葱油饼 (cōng yóu bǐng)

葱油饼, lit. “scallion oil bread,” is one of my favorite dishes that my grandma makes. I’m very fortunate that she now regularly sends me several loaves of hers, but in between these “relief” shipments I decided to try my own. My grandma makes a variant with leavened dough and adds some other flavors, but that seemed a bit too complex to start out with, so I used unleavened dough.

葱油饼 starts out with a typical dough. Then, as one might expect, you add scallions. Before adding scallions, you can add a layer of vegetable oil and some 五香粉 (wǔ xiāng fěn, or five spice powder). (full resolution: left, right)

My version is much less oily than what is typically served at a restaurant. In my opinion, the usual restaurant version is way too oily.

The first version of my 葱油饼. (full resolution: left, right)

Here are some more detailed pictures of the process, during another attempt at 葱油饼:

I think I used a 3:1 ratio of flour to water, although I could be misremembering. After making the dough, you roll it up and squash it. (full resolution: left, center, right)

Cooking it is simple: just add a bit of oil to your wok and fry until it’s done, flipping in the middle. You might burn the first few, but you’ll quickly figure out the right amount of time to cook them.

Later editions of my 葱油饼. On the right, I tried adding some 肉鬆 (ròu sōng, or pork floss) as a filling, but I found that this is somewhat tricky, since the 肉鬆 burns easily. (full resolution: left, right)