Mystery of the Mantou Shanghai

mantou and sweet coffee - Shangers Brekkie of Champions

Ah Shangers - not the home of fluffy, doughy, steamed pork buns I had expected. One of the only such buns I experienced in the whole 6 weeks of an amazing China food journey  was breakfast on the first day. I ventured forth, bleary eyed on our first morning in Shanghai - the sun already moving in a blistering arc across the sky.

On the first street corner I came to - there they were: bāozi from Babi Mantou. The beauty of Babi is that they have a menu with some English on it - and all I had to do was point at the zhū ròu bāozi characters and say "qǐng liǎng ge" (two please). Done. These were as close to the Vietnamese Bánh Bao as I could imagine - a lovely savoury pork meatball inside a slightly sweet steamed fluffy dough. The meatball is mixed with cabbage, spring onion, ginger, garlic and have a zingy white peppery bite.

Over the next week or two, as I roamed the eat streets of Shanxi and Ningbo Lu, I also had a go at buying a pork bun at a few of these ubiquitous street stalls - but I am ashamed to say - my Mandarin let me down. There is generally no English menu at these joints and so the point and go method simply doesn't work.

A typical interaction would go - Me: "yŏu méi yŏu zhū ròu bāozi?" (do you have any pork buns?)  The shī fu looks quizzical and starts lifting the lids off every steamer, talking too quickly - possibly in Shanghainese which I don't understand. I might say "qǐng nǐ shuō màn yīdiăr" (can you speak more slowly). They don't - they just speak more loudly. Eventually I hold up my hand in a stop sign, point at a bun that looks like it may be a pork bāozi and say "Zhèige!" (this one!). So far I have had baozi full of vegetables - qingcai baozi  filled with marinated tofu, mushrooms and bok choy, spicy rice noodles, and...well - mystery meat - maybe chicken...but no pork.

Generally - Shangers is a baozi paradise - but we're talking Shengjian: small, pan-fried baozi and of course Xiaolong Bao from Xiao Yangs! My favourite breakfast dish was in fact Cong You Bing whipped up on the side of the road in our favourite eat street Shanxi Lu. See my handy-dandy street food round up for more.

Xiao Long Bao from Yangs.

Shenjian mantou - fabulous pork filled parcels baked golden brown on the bottom and sprinkled with
sesame seeds....the larger hungry-girl size...(niurou baozi).

...or Yang's diminutive version...

Shengjian mantou

...and Guo tie - pot stickers - juicy pork dumplings served fresh from the steamer on every street corner in our 'hood.

One baozi I just couldn't get behind was the Nan Xiang giant xiaolongbao with crab roe.

unfortunately for me - about as appetising as this looks

you can suck out the crab roe with a straw....yairs...

no. just no. 

...but  I digress... 

There are also mouth watering Taiwanese style bao - which are like sandwiches - the Gua Bao - braised pork belly with pickled greens, coriander, and peanut powder. Nom.

Of course Beijing also has a respectable line of ... no, let's save that for another post.