YAY! for cha siu bao!!

Our Daring Cooks’ December 2011 hostess is Sara from Belly Rumbles! Sara chose awesome Cha Sui Bao as our challenge, where we made the buns, Char Sui, and filling from scratch – delicious!

This was a great challenge as this is a favorite treat!

Cha Siu Recipe:
1 pork fillet/tenderloin (roughly 1-1.5 pounds) (I used two pork chops because everything at the store was much larger than 1 1/2 pounds)
4 large cloves of garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon grated ginger
1 tablespoon peanut oil
3 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
2 tablespoon light soy sauce
1 teaspoon oyster sauce
½ teaspoon ground pepper
pinch of salt
½ teaspoon (2 gm) five spice powder
½ teaspoon sesame oil
½ teaspoon red food coloring (I use a paste color, so I used a LOT less than 1/2 tsp)


Mix everything together an pour most of it on the meat. Let the meat sit in the fridge for 4+ hours. Pre-heat oven to 350F. Heat a heavy pan until it's hot, add meat, cook to form crust of marinade. Put meat in oven and basting frequently, cook for about 20 minutes or until cooked through.


Let cool. Make bun dough:


1 cup milk, scalded and cooled to 100-115F
¼ cup (60 gm/2 oz) sugar
1 tablespoon oil
¼ teaspoon (2 gm) salt
2½ teaspoons (8 gm/1 satchel) of dried yeast
3 cups (420 gm/15 oz) plain flour


Mix together all ingredients. Knead well, let rise until doubled. Punch down and divide into 30-40g pieces. While the dough is rising prepare the filling 
12 oz char sui, finely diced
2 shallots (finely diced)
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoons oyster sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil


Stir together in a frying pan or wok. Add ¼ cup water mixed with 1 tsp corn starch, cook until thickened. Let cool while prepping the dough balls.


Press the balls into rounds, put about 1T of filling on each, pinch shut. Place on parchment squares and let rise 15-30 minutes. 
Steam for about 10 minutes, leave plenty of room, they expand a lot!

I steamed some in the rice cooker and some in a large pot with a vegetable steamer insert.