Steamed Soup Dumplings 小籠包

🧂 Ingredients

• 200 g All-purpose flour
• 2 g Salt
• 125 ml Hot Water

  (70˚C or 158˚F)
• 250 ml Broth

  chicken or pork
• 1 packet Gelatin powder

  7g
• ½ tsp Salt

  do not add if your broth contains salt
• 2 slices Ginger
• 2 stalks Green onions

  cut into 3” segments
• 100 ml Water or broth
• 250 g Ground pork

  approx. 30% fat
• 1 Egg white
• 1 tsp Shaoxing wine
• ¼ tsp White pepper powder
• 1 tsp Light soy sauce
• 1 tsp Salt
• ½ tsp Sugar
• 1 tsp Sesame oil
• 2 thin slices Ginger

  finely shredded
• 2 tbsp Chinese black vinegar

  or Chinese red vinegar

Instructions

• 1 Prepare the broth gelatin by heating 125g broth in a pot. When it comes to a
  boil, lower the temperature to low, add 1 packet of gelatin (or 7g), ½ tsp salt
  (do not add if your broth already contains salt) and mix well until the gelatin
  has melted. Turn off heat
• 2 Add the remainder 125g of the broth and mix well. Pour through a sieve into a
  container, let cool, cover and then put into the fridge to set. It can cool
  quicker if you put it into a large, flat bottom container
• 3 Once the gelatin sets, chop it up into little pieces
• 4 Put it into the fridge until ready to use
• 5 In a small pot, add 100ml water or broth, 2 slices of ginger and 2 stalks of
  green onions (cut in large pieces) and bring to a boil. Turn off heat and let it
  sit 30 minutes. Do not open the lid.
• 6 Strain, discard the solids and keep the liquid in a container for later use. Put
  into fridge when it cools down
• 7 Put 200g of flour into a mixing bowl, add 2g salt and mix well. Add hot water
  that is approx. 70˚C or 158˚F in 2 intervals while mixing the mixture together.
  Mix until water has been absorbed by the flour
• 8 Use your hands to knead the dough until you can form a very rough ball. Let it
  rest for 10 minutes
• 9 Knead again for around 10 minutes until the dough becomes smooth and form into a
  ball. Let it rest for 60 minutes Make the meat filling now
• 10 After 60 minutes, flatten the dough ball slightly, find the centre point and
  poke your thumb through it You should start this step when your meat filling is
  finished and setting in the fridge
• 11 Make the hole bigger while stretching out the ring-shaped dough. Try to pull it
  bigger while keeping the thickness even until the thickness is approx. 3cm in
  diameter.
• 12 Break the ring so now you have a long piece of dough
• 13 Cut off pieces of approx. 10g/piece of dough. Continue cutting for one batch. If
  you can only steam 12 dumplings at a time, then just cut 12 pieces.
• 14 Wrap the remaining dough in plastic wrap
• 15 Roughly shape each piece of dough into a circle shape and flatten by pressing
  with your palm.
• 16 Sprinkle with flour and put all the flattened pieces into a plastic bag or under
  plastic wrap to prevent them from drying out
• 17 Roll each piece of dough to approx. 10cm in diameter with a rolling pin with
  emphasis on making the edges thinner than the middle Thinner edges will make
  your pleats or folds on the dumpling look cleaner and you won’t end up with a
  big piece of dough when you eat your dumpling
• 18 Since the wrappers are so thin, they dry out easily so you should wrap with
  filling as soon as you finish rolling one wrapper
• 19 Put 250g of ground pork into a mixing bowl. Add 1 tsp salt and mix into the meat
  by stirring in one direction for 1 minute this will help create elasticity in
  the meat
• 20 Add 1 egg white, ½ tsp sugar, ¼ tsp white pepper powder, 1 tsp light soy sauce
  and 1 tsp Shaoxing wine and mix well, also stirring in one direction for 1-2
  minutes until the mixture looks fairly dry
• 21 Pour 1/3 of the ginger onion water into the pork mixture and stir until all the
  liquid has been absorbed. Repeat 2 more times until all the ginger onion water
  has been absorbed
• 22 Add the chopped up broth gelatin to the mixture and mix well
• 23 Add 1 tsp of sesame oil to the mixture and mix well Adding the oil last helps to
  seal in the liquids and the flavours to the meat
• 24 Cover and put in the fridge until ready to use
• 25 Take 2 thin slices of ginger and slice into thin shreds and put into sauce dish
• 26 Pour 2 tbsp of spiced vinegar onto the ginger
• 27 Prepare a steamer lined with steaming paper or parchment paper with holes cut
  into it so that the water will not pool around the dumplings
• 28 Sit a 10cm rolled wrapper on a flat surface and add approx. 20g of filling into
  the centre of the wrapper feel free to lessen the filling if it’s difficult to
  wrap
• 29 Put your thumb of your dominant hand inside the wrapper and dominant index
  finger outside. Use your other hand to feed the folds. The dominant thumb holds
  one constant spot in place from the inside and the index finger presses each
  fold onto the spot where the thumb is holding. For each fold, the dominant thumb
  and index finger will gently pull upwards, stretching the wrapper edge slightly
  so that you will have enough gap between the filling and the wrapper edge to
  finish your folds Avoid touching the filling with your dominant hand because any
  oil on your fingers will prevent the skin from adhering to each other. Have a
  kitchen towel handy so that you can wipe your fingers if you do happen to touch
  the filling
• 30 Keep folding pleats until the opening is a tiny hole. It’s common to have a
  small hole to prevent the skin from breaking during steaming. But there will
  also be more evaporation after steaming. To close the opening, just pinch the
  edges together and twist to seal. You may end up with a bit of a stem. You can
  leave it on or twist it off
• 31 Place the completed dumpling into the steamer. Leave room between the dumplings
  for expansion. Repeat and continue until your steamer is filled
• 32 Steam on medium heat (85˚C or 185˚F) for 9 minutes. Turn off heat and wait 1
  minute before opening the lid
• 33 Warning: the soup inside the dumplings will be very hot
• 34 Serve with Chinese spiced vinegar and finely shredded ginger

Nutrition Info