Homemade Cha Siu Bao (Steamed BBQ Pork Buns)

Homemade Cha Siu Bao (Steamed BBQ Pork Buns)

When I lived in Hong Kong I reckon I belonged to some exclusive dim sum society as I absolutely adored drinking delicate jasmine or a lovely Pu-er/ Bolay tea and snacking on the most amazing selection of delightful sweet and/or savoury treats you could ever imagine.  I loved visiting the Jumbo Floating Restaurant and Luk Yu Tea House but more often than not you would find me at my local haunt the Lin Heung Tea House at 160-164 Wellington Street Central.  This restaurant is one of the oldest tea houses in Hong Kong and one of the most busiest - without a 'gweilo' in sight - except for me.  I'd sit next to complete strangers on a little stool and would briskly walk over to the dim sum cart when it came out of the kitchen to see what was on offer.  My favourite savoury snacks included Cha Siu Bao, Beef Balls, Har Gow (Shrimp Dumpling), Cheung Fan (Rice Noodle) and Sui Mai.  

Before I left Hong Kong I made sure that I stocked up on some bilingual Cantonese cook books so that when I felt like a hit of dim sum I could pull one of them out with the hope of reproducing them.

This weekend, I decided to make Cha Siu Bao from a book called "Chinese Buns".  As I read through the recipe however, I hit my first major problem - the bun dough includes two key ingredients that are next to impossible to buy on the Australian market i.e. lye water (an alkaline liquid that is extremely caustic) and ammonia bicarbonate.  These two ingredients are crucial to achieving a white, fluffy, springy dough and that amazing split when the bun is steamed, so although I was keen to make them I knew before I even started that it was impossible to get the same result that I was used to eating in Hong Kong - damn!

Two days before I started, I made a sour dough starter which I'll call the "1st Fermentation".  The next day I used some of this starter to make another sour dough "the 2nd Fermentation" and today I made the actual bun dough and the pork filling.  Although, I'm going to post photo's I'm not going to post a recipe just yet as I wasn't happy with how this one went.  I followed it to a 'T' with exception of the lye water and ammonia bicarbonate but there was far too much pork thickening and not enough dough.  So I've popped the pork filling/thickening into the freezer and will make another batch of dough some time in the future.  Next time I'm going to try fresh yeast with baking powder to see how that goes so watch this space. 

Just made - the 2nd Fermentation sour dough 

The 2nd Fermentation after about 24 hours

The Cha Siu Filling

Whilst I was making the Cha Siu Bao my youngest gorgeous girl was practicing how to make them by using a small ball of dough as the filling. 

My youngest gorgeous girl's very first attempt at making Cha Siu Bao after practicing with dough! 

My little dumpling princess in action.