Recipe: how to cook Chinese food, Mantou (steamed bread)
Mantou is a traditional Chinese pastry. It is made with yeasted dough without stuffing. It has a round shape commonly. Mantou is served as a staple in the north of China.
It is said that Zhuge Liang invented it in The Three Kingdoms period. He was prevented from crossing the river by the dead spirits. He had to sacrifice the river god to ask for the blessing. So he invented Mantou instead of human’s heads and threw into the river to sacrifice.
People make Mantou in different shapes and ingredients. Such as milk Mantou, fried Mantou, pumpkin Mantou, rose shape Mantou, purple sweet potato Mantou and so on.
Mantou is also the main part of Chinese New Year. People make Mantou before one day of New Year’s Eve. Steam in Chinese is zheng. There is an idiom calls zheng zheng ri shang means upgrade. Yeast in Chinese is fa jiao. It has the same character as fa cai, which means make a fortune. People want to make good wishes via the partial tone way. Some people make Mantou in various shapes and decorates to express good meanings.
Sometimes, Mantou is used on special occasions. On one’s birthday, people shape the Mantou like a peach named shou tao. Peach in Chinese is tao. Shou is decorated on it, means longevity.
Shanxi is well known for its pastry food. People in Shanxi call Mantou is mo. People are good at making Mantou into many colourful patterns. They call it hua mo. hua means flowers or colourful. It prevails from Ming and Qing Dynasties, which has over 1000 years history. It becomes a unique art.
The following recipe is the common and basic Mantou people have ordinarily.
INGREDIENTS:
- Plain flour 240–250g
- Yeast 2–3g
- Water 100g
INSTRUCTIONS:
Step 1: add 2–3g yeast in 100g warm water.
Step 2: mix and stay for 10 minutes.
Step 3: put 200g plain flour and whisk towards the same direction until flour becomes into many small pieces.
Step 4: knead to a smooth dough.
Step 5: keep the dough in a container with cover and yeast under 30℃. you could put it in the oven and set 30℃.
Step 6: yeast it to double size. poke the dough, the hole doesn’t recover means it yeasts well.
Step 7: spread 40–50g plain flour on the dough and knead until there is no air and bubble inside.
Step 8: cut the dough make sure no air bubbles.
Step 9: divide into small doughs.
Step 10: make into balls.
Step 11: second rising. heat the water to warm in a steamer. put mantou in each tier and make sure there was enough space among each mantou. cover the lid and wait for the mantou is bigger.
Step 12: steam over high heat, after the water boiling, turn to medium heat and steam for 15 minutes. keep the lid cover for 3–5 minutes. DONE❕
Enjoy~
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