Makes 20 buns

Ingredients:

For the dough: 6 cups All-purpose flour, 1 tbsp Sugar, 2 cups Water, lukewarm, 2 tsp Yeast, ½ tsp oil

For stuffing: 2 lbs Ground pork- (1.5lbs lean), 1 clove garlic, finely chopped, 1 tsp fresh grated ginger, 2 small spring onions (whites), finely chopped, Water, Soy sauce, Sichuan pepper powder, White pepper powder, Salt

Making the dough

1. Measure out flour into a large bowl.
2. Mix 2 tsp yeast, 1 tbsp sugar, and 1 cup of lukewarm water into a measuring cup. 
3. Pour the water into the flour and mix.
4. Add more lukewarm water gradually if necessary. Generally, the ratio of flour to water is 2:1, but it can vary.
5. Begin to knead the dough, incorporating the dry flour. If more water is needed to incorporate all the dry flour, add more, but do so sparingly because the dough should not be sticky. The sign of a good dough is a clean bowl and clean hands.
6. Coat the inside of the big bowl with a small amount of oil, to prevent sticking. Place the dough back in the bowl, cover with a wet towel to preserve moisture, and put the bowl on top of a bowl or pot of hot water. Allow the dough to rise. This may take a few hours, depending on the room’s temperature. (To check if the dough is ready, poke a hole in it with your finger. If the dough bounces back to fill in the hole, it needs to rise more. If the dough deflates, it has risen for too long. If the dough does not move, it is ready.)

Making the stuffing (While waiting for the dough to rise, begin making your stuffing)

1. Put the ground pork into a bowl.
2. Put the chopped garlic into 1 cup of warm water to make garlic water. This will distribute the garlic flavor better. Set aside so that the garlic can release more flavor. 
3. Add the ginger, garlic water (with the garlic), the two pepper powders, salt, soy sauce, and green onion to the pork and stir in one direction.
4. Add water to the pork and stir.

Wrapping/steaming the baozi

1. Take the risen dough and knead the air out.
2. Separate the dough into 20 balls and flatten them slightly by rolling them out with a rolling pin.
3. Roll the edges thinner. 
4. Wrap the meat into each one.
5. Let the baozi rest for around 1 hour, or your baozi will deflate.
6. Steam the baozi for 15 minutes after steam starts coming out of the steamer. Remove steamer from heat and leave baozi inside the steamer until the initial hot steam is gone. Otherwise, your baozi will also deflate. 

Photo credit: My mom