Homemade Xiao Long Bao is Hard to Beat

It takes two days to make Shanghai soup dumplings. I’m here to tell you it’s worth every second.

Somewhere in my childhood, between begrudgingly following my parents from restaurant to restaurant and spending my first allowance on dim sum, xiao long bao became my go-to dumpling order. If you’re eating with me, chances are I’m ordering a second round for the table. But while I’ve made my fair share of homemade dumplings, rarely have I ever considered making the time-intensive, many-pleated xiao long bao myself.

You might know xiao long bao as soup dumplings, plump purses with delicate pleats and slurpable soupy interiors. In reality, xiao long bao belongs to a family of dumplings called tang bao, or soup-filled buns, and its actual name refers to the little bamboo basket that steams it. The dumpling originated in the Jiangnan region of China; since its biggest city is Shanghai, many know xiao long bao simply as a Shanghai soup dumpling.

Traditionally made xiao long bao has four key components: skin, soup, meaty filling, and dipping sauce. While pork filling is traditional, variations now exist around the world. Some restaurants might tout football-sized soup dumplings, playfully served with a straw, while others serve sumptuous crab roe soup dumplings made from local hairy crabs or even experimental dumplings containing pho, galbitang, or chocolate. (But that begs the question: Can we still call it a soup dumpling?)

Needless to say, xiao long bao consumed my every waking thought for the past month as I contemplated all the possible permutations I could potentially make. Luckily for me, I didn’t have to start from ground zero. The internet is awash with xiao long bao recipes and detailed stories of eager home cooks and ravenous chefs attempting the iconic recipe. I even consulted Instagram, where people graciously shared their experiences and pictures. With cold, frosty evenings enticing me to the kitchen, I thought why couldn’t I try, too?

Here’s the first thing anyone will tell you about homemade xiao long bao: Don’t rush the process. Once you accept the fact that soup dumplings are a two-day ordeal, your life will become much easier. (And if you insist on finishing quickly, the second thing someone will tell you is that shortcuts exist but don’t expect perfection.)

Li Xiaoyuan, a London-based chef who has worked in Michelin-starred restaurants, has made xiao long bao countless times for his friends and fellow chefs. To him, making dumplings is not only a great way to bond with people but also an efficient meal prep option since they freeze so well. “If you prepare the dough and the filling and get everyone to make it together, it’s a great way to spend an evening,” he says.

The first part you make is the soup. At first glance, it might be easy to assume that the delicate soup comes from the meaty filling. But in reality, the soup is made separately in a process similar to that of making aspic, and must be set for hours in the fridge until solid and jiggly. The key here is to nurture a collagen-rich stock using a healthy supply of bones and, if you have them on hand, dried scallops, shrimp, and Chinese Jinhua ham to rev up the umami. On my first attempt, I made stock with pork trotters, pig skin, and chicken bones, which I simmered for two hours. For my second attempt, I roasted a whole chicken in a shallow bath of water to extract its collagen-rich juices. Surprisingly, that worked too, although I produced much less aspic. Once the stock cooled, I added it to the fridge to let it firm up, then chopped it into small pieces.

As far as shortcuts go (remember those?), you can use premade stock cubes and gelatin to firm up the soup. While this admittedly works, the soup will not have the same depth of flavor. Similarly, some recipes recommend freezing the stock to expedite the process. But this can quickly get messy. Li says two days of prep is always ideal. “Let it set in its own time to a nice jelly in the fridge,” he says. “You won’t have to worry about the timing of when people are over for dinner.”

The filling is relatively straightforward. Xiao long bao traditionally uses a combination of pork, ginger, white pepper, and other spices. I won’t go into this as much, because taste is subjective (and I’m not a filling purist); what matters is to tailor the filling to your tastes.

Now comes the skin. Made from just flour and water, the ideal dumpling wrappers must strike a pleasurable balance of elasticity and thinness. Stretchy enough to form intricate pleats, yet thin enough to turn slightly translucent and droopy when steamed. I opted for a 3-2 flour-to-water ratio for dough. I reached for all-purpose flour since that’s what I had on hand, although most restaurants will source finely milled Chinese dumpling flour or even Italian 00 flour with medium levels of gluten. Sorry, store-bought wrappers won’t do here.

