Zha Liang
炸兩·(zaa3 loeng2)
Chapter 1: The Wrappers & Doughs
Zha Liang was born of wartime necessity in 1940s Guangzhou, a brilliant collision of cheap calories and contrasting textures. Today, it is the quiet masterpiece of the dim sum cart. You do not make the fried dough yourself—leave that to the bakery professionals—but you do master the wrapper. When a shatteringly crisp, twice-baked cruller meets a translucent, violently steamed rice sheet, you understand exactly why people wait an hour on a Sunday morning for a table in Chinatown.
Before you start
Prepare the sweet soy sauce.
Whisk the hot water, light soy sauce, sugar, and oyster sauce in a small bowl until the sugar is completely dissolved, then stir in the toasted sesame oil and set aside to cool.
Re-crisp the fried dough.
Place the individual dough sticks directly on the rack of a 350°F oven for 3 to 5 minutes until they are shatteringly crisp, then remove and let them cool on a wire rack.
Set up the steaming station.
Fill a large wok with two inches of water, place a flat, perfectly level steaming trivet inside, and bring to a furious, rolling boil over high heat.
Ingredients
- Thai-style rice flour1 cup
- wheat starch1/4 cup
- tapioca starch1/4 cup
- fine sea salt1/2 tsp
- water1 cup
- water1 cup
- neutral oil1 tbsp
- Chinese fried dough sticks2 large
- light soy sauce3 tbsp
- sugar2 tbsp
- oyster sauce1 tbsp
- water1/4 cup
- toasted sesame oil1 tsp
- toasted white sesame seeds2 tbsp
- scallions2 med
Method
- 01
Whisk the dry wrapper ingredients.
In a large, heavy mixing bowl, vigorously whisk together the rice flour, wheat starch, tapioca starch, and fine sea salt.
- 02
Hydrate the starch suspension.
Create a well in the center of the dry ingredients and whisk in the room-temperature water and neutral oil until a smooth, lump-free paste forms, then stream in the boiling water while whisking constantly to partially gelatinize the starches.
- 03
Rest the batter.
Cover the bowl with a damp towel and let the batter sit at room temperature for at least thirty minutes to allow the dry starches to fully hydrate into a flexible, resilient wrapper dough.
- 04
Agitate the batter and coat the pan.
Brush an 8x8-inch stainless steel pan with a microscopically thin layer of neutral oil, vigorously whisk the rested batter to lift the sunken starches from the bottom of the bowl, and pour a quarter cup into the pan, swirling to coat the bottom evenly.
- 05
Steam the wrapper over high heat.
Carefully set the pan on the trivet inside the wok, cover tightly with the lid, and steam for exactly two and a half to three minutes until the wrapper turns translucent and begins to balloon with large steam bubbles beneath the surface.
- 06
Release the wrapper and roll.
Remove the pan from the wok, let it cool for sixty seconds, then run a plastic dough scraper around the inner edges; place one crisped dough stick along one edge of the rice sheet and use the flat edge of the scraper to tightly drape and roll the hot wrapper around it.
- 07
Slice, garnish, and serve immediately.
Transfer the finished roll to a cutting board, slice crosswise into bite-sized pieces, and transfer to a warm platter to be drenched in the sweet soy sauce and garnished with sesame seeds and scallions before the cruller loses its crunch.
Notes
The secret to the wrapper is constant agitation.
Root starches are heavy and sink to the bottom of the bowl within minutes. If you do not vigorously whisk the batter immediately before every single pour, you will end up with a gluey, hard bottom and a watery, broken top.
Source the right flours.
Standard American supermarket rice flour is milled too coarsely and behaves differently under steam. Seek out Thai-style rice flour and dedicated wheat starch from a well-stocked Asian grocer to achieve that crystalline dim sum translucency.
From Cook Dim Sum at Home.