Douliu Ba-Wan Dumplings 斗六肉圆

Douliu Ba-Wan Dumplings (斗六肉圆) are the ba-wan of Douliu (斗六) in Yunlin County (云林县): dumplings with a chewy, translucent starch skin around a pork filling, served under sauce. Ba-wan is found all over Taiwan, but the Yunlin County Government's tourism site calls Yunlin's versions a compendium of the whole range, fried and steamed alike.

Ingredients

Taiwanese ba-wan skins are made from sweet potato starch, potato starch, indica rice flour or tapioca starch, and the filling is mainly pork. In Yunlin the filling is usually dried bamboo shoots, shiitake mushrooms and chunks of pork. Wu Ji Ba-Wan (吴记肉圆), a Douliu shop the county government describes as tucked away in an alley for 60 years, adds diced bamboo shoot and crisp fried shallots to a filling seasoned with more than twenty spices.

How it is made

Yunlin shops either fry or steam their ba-wan. Wu Ji uses the oil-soaking method (油泡), which keeps the skin soft and chewy without falling apart while drawing out the spices in the filling. Before serving, Wu Ji covers the dumplings with a sweet sauce made from indica rice.

How it is eaten

Some Yunlin shops serve two dumplings to a portion, others a single large one. The county tourism site describes sitting on a stool to tuck into ba-wan as the most down-to-earth of moments.

Where it comes from

Ba-wan is said to have originated in Beidou (北斗) in Changhua County (彰化县) around the end of the 19th century, and later spread across Taiwan, where each area developed its own ingredients and methods.