Chinese Burgers (肉夹馍)






Ingredients:

For Burgers
  • 4 1/2  cup All Purpose Flour
  • 2 Tsp Vegetable Oil
  • 1/4 tsp Baking Soda
  • 1 tsp Yeast
  • 3/4 cup Water
For Fillings

I use Pork and it goes the best for my personal taste.  It could be replaced with Beef as well.  The only thing is that the meat has to have some fat to taste good.  Otherwise, it will come out pretty dry.  For the pork, I use pork belly without skin.
  • 2 lb Pork Belly without Skin
  • 1 Tsp Sichuan Peppers
  • 1 Tsp Salt
  • 6 cup Water
  • Spices:
    • 1 Tsp Sichuan Peppercorn
    • 3 pieces of Star Anise
    • 2 small Cinnamon Stick
    • 3  Bay Leaves
    • 6 Cloves
    • 1 Black Cardamom or 1 Nutmeg
    • 1 tsp Fennel Seeds
  • Seasonings:
    • 3 Tsp of Oil
    • 1 big piece of Ginger
    • 3-5 Dried Chili
    • 3 Tsp Sugar
    • 2  tsp salt, or more if needed
    • 1 tsp dark soy sauce
Preparation:

 Preparation of Pork Fillings -
  1. Cut pork belly into about 5-inch length pieces.  Put them in a big bowl, add 1 Tsp Sichuan Peppers, 1 Tsp Salt, fill the water (about 6 cup) to cover them and soak and refrigerate it overnight.  This is to marinate pork belly.
  2. The next day, take the pork belly out of the bowl.  Make sure you remove Sichuan Peppers from it.  Put water into 6Qt pot, transfer pork belly pieces into it and start boiling them. Remove blood scum as much as possible.  Boil them for about 10 minutes.
  3. Meanwhile, grind spices in the grinder.  Set aside.
  4. Slice ginger into about 8-10 pieces and set aside.
  5. Set aside dried chilli.
  6. After 10 minutes, take pork belly pieces from the pot.  
Preparation of Burgers -
  1. In a bowl, add water and microwave it for 30 seconds.  Add yeast to it and stir them well.
  2. In a big mixing bowl, add the remaining ingredients.  Pour the yeast mix into it.  Mix them with spatula first.  When they are mixed, use the hand to combine them well.  Stop when everything is well combined for the dough.  The dough is a bit dry.  Cover it with the lid or a plastic wrap.  Let it sit for 20 minutes.
  3. After 20 minutes, knead the dough for a few minutes until it is smooth.
  4. Then put it back to the mixing bowl, cover it and let it sit for about 30 to 45 minutes.  We only need the dough rise half way so 30 or 45 minutes sitting is enough.
  5. After 30-45 minutes, take the dough out from the bowl.  Deflate the gas from the dough with palms.  Then, knead it to form a round shape.  Make a hole in the middle of it.  Cut it to become a long dough strip.  Divide it into 10 small pieces of dough.
  6. For each piece of dough, make it to form a round shape.  Then, face the smooth surface downward.  Using the kneading pin, roll it to flatten the dough.  Fold it from the left hand side to the middle.  Again, fold it from the right hand side toward the middle as well.
  7. Roll it with the rolling pin again to flatten the dough.  When it is about one foot long, roll it up from top to the bottom like rolling the cinnamon rolls.  
  8. When you've finished rolling it, stand it up in vertical position.  Use your palm and push it down and flatten it to get the round/circle shape.  Put it in the zip loc bag.  This is to keep it moisturized.  Repeat step#6 through #8 for the remaining pieces.


Putting Everything Together:

 Cooking Pork Fillings-
  1. In a wok on high heat, add oil.  Add sliced ginger and 3 Tsp of Sugar.  When sugar starts sizzling and start turning brown color, turn the heat to low.   Let the sugar caramelize and start bubbling in shiny brown color, quickly add pork belly pieces into it.  Make sure the sugar does not get burnt.  Add grind spices and stir fry them until fragrant.
  2. Add water to the wok.  Water should be at least 0.5 to 1 inch above pork belly pieces.  As the cooking progress, the water will evaporate so it is important the water level is higher than pork belly.  
  3. When the water starts boiling, add 2 tsp of light soy sauce, 1 tsp of salt and 1 tsp of dark soy sauce.  Taste it.  If needed, add more salt. 
  4. You can continue cook it on low heat for another 2-3 more hours.  Alternatively, to expedite cooking time, transfer everything from the wok to Instant Pot.  Cook it with the high pressure for about 30 minutes.  
Cooking Burgers-
1.  To cook the burgers, I use the frying pan.  My frying pan can cook 3 pieces at once.  So, I take out 3 pieces of dough at a time from zip loc bag.  Use the rolling pan to flatten it even more. The final size should be about 4 inch diameter.
2. In a pan on a high heat, add dough pieces and cook them for about 1 minute.  After that, turn the heat to low.  Cover the lid and cook for another 2-3 minutes.  Flip them over to the other side and cook for another 3 minutes.  The total cooking time is about 6-7 minutes.  Transfer to plate after. 
3. Repeat Step#2 for the remaining dough pieces.

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