How to make pork and shrimp siu mai – easy dim sum dumplings
- While most dim sum dishes require skills beyond the reach of most home cooks, small open-topped siu mai are relatively easy to make
- There are many varieties of siu mai filling, from the inexpensive to the ostentatious – this recipe falls somewhere in the middle
My friends in locked-down parts of the world are posting on their social media accounts about how much they miss going out for dim sum. Many of these dishes cannot be made easily at home, because dumplings require special “skins” – wrappers that enclose the fillings – which take great skill to roll out and shape.
Even my grandmother, who was an exceptional cook, didn’t bother making dim sum; we went out for it on weekends. My grandmother was way ahead of her time. Instead of waiting for the dim sum trolleys to roll around to our table – by which time the food might be cold, or worse, sold out – she would order the waiters to rush around, searching for what she wanted, and they would bring the plates and steamer baskets to us. Dim sum is best served hot out of the steamer (or fryer), which is why most restaurants in Hong Kong now cook it to order.
Home-made pork and shrimp siu mai
The only dim sum my grandmother ever made was siu mai, small, open-topped dumplings filled with pork and shrimp. These were far easier than other types of dim sum because you could buy the wrappers; she used round “skins” bought from shops that made fresh noodles. She – or rather, we (she had me help out as soon as I was old enough) – made at least 200 at a time for our extended family’s Sunday lunch. My grandmother would steam them in a huge bamboo basket, and serve them with congee.
There are many varieties of siu mai filling, from the inexpensive fish paste found at snack shops in Hong Kong, where they are served on a skewer and doused with soy sauce and chilli oil, to the sturgeon caviar- and gold-leaf-topped versions at five-star hotels. This recipe is somewhere in between.
There’s also a choice of wrappers. If you can’t find smaller siu mai wrappers (5cm-6cm in diameter), buy the larger ones usually labelled for sui gau (water dumplings) or wor tip, gyoza, jiaozi or potstickers. You can use the larger wrappers as they come (which makes for large siu mai), or cut them into smaller rounds for the size you would get if you were going out for dim sum. I prefer the smaller ones because the full-size wrappers (about 9.5cm in diameter) means there’s too much filling; smaller wrappers make for a tidier bite. You’ll need about 30 larger wrappers, or 45 of the smaller circles.