relatively soon, but instead let it sit for several hours or even overnight, it won’t have enough gluten and it will affect the main dough.
There are two tell-tale signs of over fermenting and lack of gluten:
a. when kneading the main bao dough, you can’t really get to that beautiful smooth “skin” (like this: th-cam.com/video/xsAyiXUm77s/w-d-xo.html , and it’s kinda similar to the bubble in the Lanzhou hand pulled noodle, but of course, less intense th-cam.com/video/6DgITQSonv4/w-d-xo.html ), Instead the dough would always have some small raggedy ripped openings.
b. when wrapping the baozi, you can’t really pinch and close the pleats, it tends to break very easily and you end up with holes in the pleats even if you manage to close up the pleats. That’s because the dough can’t stretch enough to wrap around the filling when there’s not enough gluten. And during steaming, the pleats will break and expand, the end result would be something like this. It’d still taste good, it’s just not a baozi but a mantou with stuffing sticked on top of it.
6 Why not packaged yeast?
I tested with just commercial yeast from very early on and the texture is just different. Commercial yeast is single strain, it’s powerful but it lacks the flavor that laozao starter provides. It lacks Rhizopus as well, that means it doesn’t not have protease that breaks down the gluten, which I think may be the main reason why the texture is so different.
For the very few Posu Bao recipes you can fine online, they all use commercial yeast, which also creates that layered in a baozi, but it does just taste like a normal baozi, nothing special.
However, if you want to make sure that your bao is fluffy, you can try adding 0.1% yeast (to the weight of flour) when mixing everything to make the final bao dough.
But DO NOT add any commercial yeast to your starter, it’s so powerful that it’ll end up dominating other microbes in the starter and becomes a single strain.
7 Lengthen the roll up log
In the video, I forgot to mention that you’ll need to lengthen the rolled-up log, apologies.
So basically, after rolling up the whole log, you’ll need gently squeeze and roll with both hands to slightly lengthen the log so that you’ll have a big enough piece for wrapping. I believe we include that in the uncut video, please do check it out.
8 Different fillings
In addition to sanxian three delicacies, there’re some other classic fillings for the Guizhou Posu Bao: potato + pickled vegetable, just pork, toasted peanut + granulated sugar, perilla seeds + granulated sugar, toasted black sesame paste, washed bean paste, pork fat cubes + sugar.
The two classic ones I see everywhere in Yunnan are minced pork + mushroom and Yunnan ham + some toasted nuts + granulated sugar (btw, this is an awesome filling, one of our favorite mooncake filling as well).
9 Amount needed when using herbal dried yeast ball
So the amount we used in the video is calculated according to the dried yeast ball we got. When using the one you can get, do check out how much rice you can make using one ball, and do the calculation according to the actual rice amount that you’re using.
10 Using rice beans
If you can find actual rice beans, you’ll need to up the oil quantity when frying as rice bean is starchier and take up a lot more oil. I tested it and ended up using about 160ml oil for 250g beans. The oil mostly functions as the heat conductor for frying and releases back after it sits a bit, so no worries.
11 How to make your sodium carbonate
Spread out some baking soda on a plate, bake at 150C for 1 hour. The thermal decomposition will turn baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) into sodium carbonate. After it’s done, store in an air tight jar and keep for future uses.
12 How to use up your Laozao
Laozao stays well in the fridge for at least a month. Here’re some ideas for you to use it: in place of sugar for seasoning; add in spicy dishes to balance the heat and add depth; thicken it like a sugar and water mixture to make sweet and sour sauce; in drinks with yogurt and milk, one popular mix here is laozao + milk/thin yogurt + Osmanthus flower + green tea; lightly flavored desserts like yogurt mousse cake, lemon bar, key lime pie…(have fun with it); make mantou and kuihs; use the laozao or the starter to make bread, I’ve done it and it tastes and smells great; and of course, use it as a yeast.
13 Make sure all your containers are clean when making laozao fermented rice wine and the starter. It should not have the slightest touch of oil. I swapped container for one of the batches of laozao, the lid of that Tupperware box probably got some oil on it, then the whole batch just gone bad with a strange bitter after note. So yeah, keep all your container clean and oil free for fermentation.
