As you may know, we’ve undertaken the task of documenting recipes for Shanghai’s most beloved breakfast items––fondly known as The Four Warriors: Da Bing, or Sesame Pancakes (大饼), You Tiao (油条), Dou Jiang (豆浆), and Ci Fan (粢饭).
I’m glad to say that this Shanghai Sesame Pancake recipe (上海大饼) concludes that mission. If this is the first time you’re hearing about The Four Warriors, check out our rundown of how to eat like a local for breakfast in Shanghai. (Be warned, that post will make you very hungry.)
Butter or Lard?
For this one, I’m going to keep it short, so we can get to the da bing. The one thing I want to point out is that Shanghainese cooking uses quite bit of lard (remember this guy from a Shanghai street food stall making Shanghai Scallion Pancakes? He adds a small handful of lard, followed by a large handful of scallions for each pancake.
This Shanghai da bing (大饼) or sesame pancake recipe is no exception. But in practice, we are a bit more receptive to butter than lard, since it’s readily available, so I took the liberty of making the recipe a bit more flexible.
The end result is still pretty awesome. For vegans, vegetable shortening is another alternative.
Only in Shanghai—Or Your Kitchen
For us Shanghainese people living overseas, we all know that it’s literally impossible to find good da bing (Chinese sesame pancake) anywhere.
Good you tiao (油条) or Chinese fired dough, is no problem (check the freezer section of your Asian supermarket), but try locating a decent da bing, and fuhgettabout it!
Without da bing, you tiao (油条) is like a lost soul searching for its soulmate, and that perfect marriage often hasn’t been possible for us stateside.
Until now that is. The taste of home is right at your fingertips–let’s get to it!
Shanghai Sesame Pancakes: Recipe Instructions
Mix all of the dough ingredients (flour, salt, sugar, water) together using an electric mixer (or by hand) to form a soft and smooth dough. Cover and let rest for 30 minutes. While the dough is resting, make the pastry dough.
Then make the pastry dough.
Mix together melted butter or lard, flour, salt, Sichuan peppercorn powder, white pepper, and scallions in a bowl using a rubber spatula. Make sure everything is evenly mixed. Cover and refrigerate for 15 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.
Divide the dough into 10 equal pieces.
Divide the pastry dough into 10 equal pieces and roll each into a ball while it’s still chilled.
Flatten the dough ball and wrap the pastry dough ball inside it.
Pinch the outer layer closed.
Flatten with the palm of your hand…
And roll out into an oval shape, about an eighth of an inch thick.
Fold the oval in half lengthwise, and roll into a coil.
Turn the roll on its side, and flatten with the palm of your hand once again.
Roll into another oval. This step creates some “lamination” in the dough, which will give you flaky layers in your da bing. Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet.
Place the da bing on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Brush lightly with water, and sprinkle generously with an even layer of sesame seeds, pressing them lightly into the dough.
Bake the sesame pancakes for 18 minutes until lightly golden brown. Be careful not to over-bake them.
Be sure to serve the da bing with you tiao (油条)! It’s a delicious carb on carb combination that you won’t regret. You can store the leftovers in an airtight container, and reheat in a toaster oven at 350 degrees F.
Shanghai Da Bing Sesame Pancake 上海大饼
Ingredients
For the dough:
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (300 grams)
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons sugar
- ¾ cup warm water (180 ml)
For the pastry dough:
- 4 tablespoons melted butter or lard (58 grams)
- ½ cup all purpose flour (75 grams)
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon Sichuan peppercorn powder
- 1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper
- 3 scallions (very finely chopped)
Additional ingredients:
- Water and a pastry brush
- ⅓ cup toasted sesame seeds
Instructions
Make the dough:
- Mix all of the ingredients together using an electric mixer (or by hand) to form a soft and smooth dough. Cover and let rest for 30 minutes. While the dough is resting, make the pastry dough.
For the pastry dough:
- Mix all of the ingredients together in a bowl using a rubber spatula. Make sure everything is evenly mixed. Cover and refrigerate for 15 minutes.
Assemble the da bing:
- Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.
