This shaobing is a sort of bread/pastry that has a crisp exterior covered with sesame seeds and a layered interior that provides some bite. While the shaobing has quite a large variation of styles depending on the region and whether it's sweet or savory, if you're eating a shaobing, you're most likely having a pleasant experience that you'd describe with words like crunchy, crispy, flaky, aromatic (from the toasted sesame), and chewy.
The best way to understand the importance of shaobing to the Taiwanese breakfast is perhaps by comparison to a classic American diner. While at the American diner, you would expect to find eggs, toast, bacon, hash brown, sausage, and pancakes, when you go to a classic Taiwanese breakfast vendor, you'd find a mix and match combination of shaobing, scallion omelette, youtiao (Chinese fried dough/stick), danbing, soymilk, etc.
The recipe I'll be sharing with you today is a classic savory version that's typically used for sandwiching youtiao and eggs, but you can use it like you would a pita bread or tortilla and put veggies, meat or whatever you like in it.
After much research, tweaking, and testing, I've finally developed this recipe of shaobing that I think most resembles what you would find if you fly to Taiwan today and visit a local breakfast vendor (except this recipe is likely even better!).
This version, I believe, is also tasty enough to snack on by itself. Certainly my family thinks so, since we finished most of our shaobing before I even got around to trying to put something into them!
If you like this recipe, make sure you also try my
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Chinese Sesame Flatbread (Shaobing)
Ingredients
Dough
- 200 g all purpose flour plus more for dusting, 1 ⅔ cup
- ½ teaspoon sea salt
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 50 g hot water (around 195°F, 90°C), ¼ cup
- ¼ teaspoon instant yeast
- 70 g cold water, ⅓ cup
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil plus more for greasing
Oil paste
- 35 g vegetable oil, 2 ½tbsp
- 50 g cake flour, ⅓ cup
Topping
- 4 tablespoon toasted white sesame seeds
- 1-2 teaspoon black sesame seeds, optional
Instructions
Making the dough
- Mix flour, salt and sugar together in a mixing bowl before adding in hot water. Stir and mix with chopsticks/fork until it becomes lumpy.
- Add yeast, cold water and oil; stir with chopsticks/fork until the liquid is all absorbed by the flour, and then knead until a dough is form. The dough will be very sticky, so just knead until you're able to form a rough ball. Grease the dough with oil and cover with plastic wrap before allowing it to rest for 20 - 30 minutes so that it'd be easier to roll out later.
Making the oil paste
- Meanwhile, heat the oil in a small pan on medium heat until it's hot. Add in the cake flour and stir until smooth. Continue to cook and stir until it darkens a bit and becomes aromatic. Pour the paste in a bowl and let it cool down.
- Preheat the oven to 425°F (220°C)
Forming the bread
- Dust the working surface with a thin layer of flour, roll the dough out to an approximately 10" x 16" rectangle.
- Spread the oil paste by spatula or by hand on the dough, leaving ½ inch on the top.
- Roll the dough from the bottom all the way up, pinching the seam at the end to close.
- Cut the roll into 6 even pieces and gently press each piece down to flatten a bit and bring the two "cut" sides to the middle and pinch them together (it's ok if they don't stay together perfectly).
- Gently roll each piece out to an oval shape and then fold the top third of the dough down and the bottom third up. After finishing all six pieces, repeat this step again for each piece. Always fold the side with oil paste in so that we'd end up with a smooth surface. Cover and let rest for 10 minutes.
- Put sesame seeds in a small plate and lightly press the smooth side of each piece of dough into the plate of sesame seeds.
Baking
- Roll each piece out to about a 3" x 6" rectangle. Place the pieces on a lined baking sheet and bake for 12 minutes or until the top is golden brown.
- If you are storing these for later, simply toast them in a toaster oven for 3 -5 minutes and they will be just as good as when they're fresh.
- If you want to stuff things inside, simply cut the side with a pair of scissors and open it like a book.
This looks great! But do you need the cake flour or can I just use all purpose flour as a substitute? Thanks!
Hi Carol, I haven't tried this, but I think it will work just fine. I would try add a bit less (maybe 2 tsp ~ 1 tbsp less) if using AP flour. Just make sure that the oil paste is spreadable yet not too runny 🙂
Just tried this recipe, and my parents (who grew up in Taiwan) love it! It turned out beyond our expectations - thank you! Now I am trying to scale the recipe up, but the "2x" and "3x" buttons in the recipe do not appear to be working. Can you please advise?
Hi Dee, I'm so happy that your parents like it! Thank you for letting me know the buttons are not working, it should work now, but it will only change the the number of gram as I put the cups on the note...
It works! Wasn't sure if there were some items you don't double or triple but looks like everything scales up in the same ratio. Thanks!!
Awesome!
Hi!
The cup measurements are way off. The AP flour is a little over 1C, not 1 2/3 C.
Hi David, this recipe was developed using a kitchen scale, the cup measurement was derived from conversion using this link: https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/learn/ingredient-weight-chart. I personally prefer and recommend everyone to bake using weights and not cup measurements, since it's not as precise and everyone's 1 cup might be a little different.
