Welcome to the first recipe post in 2020!
I hope you had a nice beginning of this exciting year. These dumplings are called Banh Bao and I ate it for the first time on a Southeast Asia trip a few years ago. (Click here to read about this adventure!) I loved them! It was so cool that they were vegan. The non vegan version was mostly filled with pork but who wants to eat that? I prefer mushrooms!
Back in Germany the thought about these dumplings never left me. I knew one day I want to make them myself.
The day came! A week ago I had the time and the motivation trying to cook them and they were bomb! Although I melted my plastic steaming thingy since the water was already gone, it was a lot of fun! So make sure there is always enough water in your pot!
Vegan Banh Bao - Steamed Dumplings filled with Mushrooms
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp yeast
- 175 ml lukewarm water
- 235 g spelled flour type 630
- 110 g corn starch
- 1.5 tbsp raw cane sugar
- 1 pinch of salt
- 1.5 tbsp baking powder
- 60 g sunflower oil
- 10 mushrooms
- 1 red onion
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 50 g celeriac
- 1 leaf of white cabbage
- 3 tbsp rice vinegar
- 3 tbsp water
- 4 tbsp soy sauce
- 2 tbsp maple syrup
- 1 tsp smoked paprika powder
- 0.5 tsp pepper
- 1 pinch of chilli flakes
Instructions
- Put yeast, sugar and water together in a bowl and stir the mixture briefly.
- Two minutes later add all remaining ingredients of the dough. At a warm place let it rise for at least a hour.
- Cut the onion, garlic, celeriac and white cabbage into small pieces while the dough is resting.
- First fry the onion briefly with a few drops of oil. Then add the celeriac. After 1-2 minutes add the garlic and the cabbage.
- Before it starts to scorch mix 3 tablespoons of water and 3 tablespoons of rice vinegar and remove the mixture. Close the pan with a lid and let it simmer for 4 minutes.
- Prepare a mix of soy sauce, maple syrup, smoked paprika powder, and pepper in the meantime. As soon as it’s ready add it to the pan.
- Then add the mushrooms with a pinch of salt and close the lid again. After another 2 minutes, the mushrooms should have lost some water. Then fry the mix again at a slightly higher level for 4 minutes and then set the pan aside to cool.
- When the timer rings, roll out the dough into an elongated shape on a floured surface. It should become approx. 20 cm long. It should be easy doable with your hands. If the dough sticks, put some flour on your hand.
- Cut the dough into about 12 equal pieces. Take one of the pieces with a floured hand and shape it into a ball. Then press the ball with your palm on the floured work surface to a disc. The disc should become thinner at the outside.
- Now put a well-filled tablespoon full of the cooled mushroom mass on the disc.
- Start to lift the dough upwards to enclose the dumpling. Simply twist the individual strands together at the top.
- Place the dumplings on a suitable piece of parchment paper and steam them for 12 minutes in a pot with a steaming insert or a bamboo steamer. Make sure there is always enough water in the pot. However, the water should not touch the steam insert.
- It is best to serve the dumplings fresh with a little soy, sweet and sour or peanut sauce to dip.
If you tried the recipe comment below how you liked it!
See you soon!
Ken
