Beware! Bones in Baozi!

The rumors are true: A Shandong mom is serving baozi stuffed with pork ribs. That means every customer has to expend extra effort to extract and spit out the bones. Could these baozi possibly be worth the bother? I went to investigate.

When I arrived, the batch was almost sold out, leaving three half-cooled buns. They were leaf-shaped and neatly pleated, typical of Shandong-style wrapping. Cute – but lukewarm wasn’t going to cut it. I insisted on trying one from the next hot batch, and prepared myself for the 40-minute wait.

Restless, I slipped into the kitchen to check out the progress. Luckily, the hospitable Shandong owners showed me their secret: a basin of inch-long ribs that marinate in homemade sauce for a whole day. While the Shandong mom mixed up the meat with freshly shredded cabbage and scallion, her husband, a chatty ex-serviceman, explained their origin.

Pork-rib baozi are a specialty of their hometown, Longkou (龙口), a small county in Shandong province – a birthday treat. When these two moved to Beijing, they made these steamed buns for home parties; a friend fell in love with the taste and encouraged them to open a restaurant.

Unlike with baozi that have a minced filling, when you use whole chunks of ribs, you can’t try to sneak by with low-quality meat. And the juices released from the bone help make these buns super-succulent. The dough is also special, involving a traditional leavening process. Instead of dry yeast, a laomian (老面) starter (dough reserved from an earlier batch) is used to rise the dough.

These baozi are even socially conscious. “For every baozi sold, two fen is donated to a local pension fund. And the elderly enjoy a 20 percent off discount,” the owner explained. “Confucius was from Shandong, you know. So Shandong people have a long tradition of respecting the aged.”

Finally, I got to taste a baozi from the piping-hot batch. They were juicy – and yes, more work than your average steamed bun. But lots of people prefer bone-in steak to fine-chopped burger meat, right? So why couldn’t pork-rib baozi become a new trend? People of Beijing, maybe it’s time to investigate this possibility for yourselves.

Try it: Shandong Mom’s Pork Rib Baozi. Daily 24hrs. Waiguan Xiejie (200m north of Daoxiangcun), Chaoyang District (6425 6505) 山东大娘排骨包子, 朝阳区外馆斜街 (稻香村以北200米)