About the "7-month testing" time, well, it's not like constant not-stop testing all the time, lol. It's more on and off, like you keep doing it for a week or two, get frustrated and discouraged, then take a rest, maybe do some more research and digging around, in the mean time work on other recipes... Then come back to it, test again. That's why it took that long, haha. But yeah, not gonna lie, it was a long and painful testing.
This is what I got so far, may edit a bit more if I think of something else. Apologies for bumping into the TH-cam comment character limit lol. Meanwhile, have fun with baos!
This looks more like a graduation thesis 😊 you deserve so much respect and appreciation for this unique professionalism and care for details. Your work here lives forever ♥️
"a few notes"
I can’t help but admire how much work y’all have put into making this recipe. Absolutely incredible.
In every recipe of them really. They are truly amazing.
Your admonition to “not knead like Pusheen” is settled in my brain. I’ve caught myself saying it the last few times I’ve worked with a dough, even when not following along with one of your recipes
I don't want to pick on Pusheen, but that's just such a good demonstration, lol.
That's why we like you guys so much: You don't go the extra mile, you go the extra 20 times around the country to make sure, then question it all again, then perfect it some more, then we are served.
You guys rock big time!
1:00 into the video: I want to make this
18:00 into the video: i wonder where I can buy this instead.
Yeah at this point I'm thinking a flight to Anshun is the easier option 😂 Much respect to the video and anyone who tries this, but I could never...
That was me at 5 mins in. Fermentation is a tough sell for me
Hello, Steph and Chris!
I made Anshun broken bao following your recipe. Thanks to the precisely described recipe, I managed to follow all the process and the trial turned out unbelievably lovely. I didn't even know the existence of Anshun broken bao until I watched your video.
I was impressed by the deliciousness of three delicacies filling as well.
It's very difficult to express my deep emotion against this experience... Thank you for your devotion.
I give you lots of RESPECT for 7months of reverse-engineering that dough. Those techniques can be a lost art because the Sifu at the shops don't share any info on their techniques. Sometimes their recipes and techniques die with them without ever passing it on to the next generation. I love your channel.
This looks like hard work even without 7 months of testing. Respect.
That's some dedication to take the time to ferment the rice and show this recipe for us!
Seven months...
I mean you can just buy laozao easily in China, but I guess they have a lot of subscribers outside of Asia
@@Jumpoable Even then, not everywhere has *active* laozao, which's what you need for this recipe (the stuff in the bottle's long been dead). For us, there's one Sichuan shop at the wholesale market which carries it, but they're the only shop in our district that has it.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Oh got it. Thanks for clarifying! Guess I won't be making & tasting this bun anytime soon LOL.
:(
Liked, just for that triumphant face Steph made as she said, "Seven Months!"
Holy heck this garners respect.
Seven months for a single recipe?
That's some impressive dedication right there.
I'm definitely going to look into learning how to make these, because the satisfaction on your face at finally getting it right must mean it's a *really* good recipe
As a native Guizhouer immigrated to the US for 30 years, I love your channel and admire your effort of promoting my home town cuisine. Just did the chuishao脆哨 following your other video. It was a success and I am inviting friends over to have Guiyang style Chuishao rice noodle tomorrow! Thank you and keep up the good work!
Steph is a genius. Should be awarded with an honorary degree from a culinary institute in China for spreading the wonders of Chinese food.
I love seeing people’s hard work pay off and you could tell she worked hard and was over the moon that she finally got it right!
Seven months! For want of a better pun, that was a real la-bao of love. What an interesting recipe!
I love watching these dishes being made. I will never make them, because I have the attention span of a gnat and prepping one dish over the course of a week is a bit beyond the pale for me, but I am immensely impressed at the amount of effort and the clear instruction you both provide.
The dedication alone is so fucking admirable!
The recipe is well explained, and while not for beginners, it's presented with enough information if some one felt particularly motivated and has no experience, they probably could pull it off.
