Char Siew Buns and Vegetable Buns

It was a “bao” day (steamed buns day) for us 😅 hubby said he wants vegetable buns but the kids love their char siew buns more. So I decided to make both. Took me 3 hours to make these buns in the end.

Feedback from my “customers” :

Char siew buns is great as it’s very flavorful 😅 but vegetable buns was a tad too bland as I didn’t add in enough salt so the littlest one could have some too.

This time I bought marinated charsiew from @lazadaredmart and just have to bake in oven for 15-30 minutes. Super convenient! 👍🏻 and it’s only S$6-$8.

Ms. A and her aunt joined me to wrap some buns ☺️👍🏻 so happy they enjoyed making buns with me.

Recipe

Vegetables fillings

• Vegetables – 250g (I’ve used chye sim hua/Asian mustard greens)
• Dried mushroom – 3 medium sized wash and soaked , squeezed out water and diced.
• Dried Black fungus – about 3 big ones soaked
• Young ginger – 1to2 inches grated
• Salt
• Sugar
• Vegetarian oyster sauce 1/2 tbsp (can add more)
• Vegetable oil
• A big bowl of Ice water

Steps:

1. Blanch washed vegetables and black fungus in boiling water for 2 minutes and transfer into ice water.
2. Heat some oil in pan and add grated ginger. Stir fry at medium heat for 1-2 minutes and add mushroom. Add some vegetarian oyster sauce. Stir fry for a few minutes till mushroom is cooked. Set aside to cool down.
3. Drain vegetable and black fungus, squeeze out water and chop both to about 1 cm pieces.
4. Place vegetables in a bowl, add sugar and salt. Mix well and add some vegetable oil into the vegetables and mix well to coat the vegetables evenly.
5. Once cooked mushroom is cooled enough, mix it together with the seasoned vegetables and black fungus.

Char siew fillings

• Char siew meat 400g- diced
• Shallots 50g – finely diced
• lots of chinese coriander -finely chopped
• Oyster sauce – 1/2 tbsp (have to adjust as per your char siew taste)
• Sugar – 1/2 tbsp
• Dark soy sauce – 1/2 tbsp
• Water – 2 tbsp
• Sesame oil
• White pepper
• Cornstarch water to thicken the sauce
• Water
• Oil

Steps:

1. Heat some oil and stir fry shallots till fragrance
2. Add char siew and stir fry a few minutes
3. Add oyster sauce, sugar, dark soy sauce and some water. Stir fry till evenly mixed
4. add corn starch water to thicken the sauce
5. Add some sesame oil and white pepper. Add coriander. Mix for a minute.

[Thermomix] Bun dough Ingredient

** I’ve made two batches of dough. One batch with 250g flour (for 10 buns), another with 375g flour (15 buns). Recipe below is with 250g. Just multiply 1.5 for all to get 15 buns recipe.

• 130g water
• 3/4tsp instant yeast
• 5g caster sugar
• 15g olive oil
• 250g hongkong flour
• A pinch of salt

Steps:

1. Mix water , yeast , sugar and oil in mixing bowl , 1 min /speed 2
2. Add in 250g flour and salt – knead for 2 mins
3. Remove dough from mixing bowl, knead on a lightly floured pastry mat manually to a long log, fold the ends in to center and continue to knead. Repeat the kneading and folding for 3-4 times. To remove the gas evenly from the dough.
4. Divide dough to 10 pieces (total dough about 424g so each piece is about 40-42g) and shape as desired with the fillings
5. Let proof till double (about 30 to 40 mins)
6. Steamed on high heat with room temperature water and turn down to medium heat once water started boiling. Continue to steam for 12 mins , turn off the heat and let buns sit in the steamer for 5 mins before taking it out to avoid shrinkage.