Dumplings and Noodles: Bao, Gyoza, Biang Biang, Ramen – and Everything in Between

Product Information

Use tongs to serve up the dumplings into bowls, add the noodles and bok choy then ladle over the hot broth. Asian food should not just be interesting when it’s cutely packaged up and if that’s the only reason people will cook some Dan Dan noodles, then I seriously question whether they’re interested in Asian food at all. One of the fondest memories I have of holidays when I was younger was making food for Thanksgiving, and Christmas.

I want to cook and eat every recipe in this book, but it’s with the Biang Biang Noodles — wide, elastic, noodles that you sort of swing into shape — that I want to start, allowing me to wallow in her Cumin Lamb and Hot Oil versions. She said we only take cash, and turned her back to us without making any enquiry if we had money, or suggesting where we could get cash. Given the short proving period for the starter, we weren’t sure of the reason behind creating a starter first and then a dough, rather than plunging straight into a yeasted dough (as is the process in other bao recipes we have used).Otherwise, it just has an air of superiority about it which I, and I am Chinese, personally find offensive. Chili: Chili slices make a great garnish and if you want your soup more spicy, you can add some to the pan when you’re cooking the onions and mushrooms. Adding a bit more flour to the rolling pin, and the table will keep your mixture from sticking, and make the process much smoother. Here, Pippa gets her molecular biology geek on, sharing what happens to noodle dough on a molecular level—as she says, it’s not necessary to know any of this to make good noodles, but it is certainly interesting and may also give you added confidence when making the recipes.

Next, we made handmade Ramen Noodles, which we used in both the Spring Onion Oil Noodles and the Dan Dan Noodles. Noodle dishes in this chapter include wok-fried noodles with beef and pak choi, breakfast yakisoba, Singapore mei fun rice noodles, Taiwanese fishing dock noodles, zha jiang mian (fried-sauce noodles), cumin lamb biang biang noodles, dan dan noodles, kick-ass tofu skin mala noodles, cold sesame noodles, chilli crab noodles, hangover noodles (charred broccoli soba), yuzu shio ramen, miso clam ramen, ox cheek mala xiao mian, Hong Kong wonton noodle soup, Chongqing noodles, and curry udon (amongst others). The heat is coming from the Thai red curry paste, so make sure you use one that’s not too explosive!

Pippa’s Fa Mian dough method involves making a yeast-based starter, which proves for 2-3 hours, before making a dough which incorporates all of the starter. These were the only times of year where my mother would agree to covering the entire kitchen in flour for the sake of delicious food! To that end, she has found more in common with the books of Ken Hom and Ching-He Huang than she thought. Ultra garlicky and full of flavor with a nice spicy kick… these noodles might just become your new favorite go-to meal. From the man hand making noodles through the back, to there being no cutlery to speak of (chopsticks all the way) and the flavours and meats used (unexpectedly I loves the entrails in the stew I had) it's different to any other restaurant of this kind I've been to.

All I know is that my grandmother made “pastry” with self-rising flour, lard, salt and pepper, and water. Thank you for taking the time to post such a thoughtful review of the book and also of the controversy surrounding it. She starts with some notes about the different effects that kneading and resting dough has on the formation of molecular bonds, and what that means for the texture of the noodles. And lastly, we made the Fa Mian Dumpling Dough and used it in the recipe for Crispy Miso Mushroom Bao Buns. This is my adapted version of a traditional Japanese dish, but here we’re mixing Thai flavours (from the curry paste) with the Japanese dumplings, so a bit of a hybrid.It’s important that we as white people acknowledge our lack of understanding of what constitutes authentic and who gets to decide on that.