Seriously, well done.
When engineers take over the kitchen.
And I thought making croissants was challenging enough.
Absolutely fascinating. Definitely will go on my bucket list.
Thank you for the heroic efforts, time and energy that went into this recipe. Appreciate so much the knowledge you share ... how to make sodium carbonate and so much more!
I work with engineers as part of my job ... you're next level because you explain the what, how, why, when and where ...
Not much of a subscriber but just subscribed!
I am so impressed by your dedication! Anshun is where my family lives and I miss its food every day. Can you please do a video on anshun beef noodle soup??
I traveled to Anshun some years ago on a tour of Guizhou. Pretty out there place, I was definitely the only foreigner around most of the time. I never thought I’d see any mention of the town again, least not in English. Thanks for the reminder.
This is why I love this channel, you go above and beyond to share all this tasty food and I'm so grateful for it
Wow, you guys are amazing! Introducing a new dish to the world is no small feat! The research, time commitment, and unwavering determination to explore and discover a hidden Chinese gem is incredible! Cuisine is the primary export of any culture and you guys are doing just that, unadulteratedly. Thank you for the video and keep up the good work!
Absolutely marvellous. Truly a work of adoration for the art of food. Thank you for pouring almost a year of your life into this, and sharing it with the world!
Steph you are such a champ!! I don't think I've ever spent 7 months trying to solve any problem! You have incredible dedication!
Hi. I am watching from the Philippines. I love Chinese food. They are the best! 🇵🇭😊❤️
Here's to hoping that this TH-cam video will stand the test of time! The fact that you had to invest 7 months of trial and error into figuring out a recipe whose success depends on "experience" even according to native chefs, says to me that this is something that needs to be catalogued and preserved for the future, or it will be lost and forgotten in the next decades.
I love you two. Your videos have improved my understanding of Chinese cuisine so much. But the time involved in this one has just reinforced why I do not bake. It is, however, very interesting. Thanks again for everything you two do!
I always fear over production but love attention to detail. This is a beautiful balance
Watching this video, I think in might be easier to take a trip to Anshun than to make these correctly!
Planning to make these this weekend. Have watched this video like 10 times in preparation.
I succeeded. Made them two days in a row. Got 12 nice big, fluffy and delicious 包子 both days.
I don’t know if the perilla seed is worth it. I got a bag from a Korean grocer for like $11. I’m not sure how the flavor would change without it.
The pounded, minced meat definitely is better than ground meat. Don’t substitute that.
The cup noodles cup is so cute, and handy! 😀👍
You guys rock. Please keep up the great work. I can tell this project was a labor of love. My wife is chinese so I’m always looking for recipes to impress her family.
My first time trying these was in YunNan,
and despite the competition in terms of the other varieties of BaoZi,
I understand the reason for the video title.
Pork bun baos are one of my favourite dishes of all time. I would love to make this recipe one day and taste this glorious bao before I die.
Love the dedication you guys put into figuring out this recipe.
Really respect the commitment (and obsessiveness) needed to recreate a unique regional favorite food.
Your dedication level is just incredible!! Seven months?! We aren't worthy. Thank you so much for your time and effort in making these videos for us.
Your hard work making these videos is so so appreciated! I eat primarily Chinese food now and it's mostly because of you both. You've introduced me to my ideal style of cooking and it's incredible!!!
Cheers! Glad you enjoy it.
So cool! Thanks for the research and sharing a recipe that is otherwise unknown to most of the world!
An idea thats a little easier instead of ripping the pieces of dough to seal the ends; use butchers twine to wrap around the dough, and tighten until it pinches off.
Ok, but I don't know too many butchers who have twins
I was just thinking of using a chopstick and pressing down. I have a silly opposition to ripping dough.
Thank you so much for gathering and sharing all the cooking wisdom!
This channel is next level. I'm Chinese and I've never heard of this bao. Thank you for introducing me to Guizhou foods, although I won't be able to make any of them 😂
In the Philippines there's an old Restaurant whose owner was from that Chinese province who makes bao like that although the filling is the same but the last filling you mentioned is fill in by a fermented salted duck egg instead.