- Divide the dough into 10 equal pieces. Then also divide the pastry dough into 10 equal pieces and roll each into a ball while it’s still chilled.
- Flatten the dough ball and wrap the pastry dough ball inside it. Pinch the outer layer closed. Flatten with the palm of your hand, and roll out into an oval shape, about an eighth of an inch thick. Fold the oval in half lengthwise, and roll into a coil. Turn the roll on its side, flatten with the palm of your hand once again, and roll into another oval. This step creates some "lamination" in the dough, which will give you flaky layers in your da bing.
- Place the da bing on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Brush lightly with water, and sprinkle generously with an even layer of sesame seeds, pressing them lightly into the dough.
- Bake the da bing for 18 minutes until lightly golden brown. Be careful not to overbake them.
- Be sure to serve this with you tiao (油条)! It’s a delicious carb on carb combination that you won’t regret. You can store the leftovers in an airtight container, and reheat in a toaster oven at 350 degrees F.
nutrition facts
Hello, Judy – this recipe sounds delicious and I like that it’s baked, not fried. Can I substitute the butter for oil, and if yes, would the ration be 1:1? Thank you!
Hi May, you can use oil, and the ratio is 1:1. But just know that butter/lard make this pancake flaky. Oil will not do that.
Amazing! We loved the flaky crispy crunchy layers! We did not do any crullers at the same time, but hey, maybe next time. Thank you so much for sharing your beautiful recipes!
You are so welcome, Dawn. I recommend that you give this Shanghai qiang bing a try. So yummy!
Hi, I love your recipes and after 42 years of this Caucasian being married to a Chinese (born in Fukein, raised in Taiwan), I am finally cooking really good Chinese food. We have used so many well known Chinese cookbooks over the years, but it wasn’t until I started using your recipes that we both started really liking my Chinese cooking. I tried these twice and both times the flavor is good (altho my spouse prefers me to leave the szechuan pepper powder out next time), they come out tough, too tough to even bite easily. Last time I even weighed the flour since King Arthur recipes always say the flour – water ratio is important in dough making and weighing flour is the best way to get that correct. I also cooked them a few minutes less this second time. Still came out very tough. Any ideas of what to try next? Thank you for all the great recipes and all the great info like I just found the freezing aromatics page and am excited about doing that to make cooking easier and wasting fewer left over aromatics.
Hi Christine, try using hot water for the dough, which will make the dough softer and slightly chewy.
I had the same experience- wonderful flavor but texture was beyond chewy, actually the toughest baked good I’ve ever made. But they were still tasty enough to gobble up in less than 24 hours. Might possible solutions be greater hydration, lower protein flour or letting the dough rest longer after forming the individual cakes?
Hi Steve, was your dough sticky, and you need to oil your hands to handle it? Sounds like your flour to water ratio may have been off.
I had the same experience! I did mess up the flour to water ratio, I think. I was using my stand mixer for the dough, and it was just so so sticky and wasn’t coming together, so I added more flour (dough newbie – not realizing how much it would impact the final result!) Hope to try again and have the product be less tough next time.
Hi Christine, was your dough sticky, and did you need to oil your hands to handle it? Sounds like your flour to water ratio was off.
Mine came out a bit dry and didn’t have a golden shine like yours. On the second batch I sprayed some oil on before putting in the oven but that didn’t really do anything. However, it was quite nice, onions had a very subtle taste and it was actually fun to make!
Hi Ling, try adding more lard/butter next time for a flakier texture and more color.
Thanks for the tip Judy! Just to say my kids loved these so I’ll definitely make these again!
Hi Ling, the dough will be wetter when more lard/butter is added. Just know not to add more flour :-) One more tip. Prepare some sugar water (1 teaspoon sugar + 1 tablespoon hot water), and brush the surface of these pancakes with a thin layer of sugar water when they just come out of the oven (while hot), it will add some nice golden color to them if they are still not dark enough after baking.
Do you hear open and switch it off and let the da bing cook with no heat on. I warmed the overn to 220degrees celcius and baked for 18 min. Came out super hard.
I am sorry, Neeta, I don’t understand your first sentence.