I'm confused when it comes to the rolling the pieces parts 😰 The pictures provided are confusing too. Specifically steps 3-5 in 'forming the bread' and first step in 'baking'. I'm sorry to ask, but can you help? 🙁 I really want to try Shaobing
Hi Meyan, of course! I guess your problem might be the word "rolling"? Step 3 means you roll the dough with your hands like if you would roll a sushi roll, and "from the bottom" means that you are rolling the dough from the edge nearest to you all the way up to the edge aware from you. You can refer to pictures 6 and 7 for clarification for this. For step 4, you should cut that log of rolled up dough like how you would cut a sushi roll (but into 6 pieces). Next, you want to press down a bit on each piece of dough and take the left and right sides (edges that were cut by your knife) and fold them up into the middle and pinch it together. After that step, your dough should look like picture 8. Step 5 is basically picture 9, where you'd roll each piece of dough out (in the same orientation that you had at the end of step 4) with a rolling pin and fold it like a tri-fold wallet -- folding the top third of the rolled out dough down and the bottom third of the dough up, and then you roll each piece out again before folding it again in the same way. And for the first step of baking, you just roll the dough out with rolling pin to make it flat, like what's shown in the last picture, before you bake. I can try taking some videos/gifs when I get chance, so that it'd be easier to understand.
Just had this in a restaurant today and we're all in love!!! Happy you clarified rolling instructions! I got lost too! I'm wondering if red bean paste or sweet potato would be a good filling? Sounds yummy to me!
Hi Angie, actually there are many different kinds of Shoabing, this particular type usually has no filling in it because we use it like taco shells and put whatever we want inside after it's baked. So for sure you can put whatever you'd like in your shaobing! There are other types of shaobing that have filling sealed and baked into the shaobing. I myself haven't tried red bean paste or sweet potato in shaobing, but that sounds like something worth trying!
i tried making this and it was SOOO sticky, just like you warned. When kneading such sticky dough, how long do i knead it for? i couldn't get a 'rough ball' because whenever i tried to lift up my ball, it actually stretched back out bc it was stuck to my silicon mat from being so sticky. Even after resting, it was still sticky so i add flour as i am rolling it out to 10x16 rectangle. Then after cutting the 6 sections, it is still sticky so i continue to add more flour only because the dough was sticking to the rolling pin as well as to my hands. any tips? did i add too much water?
Hi Jamie, I would suggest working on a thicker chopping board or on a clean counter and knead it with the help of a bench knife on one hand for folding the dough while the other hand pushes the dough out. After forming into a ball, you grease the surface with oil so that the oil will prevent the dough from sticking, and you can also dust some flour on the working surface when rolling the dough. However, if the dough is too sticky to work with, I would just add more flour, since the flour characteristics will vary among brands and the humidity of your location affects things as well. Hope that helps!
Another great recipe! I appreciate the weighed ingredients because it's so much more precise when making bread. My dough turned out perfectly without any additional flour. I think I need to try out the dan bing recipe next!
You are right, Kim! Weighing ingredients is the key to success 🙂
I have looked for this recipe, literally for years. My husband and I were stationed in Taiwan yrs ago and used to go to Mongolian Barbecue all of the time. So wonderful to open the bread with chopsticks and stuff the Mongolian Barbecue in. Thank you so much for this wonderful sought after recipe !
That sounds delicious! Feel free to let me know if you are looking for any other Taiwanese recipes, I will see if I can post them 🙂
Absolutely delicious! My entire family devoured these! Would definitely make these again and again and again. Thanks for the recipe.
Hi Jeanne, I am so happy to hear your family enjoy it! Wish you and your family have a wonderful holiday 🙂
So happy I discovered this site!! Cannot wait to try this and also the scallion pancakes! I grew up with a Shanghainese cook and these remind me of her cooking! Thank you!
Hi Doreen, I'm so happy to hear that! Hope you enjoy making them 🙂
Thank you so much for this -- my dad loves these types of foods and said "it definitely tastes like a shao bing!".... I made it as surprise; he ate THREE in one day!
That's wonderful!! I'm so happy your dad enjoyed it. You must did a great job making them! 🙂
Hi Edwina,
Thanks for sharing this recipe! I'm wondering if the dough can be made in advance and frozen? Then I bake it in the oven when I want to eat one?
Thank you!
Hi Emily, yes you can!
Amazing recipe, I substituted the vegetable oil with butter and even added a dash of sesame oil in the oil paste. Magnificent!
Thank you so much! Using butter with sesame oil sounds delicious!
can you fry these in a pan instead?
Hi Lydia, I think it should work but since I've never tried it before, I don't know if the result will be the same.
These are delicious, a keeper, light, flaky, crunchy with seeds and so easy to make.
I did not use cake flour, just plain flour and I used the cup measurements. Great recipe, thank you.
Thank you, Glen! I'm glad to hear you enjoy them 🙂