Steamed Bao Buns (Fluffy Chinese Bao)

Dough

1. Combine the all purpose flour, wheat starch, baking powder, yeast, and sugar into the mixing bowl with the dough hook attachment. Set to the lowest / stirring speed until all the mixture is evenly distributed.
2. Turn the mixer speed up slightly to level 2.
3. In a small mixing bowl, combine the milk and oil. Slowly add the liquid into the mixer.
4. Turn up the speed to level 5. When the dough turns into a ball and releases from the sides of the mixing bowl, continue to knead on medium (about level 5) for 5 more minutes. If necessary, scrape down the sides of the bowl. It’s done when the ball of dough should look smooth with no lumps and completely detach from the sides of the bowl. See photo for final texture.
5. Remove the dough from the mixer, and use your hands to form it into a ball. On a clean surface, hover your hands over the ball while making a heart with your thumbs and fingers, and make circular movements with the ball to get a tight, smooth surface.
6. Place the ball into a bowl, cover it with a lid, and let it rest for about 5 minutes to give the dough a break from kneading--you don’t want to overwork your dough.
7. Poke the ball of dough, if it leaves a mark from your finger and doesn’t spring back, you can begin to roll it into balls.
8. Transfer the ball onto a clean surface, remove the excess gas from the dough by kneading it a few times with the heel of your hand.

Forming & proofing

1. Weigh your entire dough ball to get its final weight. If you followed this recipe without scaling it up or down, it should be approximately 515 grams.
2. Portion out smaller dough balls with a knife, weighing each one to be 32 grams. This will give us 16 bao total if you didn't scale the recipe. Repeat until all the smaller dough balls are portioned out. Keep the unused balls of dough under a towel to prevent them from drying out.
3. Take one piece and roll it around until it turns into a ball.
4. Use a rolling pin to make it into a 2 ½ x 4 inch oval.
5. Lightly brush on the vegetable oil on top and fold it in half. This is your completed bao.
6. Place it on top of a parchment paper lined steamer. Make sure each bao is separated by at least 1 ½ inches since these expand when cooked.
7. Repeat until you have all the bao made. Note: If you cannot fit all of the proofed bao into your steamer at once, place the remaining bao in the fridge to prevent them from proofing more. Chilling them should slow down the proofing process. Remove them from the fridge about 5 minutes before the proofing and steaming process to get them to room temperature.
8. Proof the bao. Add hot, but not boiling water to a sauce pot and place the steamer on top. Add the bao to the steamer. Cover with a lid and let rest for 30 minutes.

Steaming

1. After proofing, uncover and check the dough, they should be at least 1 ½ times bigger. Cover again with the lid and turn on the stove to high heat. When the water begins to boil, lower to low and continue to steam for 20 minutes. Make sure the heat is high enough to generate steam the whole time, and add additional water if it runs too low.
2. After 20 minutes of steaming, remove the pot from the stove and let the steamer rest for 4 minutes before opening the lid. This will prevent the bao from deflating from temperature shock.
3. Uncover the lid and serve the bao with your preferred fillings immediately.