Anshun 安顺 is my hometown! I love this video and miss this delicious Broken Bao!
I love the technical summary page y'all have been doing lately. Inspiration from Wang Gang maybe ???
Loved the video! My favourite baozi although I’m very biased, is from Tianjin my hometown! We’re famous for our 水馅 aka watery filling. Essentially a large amount of liquid gets mixed into the meat, making the finished baozi super juicy, comparable to a southern style soup dumpling but larger. It’s the best meat baozi in the whole world imo! We also have a special vegetarian baozi where the filling contains many different types of vegetables, and seasoned with fermented tofu. It’s sooooo good and just thinking about it makes me drool. Yum. 😋
Do you happen to know what they put in the vege ones ? I'm curious also since tons of lard was used in the video
Question: Is there any issue with using a straight-up sour dough starter? I've got a like 4-year-old one I've started and maintained, but it was just started the traditional European way with flour. I'm curious what the difference between a normal starter and a rice-induced starter would be. (Disclaimer: I'm going to try this recipe with my starter anyway).
The texture would be different - the laozao starter (likely due to the acid protease? just spitballing though) gives the bun a unique softness & fluffiness that's a bit hard to describe. You could certainly try to make the bun with a sourdough, but you might need to add a bit more sodium carbonate to balance the the sourness. It would likely be better than a yeast bun, but the laozao starter *is* sort of its own thing :)
I want to know how that turns out!!
Please report back because this was the first thing I wondered
How did it turn out?
This just popped up in my recommended and I am so happy to finally see the bao I use to get in grad school when I was in China! Can’t wait to try to make it.
Dude.. you and your wife are the epitome of awesomeness thx for another most excellent recipe.
Hey, guys! I just recently found this channel, and I'm LOVING everything you've been showing us. I was a professional cook for 16 years, and I'm always looking to expand my technique and recipe repertoire, especially if I can find good, authentic instruction and execution, such as you seem to provide! Thank you for all your hard work! I was wondering: given that the Northern Hemisphere is heading in to the cooler months, would you be interested in doing a short series on various broth based soup recipes? I feel like, despite how ubiquitous soups seem to be in Asian cooking in general, and Chinese cooking in particular, it's often difficult to find actual soup recipes in an easy to access format. I would be very grateful! Whatever you choose to do, I'm sure I'll enjoy your next videos! Have fun, and thank you again!
I love every part of this,you guys really go the extra mile and it is so educational.
"Let the lard and your feelings come back to room temperature." If it was that easy, I wouldn't need therapy.
Oh my goodness!!! Never sean or tasted any Bau like this, must be Heavenly!!! ***** STARS
Keep up the content! You guys are making us laowai in China proud!
Since COVID lockdown, I’ve been learning how to bake (I’m an American, so bread products made from wheat grains). It’s fascinating to see similar dough techniques from other grains like rice. Thanks for sharing, I’m hoping to learn much more!
This was incredible to watch! Kudos to the huge amount of work put into this video.
Lard is answer to everything in life, from flavor to fixing credit scores, let lard help you solve your business problems today! Also first comment.
INVEST IN LARDCOIN
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The Power Of Lard!
@@ChineseCookingDemystifiedhmm... I'd back that
Thanks for the hard work. You guys are really cool. I like how you explain to us some cultural backgrounds of the recipe and ingredients
STEPH!!! Y’all really snapped with this! This is so incredible!!
Thanks you two for your hard work and great recipe videos!! You both are amazing!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️
This kind of knowledge must be great for restauranteurs who want to offer something special. It helps to raise the quality of Chinese food available everywhere!
You guys are amazing.... if you would make a cookbook I would definitly buy it, but I dont even know if everything you bring here on the channel could ever be put in to words and not moving pictures. Chapeau! :D
I remember seeing these baozi on the Goldthread TH-cam channel and looking in vain for a recipe. You guys have answered the wish that I thought would never be!!!!!
