Green onion pancake
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Green onion pancake (traditional Chinese: 蔥油餅; simplified Chinese: 葱油饼; pinyin: cōng yóu bǐng, lit. "scallion oil cake") is a Chinese snack consisting of a non-leavened, salty flatbread infused with oil and minced scallions (green onions). Unlike a true pancake, it is made from dough instead of batter, similar to the Indian paratha.
[edit] General recipe
- For chewy pancakes, add warm or hot water with flour to create the dough. For crispy pancakes, use cold water to create the dough.
- Mix two parts flour with one part water.
- Knead until dough is smooth.
- Take a piece of the dough and flatten it out into a pancake.
- Smear the preferred form of grease onto the flattened dough. This could be corn oil, peanut oil, or lard. Olive oil and butter are not typically used. Sprinkle chopped scallions and salt onto the flattened dough.
- Roll up the flattened dough into the shape of a snake.
- Reshape the "snake" into a coil. The dough should now resemble an unbaked cinnamon roll.
- Flatten up the coil into a pancake.
- Pan-fry the pancake with oil. Both sides of the pancake should be golden brown.
- Place the fried pancake on a plate covered with a paper towel to cool the pancake and to drain the grease.
[edit] Variations and innovations
One could substitute the green onions with another topping of choice such as corn and diced bell peppers. Sesame seeds are sometimes added with the green onions. There is actually a Chinese dessert called red bean pancakes (豆沙餅) where the green onions and salt are replaced with a sweet red bean paste.
Another method to cook green onion pancakes is to fry them with eggs coated on one side. There is another Chinese snack called egg pancake (蛋餅), which is almost identical to the green onion pancake except that the dough of the egg pancake is thinner and chewier.
One more variation involves leavening the dough and not flattening up the coil into a pancake. The coil is then fried or baked into a bread.
In North America, the pancakes are often served with hot chili sauce or Vietnamese dipping sauce.
