Name: Har Gow (Crystal Shrimp Dumplings)
Prep time: 1 h
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 1 h 10 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Chinese
Ingredients: 100 g wheat starch; 25 g tapioca starch; 0.25 tsp salt; 150 ml boiling water; 1 tbsp lard; 300 g raw shrimp; 1 tsp salt; 1 tbsp potato starch; 40 g bamboo shoot; 30 g pork back fat; 0.5 tsp salt; 1 tsp sugar; 0.25 tsp white pepper; 1 tsp sesame oil; 2 tsp potato starch; 2 tbsp soy sauce; 1 tsp chilli oil

Ingredients

4servings

Wrapper
wheat starch · cheng mian: wheat flour with the gluten washed out, sold as wheat starch in Chinese groceries. There is no substitute100 g
tapioca starch · this is what makes it chewy; potato starch also works25 g
salt0.25 tsp
boiling water · it has to be at a full boil; at 90C the dough comes out crumbly150 ml
lard · or neutral oil; it is what keeps the dough from cracking1 tbsp
Filling
raw shrimp · peeled weight; thaw frozen shrimp fully and squeeze dry300 g
salt · for scrubbing the shrimp, then rinsed off1 tsp
potato starch · for scrubbing the shrimp, then rinsed off1 tbsp
bamboo shoot · blanched and finely diced; without the crunch the filling falls flat40 g
pork back fat · optional, but it is what makes the filling juicy; finely minced30 g
Filling seasoning
salt0.5 tsp
sugar1 tsp
white pepper0.25 tsp
sesame oil1 tsp
potato starch · holds on to the moisture the shrimp release2 tsp
To serve
soy sauce · for dipping; in Canton they are usually eaten plain2 tbsp
chilli oil · optional1 tsp

Steps

Scrub the shrimp with 1 tsp salt and 1 tbsp potato starch for a minute, then rinse twice in cold water. It strips the surface slime, which sharpens the flavour and clears the colour.
⏲ 5 min
Dry the shrimp completely on kitchen paper. Any water left here turns to liquid in the filling as it steams and bursts the wrapper from the inside — the usual way har gow fail.
⏲ 3 min
Leave half the shrimp whole, or cut only into two large pieces, and chop the other half. The chopped half binds the filling, the whole pieces give you something to bite. Chop it all and you get fish cake.
⏲ 5 min
Mix the shrimp, bamboo shoot and pork fat with the salt, sugar, white pepper, sesame oil and 2 tsp potato starch, stirring in one direction only for 2 minutes until it turns tacky. Cover and rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
⏲ 30 min
Whisk the wheat starch, tapioca starch and salt together. The 4:1 ratio is there because wheat starch alone gives a cooked wrapper that tears easily.
⏲ 2 min
Bring the water to a full boil and pour it in all at once while stirring fast with chopsticks. Added in stages you get lumps of cooked starch amongst raw. In 30 seconds it becomes one translucent mass.
⏲ 1 min
Add the lard and knead by hand for 3-4 minutes while it is still hot, until smooth and as soft as an earlobe. Left to cool first, it goes crumbly and will not come together again. Keep it under a damp cloth.
⏲ 5 min
Divide into 12g balls (about 20). Oil the worktop and the flat of a cleaver, then press and smear each ball out with the blade into a thin 8cm round; a rolling pin also works. Keep the rest covered as you go.
⏲ 10 min
Put a tablespoon of filling on a wrapper, fold it over and pleat 10-13 folds along one side only, sealing as you go. The other side stays smooth and taut — that is what makes the crescent stand up and stops it splitting in the steamer.
⏲ 15 min
Line the steamer with oiled parchment or a cabbage leaf and set the dumplings out without letting them touch. Where they touch, the skin tears when you lift them.
⏲ 3 min
Steam over high heat for 6 minutes in a steamer already at a boil. They are done when the wrapper goes see-through and the shrimp shows pink. Longer and the skin waterlogs, sags and bursts.
⏲ 6 min
Turn off the heat and wait 30 seconds before lifting the lid; the wrapper firms just enough to be picked up whole. Serve straight away — not even dim sum houses re-steam a cold one.
⏲ 1 min

Tips & Variations

Variations

Fun gor. The Chiuchow cousin: rice flour in the wrapper, peanuts and shiitake in

the filling. The skin is a little thicker and less clear, but it does not tear, which makes it far kinder to a first attempt.

Chive har gow. 20g of finely chopped Chinese chives in the filling. It is the

commonest variation in Cantonese dim sum houses and the aroma suits shrimp well.

With crab, at 200g shrimp to 100g picked crab meat, the filling turns softer. Crab

carries more water, so add another teaspoon of starch.

Without wheat starch you cannot make har gow and are better off making something

else: the same shrimp filling in a flour dough is a gyoza, and with rich stock set into it, a xiaolongbao. The translucent wrapper is the one part with no substitute.

The steaming and the pleating transfer directly to mandu.

Tips

Wheat starch is the whole trick. It is what remains after flour is washed to

remove the gluten, so on heating there is no protein to set white and opaque — only starch gelatinising, which goes clear. That is why plain flour gives a white dumpling skin however thinly you roll it (dough and gluten).

Boiling water, poured in at once. Gelatinising starch genuinely needs boiling

temperature: warm water will not bring the dough together, and pouring in stages leaves cooked lumps amongst raw starch (heat control).

Knead it hot and keep it covered. This dough cannot be recovered once cold, and

exposed to air the surface dries and cracks within five minutes. Roll one wrapper at a time with the rest under a damp cloth.

Dry shrimp win or lose this dish. Dry them thoroughly after rinsing, and squeeze

thawed frozen shrimp. The 30-minute chill is also about water: it gives the starch time to take hold of it.

Do not skip the bamboo shoot. Shrimp and wrapper are both soft, so with nothing

crunchy in there you tire of them by the third one. Water chestnut or blanched celery heart will stand in (blanching vegetables).

Stop at 6 minutes. The wrapper is thin and cooks fast, and after that it simply

keeps absorbing water. A sagging or split dumpling has almost always been oversteamed.

To get ahead, freeze them shaped, and steam from frozen with 2 minutes added.

Refrigerating is the worst option — the wrapper draws water out of the filling and by the next day it is stuck to the paper.

The basics behind this dish

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