Glutinous Rice Shumai
I’ve caught the flu recently that’s the reason I haven’t replied to all of your comments recently, really sorry about that but I hope you can understand a person like me who has to work 48 hours in 3 days with flu basically doesn’t have any extra energy to do other thing else.
I know a lot of people love Dim Sum so I decide to make this Glutinous Rice Shumai. It has a different filling compared to normal yellow pastry shumai that people usually order in a Cantonese restaurant.
I have completely forgotten the first time when I tried to make this shumai but the flavour of it is very unique. When Chris tried it for the first time he wasn’t too sure about the taste but after trying one, he tried another and then before you know it they were all gone.
Shumai is a dish that grows on you. It’s really cheap to make, very tasty and very filling. A perfect snack.
I searched for the history of this dish and shumai was created in Yuan Dynasty. For those who aren’t sure, the ruler of the Yuan Dynasty was from Mongol, of which the most famous ruler was Genghis Khan. I always thought Shumai was created by Cantonese or Chinese people but amazingly I found out it was actually created by the Mongolian people. This is another benefit for writing a blog. I have learnt another lesson from history by researching the ingredients for my blog.
Credit: These photos were taken by Chris at Chris Radley Photography
Glutinous Rice Shumai
Ingredients
Ingredients for Shumai pastry
- 1.5 cups bread flour
- 1 cup plain flour
- 1 cup boiling water
- 1/3 cup cold water
Ingredients for Shumai
- 1.5 cups glutinous rice
- 2 dried shiitake mushroms soak in hot water for 10-15 minutes to soften then chop finely
- 1 tbsp dried shrimps also soak in hot water for 10-15 minutes then chop finely
- 150 g pork belly remove the skin an cut into 2.5cm dices. We will use this pork belly to make a stewed pork for shumai filling
Seasonings for Shumai filling
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
- Couple pinches black pepper
Seasonings and ingredients for stewed pork for Shumai
- 2 spring onions
- 1 thin slice ginger
- 3 tbsp soy sauce
- 2 tbsp rice wine
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tbsp sugar
- 1 pinch cinnamon
- 1/2 star anise
- 1 clove garlic
- Some water to cover the pork
Instructions
Procedures for Shumai pastry
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Mix flour together and pour the boiling water in the flour, mix with a pair of chopsticks and add 1/3 cup of cold water.
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Use your hands to knead the dough until it’s smooth and cover by wet kitchen napkin of tea towel. Leave it on aside for 20 minutes and separate to small portions (depends on what kind of size you like).
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Use a rolling pin to flatten the small dough from step 2 and use your finger tips to make the pastry have some wrinkle bits (looks a bit like flower petals).
Procedures for stewed pork for shumai
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Heat a wok with 1 table spoon of oil. Stir fry the ginger, spring onion and garlic first for 30 seconds. Add 2 tablespoons of sugar into wok and wait for it melt. Add the pork into the wok and stir fry it until the pork get a little bit colour.
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Add all the seasonings and spices into the wok and stir fry it for another 2 minutes. Place everything into a small soup pot or small sauce pan with lit and cover the pork by water.
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Use full gas power to boiling the pork first then turn to lowest power to simmer the pork until it is soft.
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After the pork cooked, place it into a bowl or plate and cool it down. After it cool down, chop it and use for shumai filling.
Procedures for Shumai fillings
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Cook glutinous rice by rice cooker. 1 ½ cup rice : 1 ½ water. Because it’s glutinous rice so I will put another 2 tablespoons water to cook it.
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Mix Shitake mushroom, dried shrimps, chopped pork, soy soy sauce, black pepper with hot glutinous rice together and make sure it mix evenly.
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Take one pastry we made earlier and put 1 teaspoon of filling in the middle.
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Use your hand to close the “waist” part and the shumai should look like a “vase” shape. Put a little bit more filling on top of it.
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Use bamboo steamer to steam for 10~15 minutes and ready to serve.
I love dimsum and yum cha. Your shumai looks excellent! The dough is so translucent!
Hi Roti,
Thank you very much for your comment. I really appreciate it.
Wow! Your pictures and recipes continue to amaze me. I’m sorry you have been ill…I got a nasty bug last week, so I feel for you. I’m so impressed with your blog, and I always look forward to new posts. Thank you for sharing!
Hi Monet,
Thank you for your comment and I feel very sorry about the nasty bug you got last week. I hope you are fine now. Well, being ill is not fun at all. All the best!!
Hi Liv,
The siu mai looks delactable. I can’t believe I used to hate it when I was a child, they are so delicious and healthy.
Hope you get well soon. 🙂
Hi Emily,
Why you used to hate Shumai when you were a child?? Is because of taste of it or something else?
You’re so right most Chinese restaurants serve yellow pastry shumai! I guess I have to try to make them myself to get rice pastry shumai 🙂 Liv, I wanna come over to your place! 😀
Hello Tanatha,
Thank you for your comment.
It’s not difficult to make your own pastry for shumai! I hope you will enjoy my recipe and have fun cooking it at home.
🙂 I will be super welcome you if you do come to Edinburgh one day.
These look scrumptious! I would love to try!
Hi Natasha,
Thank you for your comment. I really appreciate.
all the best.
HI 5 star foodie,
Thank you for the comment. I really appreciate.
Hi Liv,
Sorry to hear you are feeling under the weather 🙁 I hope you get your energy and healthy back soon. Your recipe sounds so good and definitely one I have to try soon. So many of your recipes do that I am getting a back log on ones to try ,hehe.
Take it easy
Hi Nancy,
Thank you very much. I feel a lot better now after fever for 2 days I finally getting better. Thank you for the comment for my recipes. I hope you will have fun in the kitchen with my recipe.
All the best!
Sorry you haven’t been feeling well! 🙁 I hope you get well soon. Your shumai look amazing! I love shumai. Whenever we eat dim sum, I must always have shumai and hargow (not sure if I’m spelling this correctly). I don’t think I’ve ever had glutinous rice shumai, however. Just the pork and shrimp ones. Is that the same as the glutinous rice shumai? I noticed you use pork and shrimp in these.
Hi Judy,
Thank you for the greeting. I have no idea what happened to me. I have had the flu for nearly two weeks and it’s making me feel really worn out. I may go to the doctor in the next couple of days but I really hope the flu will clear asap.
About the food, Hargow is one of my favourite dim sum as well. It’s so tasty. I know the most common ingredient for shumai in restaurants is pork and shrimp (prawn) but this glutinous rice shumai is different compared with these. Even in Taiwan, not every restaurants sells this kind of shumai
Hey, I am researching for a college project I am doing right now on Shumai, focusing on its history, but really extending to almost anything shumai-related. I was wondering where you got your information that shumai originated from the Yuan Dynasty/from Mongol origins. I have also seen a claim of originating from the Tang Dynasty.
Thank you!
Colin
Hi Colin,
I found the information of Shumai through some Chinese food history website and also Chinese version of Wikipedia. It’s hard for me to find this kind of book in UK so most of time I just go through some Chinese websites to find the information I need. I hope this is helping with your project.
Liv
Dear Liv,
Thank you, that is helpful… is there any chance you could send me the url for the chinese website? I have some friends that can translate it for me.
Colin
Hi Colin,
Here is the link of Shumai history website:
http://www.epochtimes.com/b5/10/2/15/n2819723.htm
Wikipedia (Chinese) about Shumai: (Wikipedia said it’s from the end of Yuan dynasty begin of Min dynasty.)
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E7%87%92%E8%B3%A3
I hope these websites will help you with your college project. 🙂
Wish you get an A
Liv