Let's Make Tae Tae!

Tae tae, tae tae…my childhood in thick dumpling skin. Tae (or tae tae as youngsters call it) is a wheat starch-based dumpling that’s filled with char siu, mushrooms, shrimp, and scallions. It’s then steamed until perfection (aka a translucent dough) and can then be enjoyed hot or at room temperature. I’ve been eating these for as long as I can remember, with my Pau Pau making them hot and fresh whenever we’d come to visit and always sending us home with a package or two. Now just a heads up, I am nowhere near the kind of cook my Pau Pau is (neither is my mom…she nearly burned down the house steaming these puppies), so they don’t look as pretty as hers do, but it’s a time honoured tradition that I want to share with all of you. So with that said, let’s get started!

Ingredients:

• roughly 2 cups of finely chopped Chinese BBQ pork 
• roughly 12-15 large shrimp, cleaned and deveined 
• 1 cup shiitake mushrooms 
• scallions (to your taste) 
• 1-2 packages of wheat starch (depending on how much dough you’re making) 
• 1/2-1 cup boiling water
• 3-5 tablespoons olive oil, with additional oil for the steamer

Directions:

1. Chop all ingredients into fine pieces and mix in a large glass bowl. 
2. Empty the entire contents of a package of wheat starch into a pot. Add just enough hot water to form a moist but not sticky dough. Add a few tablespoons of olive oil to prevent stickiness. (for example, this dough is too sticky and lacks oil)
3. Take a golf-ball sized piece of dough and flatten it out on a greased surface as thin as you can (A/N – I used a spatula to push the edges out from the centre). 
4. Working carefully, form scalloped edges along one half of the dough, creating something similar to a conch shell. Fill with the filling, leaving enough dough to fold over and seal. 
5. Fold over the other edge and pinch the two sides closed, keeping the scalloped edge if possible (it’s a lot trickier than it looks, trust me). 
6. Place in a circle on a greased steamer and steam for 10-15 minutes, depending on the thickness of your dumpling skin (A/N – ignore that ball of dough and filling in the centre. I got a little carried away and that was the result of my frustration kekeke). 
7. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE ENOUGH WATER TO STEAM! This may sound silly, but my mom nearly burned our house down when she neglected the pan and didn’t realise it had run out of water. Needless to say, there were several burned tae, burned metal, and a terrible smell in our house for days.
8. After the 10-15 minutes are up and the skins are translucent, remove the taes and place them on a plate to cool (it’s ok if they touch, they won’t stick). When cooled to your liking, pick one up and enjoy! Nom nom nom! >.<