I Made Siew Mai!

I'm a lazy cook. I enjoy cooking but I only pick the easy-looking recipes. I avoid complicated ones by all means and always ended up "ooh-ing" and "ahh-ing" over some amazing culinary attempts by other bloggers. I guess having a blog does have its advantages, trying to make my blog entries more interesting, I was even adventurous enough to try my hands on.... Siew Mai (烧卖)!

I had the first attempt on Siew Mai-making last week. I didn't expect the kneading and forming the Siew Mai skin to be so difficult. It took me almost 4 hours to make about 20 Siew Mai, but the hard work was kind of wasted because the taste was not up to my expectation, it's bland and the texture was just not right. Surprisingly, the Siew Mai skin turned out ok, it's thin enough and the filling could be seen through it.

The worst was not over yet, it actually came the following day. The muscles of my shoulder and two arms were so sore and it felt like I've went for two rounds of boxercise at one go! Ouch!

I've been thinking long and hard over the week, wondering how to make it better. First of all, I "blamed" the tough process of Siew Mai skin making on the rolling pin that I have, it's a rod with the diameter of 20 cents coin. I thought it'll be easier with a bigger rolling pin and so I got one from Sia Huat.

I decided to give Siew Mai making a second try this weekend. I tweaked a little on the ingredients of the filling and it was chilled in the fridge while I make the Siew Mai skin.

Once I started making the skin, I realised that having a big rolling pin didn't help at all, a smaller rolling pin should be used to make something paper-thin! I have no choice but to continue kneading and forming the skin with my good old rolling pin, while cursing and swearing (which I won't elaborate here) over the money wasted on the new rolling pin at the same time. Halfway through, my lazy bugs kicked in, I lost patience with all the kneading and rolling... I counted the Siew Mai skins on the counter... Well, 9 pieces so far. I decided at that point to stop, I reckoned, with 9 pieces of Siew Mai, it's more than enough to prove to myself that I can do it, so 9 pieces of Siew Mai it is...

So how would I rate my Siew Mai? I'd honestly give it only a 6 over a total of 10 points. I wouldn't say that it's comparable to the restaurants', but it's barely good enough for home-made version. Would I do it again? Er... wait till I get over the "trauma" first... in the mean time, I'd rather enjoy a plate of piping hot Siew Mai in the restaurant!