Sio Pao (Filipino Steamed Buns)

Sio Pao (pronounced as "shopaw") is a popular snack in the Phillipines, and has always been an all time fave of mine. It's usually filled with a meaty filling flavors like asado or guisado, but the mung bean and ube filling sio pao will always be the best for me. I already did a previous post on how to make sio pao with ube filling (click here), only this time I'm posting about the veggie filling, but the dough recipe is the same.

Mix Veggie Filling

Ingredients:

1 cup grated carrots

2 cups minced cabbage

minced veggie meat (you can put any veggie meat you want)

minced red bell pepper

1 tsp white sugar
2 tsp soy sauce
1/2 tbsp peanut oil
1/4 tsp sesame oil
salt and pepper to taste

Masala:
mix together 1/4 tsp hing and 1/4 tsp black pepper.

Procedure:
1. Heat the oil in the pan, once heated put the masala for about 2 sec, then add in the carrots.
2. When carrots are slightly cook, add the veggie meat and the bell pepper.
3. After 2 mins, add in the cabbage.
4. Add in the soy sauce, sugar, salt and pepper.
5. Stir in the sesame oil when it's done.

Click Here, for the Sio Pao procedures.

Siopao (Filipino Steamed Buns)

Hmmmm....I miss my sio pao, and for that, I decided to made some. Sio Pao is a famous snack in the Philippines. It's a good food on the go and very affordable. Making sio pao is not complicated at all even for first timers. You just need to be time conscious when you're waiting for the dough to rise, otherwise you'll over grow the dough, and this can really affect the texture of your dough resulting to a dry and heavy buns. When deciding on what fillings to make for the buns, just feel free to experiment, or I may say, do as you please. I decided to do a sweet filling which is made of sweet purple yam just because it's my favorite,lol!

Ingredients:
Dough

4 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
3 tbsp cooking oil
3 tsp dry yeast
1 cup lukewarm water
1 tbsp sugar

Filling:
For my filling, since I use a powdered purple yam, I just followed the instructions on the packaging. However, for a salty filling, you can use a some scrambled tofu,minced cabbage and carrots. Just stir fry it, add some soy sauce and any spices you like, but make sure that it's not liquidy to avoid any problems with the dough.

Procedure:
1. Sift the flour and baking powder, then add up the 1/2 cup of sugar and the 3 tbsp of oil.
2. Mix together the yeast and sugar in a lukewarm water and stir until it's lump free and wait till its bubbly.
3. Pour in the liquid mixture in the flour mixture and mix well. Form into a ball and cover with a damp cloth.
4. Leave the dough to rise for 1 hour or until it doubles its volume.
5. Once the dough arises, punch it in the middle and let it rise again for another 30 minutes.
6. After 30 minutes, knead the dough in a floured surface until it is smooth and not sticky.
7. Divide the dough into 2 balls and roll it into a log then cut it into small balls.

Note: I weighed my balls into 75 grams each just enough for a regular bun size, and it makes about 14 buns.

8.Flattened the balls into a circle and put the filling into the middle.

9.Pull the sides of the dough into the center in closing the bun.

10.Place the bun into a 4"x 5" square parchment paper and cook in the steamer for 15 minutes.

11. After 15 minutes, viola! Your sio pao is ready :)