Cute custard filled bao

Bao can be so much fun! These custard filled steamed buns have even been steamed in the Instant Pot.

Days like today when it is all gloomy and rainy and cold outside I always feel like baking.

I wasn’t in the mood for bread (if you are, then find my trusted recipe here: Freshly baked bread), but I did feel like something sweeter.

Recently I made some steamed bao and I really liked that dough. It was easy to work with and didn’t need any floured surface. I thought it would be perfect to make some cute bao animals!

For this post I am not sharing any new recipes with you; I am simply going to show you what I have made using the recipes that are already posted here:

Making the custard

It is no secret that I’ve used custard powder for this recipe. I’ve done this for the simple reason that I needed the custard to be very thick. In order for me to be able to pre-fill the buns prior to cooking the custard needs to be able to hold itself in a ball so it doesn’t leak or spill whilst being decorated.

I’ve split the custard mixture in half and added milk chocolate to one of the halves to create a rich, velvety chocolate custard. Once the custard reached the desired thickness, I spooned the two different flavours into separate bowls and covered them in clingfilm by letting the film touch the surface of the custard. This will ensure that the custard doesn’t form a film on the top (although that is my favourite part of custard!).

Dividing the dough and filling the bao

I always weigh my dough and then divide it into equally weighted pieces. Thinking back on it now, I would’ve liked the dough to be a touch thicker as I have rolled it very thinly which lead to some of the bao to be see-through. I also still need to find a technique to close the bottom part a bit neater. Nevertheless, I took the pieces of dough and divided one of the pieces to allow me to colour the dough into different colours. I needed pink for the piglets’ noses, ears and tails as well as the dogs’ tongue, black for the eyes and dogs’ noses, and yellow to make the dogs’ features. I just used gel colours from our local supermarket and they really worked great.

I rolled out the dough into rounds that would fit in the palm of my hand. I then took a cold scoop of custard and placed it in the middle before crimping and sealing the bottom. I made all the ‘bodies’ first and left them under a damp tea towel before I started to decorate.

Decorating the bao

Decorating was so much easier than I thought! I had a little bowl of cold water next to me that acted as the ‘glue’ to keep things together and it really worked a treat. I also made extensive use of a toothpick to help me push the piglets’ noses into the bun, hence creating the nostrils.

For the piglets’ tails I just took a small piece of dough and rolled it so it was thinner and sharper at one end and thicker on the other. With the help of my trusty toothpick I curled them with the thin side meant to be the outside and the thicker side to be attached to the body with a dab of water. The ears where made by rolling a tiny piece of dough into a teardrop shape and using the toothpick and a dab of water to stick the rounded bit of the teardrop into the dough body. The eyes where just two tiny black balls of dough attached with a dab of water.

For the dog ears I took two pieces of dough and stretched them into ovals before pinching one end together. The pinched part has been attached to the body with a dab of water. I wanted the dog to have a ‘patch’ over one eye and therefore just took the same yellow dough to make this – there was no shape to it as I wanted it to look ‘natural’. The nose and eyes where just black dough (a bit of the undyed dough for the pupils) and the tongue was the same as how I made the piglets’ ears to be honest.

Steaming the bao

This part I used my trusty Instant Pot for. It comes with a trivet and a steamer basket. I’ve purchased a glass lid separately that fits so nicely on top. With the sauté function it was quite easy to steam these without much effort. The only downside was that I could only fit two buns at a time. It steamed for around 7-9 minutes. If I am very honest; the bao was so much cuter before I steamed them!

Final thoughts

These were hands down the cutest bao I’ve ever attempted. Although they were a bit fiddly and it took an unspeakable amount of time to create, it was so much fun!

Have you ever tried to make something like this? What other shapes should I try? Please let me know in the comments.

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