HOW TO PREPARE A SOFT DOUGH FOR THE SCALLION PANCAKE

In order to make soft scallion pancakes, we need to prepare a soft dough. To achieve this, two important procedures are required in the dough making:

USING BOILING WATER TO MIX THE FLOUR

Boiling water makes a softer dough. You know why? The heat of the boiling water cooks the protein in the flour, making it incapable in forming gluten. Hens such dough has much more ductility, comparing to the one made of room temperature water.

Thus by changing the ratio of boiling & room-temp water, you adjust the softness of the dough. I usually go for half-half, so as in this recipe for the scallion pancakes. You could try with 40%-60% or 30%-70%, depending on how soft you would like the dough to be.

ADDING OIL INTO THE DOUGH

The oil can prevent the dough from getting dry, and the same time help to cook it.

It is suggested to use corn oil, sunflower oil or other vegetable oil without strong scent. Olive oil is not recommended as the scent may overwhelm the scallion flavor.

USING A FLOUR & OIL MIXTURE TO GIVE FLAVOR AND LAYERS

Now let's talk about the flavor and the layers of the pancakes!

As the name says, this is a scallion flavored flatbread. The flavor comes from the chopped scallions embedded in between layers of the bread. So how to put the scallion chops into the pancakes? And how to create even thinner layers inside the pancakes?

These all can be done thanks to the flavored flour-oil mixture, in Chinese called 油酥 (yóu sū).

The flour-oil mixture is a sauce made of chopped scallion, flour, vegetable oil and seasonings. Since no water is involve, no gluten will be formed. When you lay the mixture on the surface of the flattened dough then fold it back, you create separators in between folds. In this sense, the mixture functions like bookmarks that divide the dough into sections.

In order to bring out the perfume, we shall slowly pour the hot oil onto the chopped scallion and the seasoning. This is similar to the method used in the recipe of Biang Biang Noodles.

Now we are clear on the methodology in making the pancakes, let's head up to the recipe!

PANCAKE CINESI AL CIPOLLOTTO 葱油饼 — Pin
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SCALLION PANCAKES 葱油饼

Recipe by Sasha WangCourse: Second course, snackCuisine: ChineseDifficulty: High

Servings

persons

Preparation

hour

Cooking

minutes

Resting

hours

Scallion pancake is a classic Chinese flatbread that is welcomed by almost every Asian food lover! In this article I will show you how to make thin and foldable version, which means no yeast is needed.

INGREDIENTS

THE DOUGH
All purpose flour: 400g
Boiling water: 100g
Room temperature water: 100g
Sunflower oil: 25g
Salt: 5g
THE FLOUR & OIL MIXTURE
Salt: 1 tsp
Five spice powder: 1 tsp
Sichuan pepper powder: 1 tsp
All purpose flour: 30g
Chopped scallion: 70G
Sunflower oil: 70g

Preparation

THE DOUGH
Put the flour and salt in a big bowl. Gradually add boiling water meanwhile stir the flour to make sure it mixes with the water evenly. The flour mixed with boiling water looks semi-transparent.
Add room temperature water slowly and mix well with the flour. Knead the ingredients into a dough. Cover it with a piece of plastic wrap and rest it for 20 minutes.
Add in the sunflower oil and continue to knead the dough until all the oil is absorbed. At the beginning it may seem like "mission impossible". But gradually you will see that the oil will disappear and the dough shall become much softer. It takes around 1 minute.
Divide the dough into 8 small pieces. Roll each one into a log then flatten it using your palm. Brush some sunflower oil on the surface of each piece, lay them in a tray.
Cover the tray with plastic wrap and rest the dough overnight (or at least 2 hours).
FLAVORED FLOUR & OIL MIXTURE
Put salt, five spice powder, Sichuan pepper, chopped scallion and flour in a bowl. Mix everything well.
Heat up some sunflower oil until some smoke starts to come out. Slowly pour the oil into the mixture prepared in last step.
Continue to stir until all ingredients are well mixed.
SCALLION PANCAKES
Take one piece of dough and roll it flat and thin. Brush a layer of the flour-oil mixture on the surface and roll it from the bottom up according to the instructions in the photo below.
Finish shaping the dough by rolling it up like a snail shell. Hide the end and press the dough gently to fix the shape.
When all the pieces are shaped, rest them in the tray for 10-15 minutes.
Take one piece and roll it into a thin paste. Try to keep it as round as possible, however it is not a must 😊.
Heat up a pan on medium-low heat. Work with one pancake at a time. Place the pancake on the pan, when there are bubbles popping up, keep pan-frying for 20-30 seconds then turn it over. Keep cook the other side for 30 seconds.
Check the bottom frequently to prevent from burning. Take it off the heat once it is golden brown and crispy on both sides.

Two characters tell that you've made a good scallion pancake:

Golden brown on the surface, with a pattern of the tiger skin. It is called 虎皮 (Hǔ Pí) in Chinese.
Crispy on the outside with crumbs. We say it is 酥掉渣 (Sū Diào Zhā).

Look at the crumbs! It means the pancake is crispy outside.

Ecco le briciole! Questo è un chiaro segnale che il pancake sulla sua superfice è croccante.

The pancake is soft and with layers inside, full of flavor of scallion.

Discover more recipes using SCALLION.

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