A well-kneaded and rested dough will become pliable enough to shape using a mini rolling pin. While more seasoned dumpling makers may balk at making machine-assisted wrappers, several home cooks I consulted have reported great success using pasta machines to thin their wrappers and cookie cutters to stamp perfectly uniform circles. But if it’s your first time making xiao long bao, I definitely recommend trying the rolling pin method, since it will allow you to keep the center a bit thicker to support the filling and the edges thinner for easy folding.

Of all the steps in making xiao long bao, I was most nervous about the pleating. I didn’t grow up learning how to make dumplings and the motions had always seemed unnatural to me. So I asked Instagram again. Many people sent me videos, which I watched on loop until my eyes felt sore. But something sunk in, and when it came time to pleat the dumplings, the motions felt curiously natural. The resulting dumplings weren’t perfect by any measure, but I was still able to pinch and seal the tops and achieve a desirable dumpling shape. (If you’re a first-timer like me, you can always use a flat surface to balance the dumpling bottoms; be patient with yourself!)

Once the dumplings are steamed in a bamboo or metal basket — mine took 10 minutes — resist digging right in. Along with the dumpling’s core ingredients, you cannot forget the vinegar. Xiao long bao typically calls for a red or black vinegar flavored with fragrant matchsticks of fresh ginger. The precise amount of vinegar is usually up to the eater. But at some restaurants, such as London’s Michelin-starred A. Wong, chefs will inject ginger infused vinegar into the dumpling to achieve the most balanced profile.

Throughout my dumpling experiments, I consulted a few experts whose expertise on the subject amazed me. Christopher St. Cavish, a food writer and xiao long bao connoisseur, knows the soup dumpling from the inside out. I first encountered his work in the Shanghai Soup Dumpling Index, a compendium of soup dumpling statistics from 52 restaurants in Shanghai. When asked to describe the most ideal xiao long bao, he quickly pointed out how their range — thicker versus thinner skinned versions, for example — contrasted with his own particular tastes. Ultimately, he emphasized the importance of fresh over reheated dumplings: “As xiao long bao sit after steaming, the skins thicken as they absorb the liquid from the soup,” he says. “That sort of defeats the purpose of rolling the skin thin, if that’s the style you are going for. A fresh one is always best.”

After my first few successful xiao long bao trials, I got bold, meaning I began to consider the vegan soup dumpling, a combination that has stumped even many seasoned chefs. At Din Tai Fung and Nan Xiang Xiao Long Bao, two famous soup dumpling chains, you’ll find a generous assortment of veggie dumplings but no soupy variations. Supermarket brands such as MìLà and Trader Joe’s have crafted frozen vegan dumplings with jackfruit and plant-based gelatin, much to the delight of fans, but even they’ve admitted to the difficulties of the task.

Home cooks in search of a veggie soup dumpling may have more luck, as I did. Before attempting my own version, I consulted Li, who has successfully made a veggie version with mushrooms and tofu. Those confident in their pleats can race against time: Freeze meatless stock in ice cube trays, chop it up, and quickly fold the icy stock into your chosen filling before it melts. Other recipes call for agar-agar, a thickening agent made from red algae, to create a soupy interior that mimics meaty broth. (Just note that agar’s melting point is quite high and therefore it must be warmed up adequately.) Even with all this planning, there’s still a slim chance the mushroom or tofu interior will suck up all the broth, leaving the final steamed dumpling with no soup. But I still had to try, and was delighted to learn that my combination of a bead curd and mushroom filling with a veggie broth thickened with agar-agar made a delectable slurpable veggie soup dumpling.

For me, xiao long bao in the winter is a cure all for many things: cold, brisk days, seasonal depression, heartbreak, and intense soup cravings. Sure, any regular soup could get you your fix, but isn’t it more fun to bite into a bursting dumpling and slurp out its contents?

I like to think so. As I learned this winter, the process of making homemade xiao long bao may initially seem impenetrable and too exacting. But in practice, the recipe is quite formulaic and no less demanding than making a homemade croissant or a bowl of ramen, especially if you’re not aiming for perfection.

Jess Eng is a food and culture writer based in New York City. Her work appears in the Washington Post, the New York Times, TASTE, and more.
Lily Fossett is a freelance illustrator based in Bath, UK. She has a passion for portraying narrative in her illustrations and uses digital media to explore color and texture.