Fiction To Sink Your Teeth Into, a feature from author and professional chef Rohan O’Duill!

As the characters take on their roles as city boroughs and scramble to find each, other they get offered a plate of Mrs. Yu’s Baozhi dumplings. It is hungry work becoming a city after all. These dumplings do require a bit of skill but they will be well worth it as you bite into one and enjoy Jemisin’s beautifully written book.

Snack/meal Ingredients

Dough
• 250g plain flour
• 1 tsp dried yeast
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tbsp oil
• Warm water until forms a dough

Filling
• 1 carrot
• ½ courgette
• 1 small onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 thumb of ginger
• Tsp 5 spice
• Tsp honey
• Tbsp soya sauce

Alternatives: you can use all kinds of veg in your filling as well as pork, chicken, beef or prawn.

Equipment
Stand mixer, frying pan, steamer. (I picked up my steamer in the local Asian market for about a 10 euro. You just pop it on top of a pot.

Method
Put all the dry ingredients for the bread dough into the mixing bowl. With the dough hook start to beat, slowly add the water until you get a nice dough consistency.(It should come away from the edges) pour over the oil and stand in a warm place for two hours.
Finely dice your vegetables and gently fry until golden brown, add the spice and fry for another minute.
Add honey and soya sauce and allow to reduce to a sticky sauce, (should only take a couple of minutes.) Once your dough has risen, put it back into the mixer and mix until it is back down to its original size. Cut the dough up into ten portions.
To make the parcels is difficult to describe, so I am going to leave it to the expert. Check out this youtube video to see how it should be done.

Once you have your dumplings, place on a small piece of parchment in the steamer and put over a pot of cold water. Heat the water and turn sown to a steady simmer. Cook for 15 minutes. You will need to rotate through the steamer twice. But don’t worry, these dumplings will last for a few days if you don’t get through them all in one sitting.

Now you are ready to sit down with this truly absorbing book and get stuck in to your delicious baozhi. Enjoy!