Make this delicious, soft fluffy steamed buns with natural golden color from carrot juice filled with onion, shredded cabbage, and carrots. Suitable for vegan and vegetarian.
The inspiration for this recipe came from the overflowing supply of carrots in the fridge 🙂 so I was finding ways to use carrots in any recipe I can. The family loves this carrot steamed buns with veggies filling. It’s meatless but satisfying.
HOW TO MAKE SOFT FLUFFY CARROT VEGETABLE STEAMED BUNS
1. PREPARE THE VEGETABLE FILLING
Preheat a large wok or skillet. Add cooking oil. Add onion and saute until soft, about 3-4 minutes.
Add shredded cabbage and stir fry for about 1 minute.
Add vegetable broth and cover with a lid. Cook until the cabbage is soft, about 5 minutes or so. Uncover the lid and add carrots followed by seasonings.
Stir to mix everything and continue to cook until liquid evaporates and the veggie filling is dry. Garnish with chopped green onions. Have a taste and adjust seasonings to your liking. Let the filling cool down completely before wrapping. If preparing ahead, let it cool down completely and then cover and store in the fridge
1. PREPARE CARROT JUICE
Place the carrots and water in a blender and blend into a juice. You will get roughly about 1 cup of juice. You may not need all of the juice.
2. MAKE THE DOUGH
I have step-by-step instructions and video on how to make soft fluffy steamed buns dough post. It’s a similar process, only that this one uses carrot juice instead of milk/water.
3. WRAPPING
Divide the dough into 12 equal portions.
Lightly dust the work surface with some flour. Flatten the dough with your palm and then use a rolling pin to roll it out to form a circle about 4-5 inches, with a slightly thicker middle part. Scoop about 1-2 Tbsp of the filling onto the middle of the dough.
Gather the sides to enclose the bun and pinch to seal the buns. This can be the pattern for the bun or if you flip the bun so the seam side is down, you will just have a smooth round steamed buns.
4. STEAMING
Steam the buns on LOW heat (make sure it’s low and not medium or high) for 10 minutes. If you make larger buns, add another 3-5 minutes. After steaming, turn off the heat. DO NOT OPEN THE LID of the steamer. Let the buns sit there for 1 minute like this. The buns will not sink or wrinkle due to the sudden change in temperature.
POSSIBLE VARIATIONS FOR FILLING
Vegetables: finely chopped green beans, shiitake mushrooms or other mushrooms
Meatless protein: extra-firm tofu cubes, diced tempeh
HOW TO STORE CARROT VEGETABLE STEAMED BUNS
1. Let the already steamed buns cooled down completely
2. Place them on a baking sheet, not touching each other, and then put the entire tray inside the freezer for about 1 hour. They will harden, but not completely frozen yet
3. Transfer to a freezer bag and they will not stick to each other anymore. Try not to keep for more than 1 month
HOW TO REHEAT CARROT VEGETABLE STEAMED BUNS
They can go straight from freezer to steamer when you ready to eat them. Steam on high heat for 5-8 minutes.
DID YOU MAKE THIS CARROT VEGETABLE STEAMED BUNS RECIPE?
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Soft Fluffy Carrot Steamed Buns with Veggies Filling
Ingredients
Steamed buns dough:
- 180 gr all-purpose flour 1 cup + 5 Tbsp, plus more for dusting
- 180 gr cake flour 1 cup + 5 1/2 Tbsp
- 1 ¼ tsp instant yeast
- 30 gr sugar about 2 1/2 Tbsp, more or less to your taste
- 1 Tbsp cooking oil
- ¼ tsp salt
Carrot juice:
- 2 large carrots peeled and roughly chopped
- 250 ml water 1 cup
Veggie filling:
- 1 Tbsp cooking oil
- 1 medium onion peeled and diced
- 300 gr shredded cabbage
- ½ cup vegetable broth
- 200 gr carrot about 2 large carrots, grated
- 2 stalks green onion finely chopped
Seasonings:
- 2 Tbsp vegetarian oyster sauce
- ¼ tsp ground white pepper
- ¼ tsp sugar
- Salt to taste
Instructions
Prepare the veggie filling (can be done the day before):
- Preheat a large wok or skillet. Add cooking oil. Add onion and saute until soft, about 3-4 minutes. Add shredded cabbage and stir fry for about 1 minute. Add vegetable broth and cover with a lid. Cook until the cabbage is soft, about 5 minutes or so
- Uncover the lid and add carrots followed by seasonings. Stir to mix everything and continue to cook until liquid evaporates and the veggie filling is dry. Garnish with a chopped green onions. Have a taste and adjust seasonings to your liking
- Let the filling cool down completely before wrapping. If preparing ahead, let it cool down completely and then cover and store in the fridge
Prepare carrot juice:
- Place the carrots and water in a blender and blend into a juice. You will get roughly about 1 cup of juice. You may not need all of the juice
Prepare the dough with a machine:
- Place the flour, instant yeast, sugar in a mixing bowl. If you are using a stand mixer, use a dough hook attachment. Add 1/2 cup of the carrot juice to start with. Add cooking oil. You may need to add more juice if the dough is still a bit dry. Add more teaspoon by teaspoon until the dough comes together and continue to knead for 10-12 minutes until the dough is very stretchy and smooth
