Chinese Sesame Seed Spring Onion / Scallions Yeasted Pancakes 芝麻香葱烙饼

&version;If you are familiar with northern China cuisine, I'm sure that you will know or maybe like the Chinese scallion pancakes which is commonly known as 葱油饼 (pronounce as cōngyóubǐng in pinyin). For those who don't know, 葱油饼 is a Chinese savoury pancake which folded with a generous amount of oil and finely sliced scallions or spring onions. It is characteristically made from a basic water and flour dough and typically not yeasted.
Instead of cooking 葱油饼 today, I'm cooking another different scallions pancakes and they are called 葱烙饼! Can you know or see the difference?
Unlike 葱油饼 (cōngyóubǐng), 葱烙饼 (cōnglàobǐng) is typically made with yeasted dough. Unlike 葱油饼 again, 葱烙饼 are usually larger like the size of a large pizza and are thicker with doughy and chewy center. What I like about laobing is they are crispy on their outside but never as oil-soaking like SOME youbing. I remember eating super oily youbing before... The badly cooked youbing are like dripping with oil. Ewww!!!
According to a Taiwanese food author, Carol Hu, the way to cook good laobing with crispy outside plus soft, spongy and chewy inside is to incorporate an overnight sponge dough and a cooked dough into a main pancake dough. Sound complicated??? Not really when you see how I cooked mine.

Chinese sesame seed spring onion pancakes 芝麻香葱烙饼

On the night before, I made an overnight sponge dough.
On the cooking day, I made the cooked dough and combined all with other ingredients to form a pancake dough

When the dough has doubled in size, I gathered these ingredients...

... and add them into the finely sliced spring onions.

The dough is easy to handle! I don't even need to flour the rolling pin and the rolling area.

Take one end of the dough and roll it towards the other end to form a log like this.

Roll the log into a spiral shape and allow the pancake to rest until it looks puffy.

Gently roll dough into a large and thin round shape ...

During cooking, the thinly rolled panacake will rise into a thicker pancake.

To ensure that the inside of the pancake is fully cooked, I covered the frying pan with a large aluminum foil and bake the pancake in a preheated hot oven  for 10 minutes.

The pancake is ready!
Just slice and serve with extra sliced spring onion if you wish.

See this... It is NOT oily at all!!!
It is crispy, soft, chewy and yummy!

Here are the recipes adapted and translated from the book, the first book of noodles for beginners by Carol Hu

Make 1 large pancake that can serve 6-8

A

Overnight sponge - make approximately 50g
30g all purpose flour, with 9-10% protein
a pinch of yeast
1 tbsp (15ml) water, plus 2-5ml more if the dough is too dry
a small pinch of salt

Combine all ingredients in A to form a dough. Knead dough for 7-8 mins until smooth.

Place dough in a bowl. Cover it with a cover or cling wrap and allow it to prove overnight in the fridge.

B

Cooked dough:
100g bread flour, with at least 12% protein
1/8 tsp salt
50ml hot water, plus 5ml more if the dough is too dry

Combine bread flour and salt in a mixing bowl. Pour hot water into the flour and stir immediately so that the hot water can be absorbed into the flour mixture. Knead for 7-8 mins until the dough is smooth and firm. Cover dough with a cling wrap and allow it to rest for at least 30 mins in room temperature.

C

Pancake dough:
all of the above overnight sponge (A)
all of the above cooked dough (B)
150ml water, plus 5-10ml more if the dough is too dry
270g bread flour with at least 12% protein
30g all purpose flour with 9-10% protein
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp yeast
20g sugar
20ml vegetable oil

Using a breadmaker or by hand, combine all ingredients listed in C and knead for about 10-15 mins or until dough is elastic and smooth and prove the dough in a warm place for 60-90 mins or until the dough doubled in size.

D

Spring onion filling:
6-7 spring onions, washed, thoroughly drained, finely sliced
2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground white pepper
2-3 tbsp white sesame seeds
1 tbsp sesame oil

Combine all the spring onion filling ingredient listed in D. Set aside. Place dough on a lightly floured surface. Using a rolling pin, roll dough it into a large and round shape (about 35 cm diameter) with 0.5 cm thickness. Spread spring filling evenly on the rolled dough. From one end of the dough, roll the dough toward the other end like a Swiss roll to form a long log. Take one of the log and roll it along the length of the log to form a spiral shape. Transfer dough onto a large tray and cover with a cling wrap. Allow the pancake to rest for 30 mins or until the pancake look puffy.

E

2 tbsp vegetable oil

Preheat oven to 200°C or 400°F or 180°C fan forced.

Using medium heat, heat vegetable oil in a large and flat oven proof frying pan. While heating, roll the puffy pancakes into a large round shape (about 30 cm diameter) with 1.5-2 cm thickness. Transfer the pancakes to cook on the frying pan until both sides are golden.

To ensure the pancake is well cooked at its inside, leave the pancake in the frying pan, cover the frying pan with a large piece of aluminum foil and place the covered frying pan into the oven and bake for 10-15 mins or until the pancake is well risen and cooked.

Cut into wedges and serve immediately with congee or any Chinese soup with thick consistency.

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