How to make Taiwanese style spring onion pancakes 蔥油餅

Following on from our recipe and video for Shen-Bin 牛肉餡餅 is this Tong-Yo-Bin, which simply means “spring onion, oil pancake”. These pancakes are a great side dish, a bread which in other cuisines might be substituted by nan bread or garlic bread. If you follow Joanne’s method properly you will have a multi-layered flaky pancake that is not doughy, but is crispy and breaks into flakes which you can dip or eat alongside the rest of your meal. Also once the pancakes are prepared you can store the uncooked 蔥油餅 pancakes in the fridge or freeze them to be fried at a later date.

As mentioned previously we made the dough just like for the for the Shen-Bin 牛肉餡餅 where some dough was left over. I will now go through the ingredients and method.

The ingredients 食材 are as follows;

• 500g plain flour
• 1 Chinese bowl of spring onions (scallions), chopped
• 1 tbsp of sesame seeds
• 3 tbsp of vegetable oil

spring onion (scallion) pancake, looking good

The method, the pastry / bread 作法;

1. first ‘burn’ the flour – to the 500g flour add 150ml of boiling water
2. stir this in with your chopsticks – it’s hot!
3. once cooler you can mix it in with your hands
4. then add 150ml of cold water, bit by bit, perhaps 1/4 at a time
5. when mixed thoroughly take out of the bowl and knead it on a flour covered worktop, using the ‘3 shining principle’ it will be well kneaded when your hands, the bread and the worktop are all ‘shining clean’!
6. make a ball and cover this dough with cling film, we’ll come back to it later

Prepare and Cook

1. flatten out a piece of dough about the size off your fist, roll it until it’s a circle of about 15cm or 6 inches
2. spread 1 tbsp of vegetable oil of your choice over the surface
3. add the chopped scallion/spring onion
4. sprinkle the sesame seeds over the surface
5. roll the pancake into a cylinder, then will this roll make it into a circle like a caterpillar rolling into a circle
6. now get your rolling pin and flatten out this circle into a pancake again
7. add oil to your frying pan, about 2 tbsp
8. use a medium heat
9. when the oil is ready add the spring onion pancake 蔥油餅
10. when golden turn over, turn again to ensure crispiness
11. serve it as a side dish, it’s great with food that has lots of sauce

As usual Joanne has recorded a cooking video so you can follow the exact method step by step, as she prepares the scallion pancakes. It’s especially good to see the rolling and folding technique, which if you are in a rush, you can skip the video to about 1 minute and just watch that bit!

Taiwanese style spring onion pancakes 蔥油餅 cooking video

Stay tuned for more help, advice, cooking and shopping! The next recipe will be raspberry smoothie and jam.