Prepare the dough by hands:
- Place the flour, instant yeast, sugar in a mixing bowl. Mix until you get a rough dough (it's not going to be smooth yet). Cover and rest it for 15 minutes. Then go back and knead it. You'll be surprised by how easier it is to knead it now. Knead until the dough is smooth and pliable, about 15-20 minutes. At any point during kneading, you can always stop and rest the dough if you find it hard to knead. This is to relax the gluten. Then go back to knead again and you'll be surprised by the difference it makes by just resting the dough before kneading again. It's easier for you too
Rest the dough:
- Cover and rest the dough for 15 minutes. This is not to proof the dough. It shouldn't double in size. This is to relax the gluten for easier shaping and rolling the dough
Wrapping:
- Divide the dough into 12 equal portions. Lightly dust the work surface with some flour. Flatten the dough with your palm and then use a rolling pin to roll it out to form a circle about 4-5 inches, with a slightly thicker middle part. This is to support the weight of the filling. Don't roll the dough too thin. If you roll the dough too thin, the filling might make the steamed buns "wrinkle" later when you steam
- Scoop about 1-2 Tbsp of the filling onto the middle of the dough. Gather the sides to enclose the bun and pinch to seal the buns. This can be the pattern for the bun or if you flip the bun so the seam side is down, you will just have a smooth round steamed buns
- Cup the dough with both palms and move the dough in a circular motion to shape it taller. This part is important so your steamed buns come out tall instead of spreading to the side after steaming
Steaming:
- Most likely your steamer won't be able to accommodate steaming all buns at one go, unless you have something like this 3-tier food steamer (which I like to use a lot!). You may need to steam in 2-3 batches, which means, the rest of the batches will sit longer and continue to proof while waiting for the steamer. Not good for the buns! Here's what you can do: Make sure the cover them with plastic wrap and then place them in the refrigerator to slow down the yeast activity or halt it all together until they are ready to be steamed
- Bring the water in your steamer to a boil. Wrap the lid of your steamer with a kitchen towel to prevent moisture dripping back on the steamed buns as this will create "burn" spots
- LOWER THE HEAT TO MEDIUM . Place the buns in there, leaving about 1-inch space in between. Cover with a lid and leave about 1/4-inch gap to let some steam escapes. This helps to prevent wrinkle on the steamed buns. Steam on medium heat for 10 minutes
- After steaming, turn off the heat. DO NOT OPEN THE LID of the steamer. Let the buns sit there for 1 minute like this. The buns will not sink or wrinkle due to the sudden change in temperature
Cooling:
- Remove the buns to a wire rack to let them cool down. This is to ensure the bottom of the steamed buns will not be wet and soggy
Notes
Recommended products:
Check out this Soft and Fluffy No-Yeast Chinese Steamed Buns. These are so good and super easy to make!
9 comments
Made it today for my wife, she loved it. Did use the 50/50 All purpose flour/cake flour mixture for the dough.
Want to try making it again using my starter instead of the instant yeast. Thank you for sharing your recipes and knowledge.
I’m glad it worked out for you David. I want to learn to make steamed buns using sourdough too 🙂
I have an old recipe for steam bread that uses starter that I have used for years. More than happy to share with you if you want.
My starter came out of Alaska back in 1965 and was old then.
Wanted to try your recipe first, and we loved it. Only wanted to try it with my starter, because, the starter came before the commerical yeast.
Most of the Chinese yeast products I have made, used baking soda instead of salt. I didn’t see that with your recipe.
Sure, if you don’t mind sharing it. I would love to try it out!! 🙂
Loving the results from your carrots inspo! The color is gorgeous and the stuffing sounds delicious. One of my favorite things to do on cold weather weekends is to make steamed buns or dumplings, most of them your recipes actually, so it is kind of nice that winter is coming (for that reason only haha). Bookmarked and looking forward to make these – never practiced this specific fold for the wrapper before, will be fun!
Can you freeze these buns before steaming them?
Hi Mary, I would recommend to freeze them AFTER steaming. Let them cool down completely and then place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, not touching each other and let them freeze for about 1 hour, then transfer to a freezer bag. You can simply reheat later without thawing by steaming on the steamer over medium-high heat for 8-10 minutes or until they are heated through. I hope this helps.
The amount of yeast stated above is 1/4 tsp, while your “how to make soft fluffy steamed buns” recipe uses 1 1/4 tsp yeast. Mistake?
Hi Tammy, Yes, it’s typing error. It should be 1 1/4 tsp. Thank you for catching that. I’ve updated it accordingly.