"Room temperature, 26 degrees celsius" *cries in rainy island in the north atlantic*
LOL here in Netherlands people will start dying at 26c room temps
@@neophyte1994 so true haha
These look amazing, thank you for this fantastic tutorial.
As always you knocked it out of the park. I so appreciate your commitment to excellence.
Honestly, I never heard this type of bao, until I discovered it here.
I love this channel. It’s so well presented and very informative!
You guys usually put in more effort than most of creators nowadays. But this one and some of your other videos, these are all in a DIFFERENT LEAGUE OF YT CONTENT. You deserve the praise and I hope you get more. I personally wanna try this recipe but it's just difficult for a broke guy like me, not to mention, getting alternatives is difficult from where l live. So I'll just be here and do what I usually do: learn your wonderful techniques. I've learned a lot already over the past years from following your channel and I can't thank you enough for it. 😊
This is so well done! So much fun and it looks so delicious!
I love the reference clip from the Yunnan province, I watch her videos also. *grins. So very rustic and authentic."
Magnificent! Thank you for your hard work and documenting everything! 🙂
And another recipe I'm never going to do. Don't get me wrong, I love the insight your videos give into chinese culture and cuisine but this is just so overwhelming. It's great that you are so thorough and dedicated in your food research.
As an alternative to tearing your dough, a trick i learned while making cinnamon rolls is that you can lay down a (unflavored) line of dental floss, lay the dough on it, cross the floss over itself, and pull. It will cut through the dough cleanly without squishing together the layers.
What a treat to see Dawang. Thank you for sharing this journey with us.
I'll probably never make this, but this is amazing and I'm just commenting for the algorithm because you guys deserve all the hype in the world.
Wow... this looks so good! Thank you so much for all of your time in research just to share it!
Bravo.....I’m sticking with charsiew Bao.....like they some things don’t travel...fantastic effort
That Steph reaction was GOLD
Congrats on the recipe development! Looks amazing.
“Lets talk about FEELINGS shall we?”
I lowkey thought that you are going into my emotions😹
Thank you again for all the hard work you two do!
looks amazing. So cool how you reverse engineered this! The flaky soft layers look so good.
I really appreciate the hard work you put into researching this recipe!
Thank you thank you thank you for all the work you have put into this!!!
Wow absolutely wow, amazing and thorough work, seems pretty complicated but one day I might give it a try.
thank you guys!
Man I want to make this real bad but like literally when am I gonna have time for all that starter making?? Haha
That’s why you do it once and feed it I guess?
Economies of scale, make for whole neighborhood, get viral on social media, then sell at discounted prices, thereby displacing the corporations with attractive, best-in-class, homemade product experiences. Bonus points for consistency. Be the Dicks's Burgers of Anshun Broken Bao.
Me too... ugh. & I can just buy fermented sticky rice paste in Asia but it's still too much work LOL
@@neilthecellist wait this is smart. In Sydney Australia burnt basque cheesecakes are all the rage right now and there are heaps of home bakers selling it to local neighbourhoods! I can imagine one can just keep making these until the idea is popularised
You outdone yourselves this time.
Absolutely amazing. Thank you for doing this!
Thank you 💝 you have placed lot of hard work into it,
Congratulations to both of you for succeeding at this crazy project
Looks so amazing I love making this sending ❤️ from 🇺🇸 look forward to watching more videos
The dry feeling of the dough without sodium carbonate can be traced to the gluten being degraded by the enzyme protease. The Australian TH-camr Ann Reardon explained in a video about gluten that gluten-free products tend to feel drier in the mouth and that food manufacturers try to overcome that by adding fat, sometimes more than what the regular products have.
i admire your dedication to food!
I think my Asian cuisine teacher talked about these buns once, now I'm even more inclined to make these in the future.
Thank you very much! I really want to try some of these at one of these points, I really love all the lovely recipes you all have on your channel. It's a lovely thing, denkischee!
WOW, what a project!
Incredible results
Super made looks really delicious from great 👍👍
Chinese food imho is the best in the world. So many varieties.
that is dedication to the bao. Man now I crave bao. I'll need to make bao this week, but a simple garlic chive pork bao