Hosted by Caroline Moratti and Alice Jones, along with Pippa
Bao buns are tender morsels of savoury delight. Quite frankly, you deserve one. Or several. The umami of the beef and hoisin sauce is rich and salty and pairs wonderfully with the delicate bao. The only comparison I can think of is that one scene in Ratatouille where he places cheese and a strawberry in his mouth and fireworks go off. I hope you, too, have memorised Ratatouille scene by scene and know exactly what I’m talking about. This dish is a fireworks worthy dish. Be free, my little rats, and cook to your heart's content.
Serves: 3-4 hungry flatties
Ingredients
Frozen bao buns – defrosted to room temp (look in the frozen aisle of your local supermarket)
1 cup rice
1 can coconut milk/cream
Half a cup water
1 onion - sliced
400g sliced beef
1 spring onion stalk
1 cup of frozen peas/carrots mix
Splash of sesame sauce
Splash of soy sauce, to taste
2 teaspoons minced garlic
2 teaspoons minced ginger
Half a bag of mesclun salad
2 teaspoons of hoisin sauce (and extra to serve)
Method
- Dump your raw (and rinsed) rice, coconut milk/cream and water into a pot. Bring it to a boil and let it simmer for 15 minutes until creamy and cooked through.
- While the rice is cooking, heat up some oil in a pan and chuck in the onions and beef. Once the beef is slightly browned, add the ginger, garlic, soy, hoisin and sesame sauce.
- After a couple of minutes, add peas and carrot and half of the spring onion to the pan. If this sounds suspiciously easy, that’s because it is. Taste everything and feel free to add more soy or hoisin depending on your vibe.
- In the last five minutes of rice cooking, steam the bao buns. If you’re not fancy and don’t have a steamer, just follow the microwave instructions on the back of the bao bun packet. If you are steaming, though, make sure you lay down a wee layer of baking paper first so the bao buns don’t stick.
- Once cooked, fill up the bao buns with your meat mixture, leftover chopped spring onion, mesclun salad, and extra hoisin sauce. Delicious. Bone Apple Teeth.