Siu Mai

Siu Mai is often associated with breakfast or brunch. However, I made these for dinner, defying the common convention. 

Most of the time, when we go for dimsum breakfast, we will sure order these. It was said that this type of open-top dumpling originated from Inner Mongolia, between Ming and Qing Dynasty. It was brought to Beijing and Tianjin by merchants from Shanxi. 

There are some variations to the ingredients used. The main ingredients are usually minced pork and shrimps. Some of the recipes would called for the use of shitake mushrooms and water chestnuts. I did not add in any mushrooms as I prefer to retain the original flavour of siu mai, which is without mushrooms. However, I prefer to have a little crunch and therefore added in some diced yam bean.

Siu Mai

Ingredients:

400g minced pork

7 large shrimps, minced

1/2 cup diced yam bean

6 cloves garlic, pounded into a paste

Thumb-sized ginger, pounded and extract ginger juice

1 large egg

1 1/2 tbsp tapioca flour

1 tbsp Chinese rice wine

1 tbsp sesame oil

1 tsp oyster sauce

1 tsp light soy sauce

Pepper

Sugar

Salt

31 pcs wonton wrappers

Method:

1. Add minced pork, shrimps and garlic paste together in a bowl. 

2. Pour in ginger juice and mix well.

3. Add in yam bean and mix thoroughly. 

4. Then add rice wine, sesame oil, oyster sauce, light soy sauce, tapioca flour and

 mix well.

5. Crack egg into a bowl. Scoop out 1 to 2 teaspoon of egg whites and set aside for later use. Beat the remaining egg and add in to the rest of the fillings. 

4. Then add in salt, sugar and pepper to taste.

5. Set it aside to marinate for at least 1 hour.

6. Grease steaming plate to avoid the siu mai to stick to the plate.

7. Scoop a tablespoon of the filling onto a wonton wrapper and wrap it. Place siu mai in steaming plate.

8. Repeat with the remaining pieces.

9. Coat the top of each siu mai with the egg white set aside earlier. 

10. Sprinkle or spray some water on the siu mai to prevent the skin to dry out. 

11. Steam in rapid boiling water for 5 to 7 minutes. Do not oversteam or else the filling will dry out.