If you’ve ever tucked into a bao, those small, pillowy steamed buns filled with such things as braised pork belly, fried chicken or perhaps tempura sweet potato, you owe something to Erchen Chang, her husband Shing Tat Chung and sister-in-law Wai Ting Chung. Together, they first bought the moreish buns to the UK in 2012 with a street food pop-up-turned bao empire that now has a weekend stall at Netil Market and three crowd-forming restaurants in Soho, Fitzrovia and Borough.

Here, we meet Erchen at BAO’s latest opening in Borough market to talk about the food of her childhood in Taiwan, why it took her six months to perfect her bao bun, the importance of design and what she cooks at home, plus get her recipe for prawn shia song rice with soy cured egg.

Erchen: “Why is food so important to me? I think I grew up in an environment in which food was just naturally important; my family love eating, and all social events are based on communal meals. It’s hard to put a finger on it because I literally live and breathe food, every day. It’s just something that I enjoy so much.

“In Taiwan, food is embedded deep in the culture. Everything, everywhere you go is about food. If you’re gathering with friends, it’s always for food first. As a tourist, you can eat a lot of authentic Taiwanese food in restaurants and on the street – the good cooking doesn’t just happen in people’s homes as there’s a big eating out culture. 

“When I was growing up, it wasn’t just dinner that was important, we would spend time eating breakfast together as a family too. But, back then, I didn’t think about it too much because it was so ingrained.

“I started thinking about food more when I moved to the UK. I came to study in England when I was 14, and all of a sudden I was faced with just one plate of food. Back home I was so spoilt to have my grandma cook ten dishes for dinner: always a soup, always a plate of rice, plenty of vegetables, plenty of meat.

“But I didn’t learn to cook from her. My grandma’s kitchen is her one woman show, and you don’t disturb her. It’s amazing to watch her whip out ten dishes easily, no sweat, but you don’t want to get in the way of that!

“Now, when I think about her cooking, it’s not that difficult when you break it down: she always has a cold dish, always a broth slow cooking at the back, always a fried fish, which is done last minute when everyone is sitting down, and is the centrepiece of the meal. So, there’s a rhythm to it, and I love it, but if you haven’t been watching, you’d think, ‘Oh my god how the hell did you come up with all these things’.

“So the shift came when I moved here, when I started appreciating what I had before. I started remaking dishes or asking my family how to do certain things, but it wasn’t until I was studying at the Slade School of Fine Art that I started cooking more because there was, I guess, more parties and I wanted people to come over to my flat for big feasts.

“My partner Shing and I would cook a lot at home. We would just try and recreate things we had seen, but not necessarily Taiwanese. When there is a dish that we really want to crack, we can spend half a year doing the same thing, over and over again.

“For example, the bun took us half a year to perfect, without us even knowing we were going to open a restaurant – we were just so interested in making it. When we went back to Taiwan we would eat everywhere and come back with ideas.

“In Taiwan the bun isn’t a soft as ours, it has a bit more of a chew. We had an amazing bun north of Taipei, and that’s where we thought, ‘Oh my god, this is so good.’ We decided to try our best to recreate it at home.

“At that time, we had just graduated. We both studied Fine Art, Shing also did design afterwards, and Ting, his sister and our business partner, also comes from a creative background so we just thought you know, let’s just make something and see how it goes. We started doing popups and that’s how we began.

“With the menu, we always start by looking at a dish in its most authentic form. That’s to begin with, when we’re doing research. We always start with something that already exists in Taiwan or Asia, but we tend not to really stick with the authentic version because to us, we want to recreate an experience but with our take on it.

“So, it’s not so important to be 100% authentic, and I think that’s what makes BAO what it is – we’re a world on our own. I am representing Taiwan and I take a lot of cultural references from there, but I’m not necessarily always trying to directly recreate a dish. I think the most authentic is probably our classic bun, which is where our whole journey started – we have stuck to the authenticity there, but we kind of go wild with the rest.

“Design has always been the core for all three of us, in terms of creating experiences. Why is design important? I’ve been to several viewings with The Modern House, all to beautiful homes – including Coningham Mews and The Coach House – where you can really imagine living in a space in which people have tried and tested the design, found what works and made it comfortable. It’s about what a space can add to an experience, from living to eating.

“Our restaurants are all inspired by different things in Asia that we like or want to know more about. For Borough, we have studied late-night grill joints in Tokyo such as yakitori places or izakaya restaurants where people drink shochu and soda water and have a good time.

“We study our references a lot, and not just in terms of design but how humans interact with the space and how that can facilitate experiences. Of course, aesthetics help a lot – you need to have it to start everything off – but it’s what happens afterwards that makes a space interesting. We’re really interested in how all the details combine and what creates an atmosphere. 

“One thing you might notice is that our restaurants are very well catered to single dinners, even though there’s a lot of groups that come. In Soho I remember a lot of the comments were about how easy it is for single diners to go in, sit and eat. You don’t feel uncomfortable because everyone is so close to each other. Our logo is a man-eating by himself, and it’s all about how, in this metropolitan world, being alone is ok. 

“On my days off I would say half the time I cook, half the time we go out. I do like staying at home. We live in Soho at the moment because it’s convenient for work but we’re moving out soon to a house we’re renovating near Stratford. 

“I would say I cook at home two to three times a week. I’m not as adventurous now, and I seek more comfort food if I’m honest. I probably have four to five tastings a week, so all I do is think about food, taste and tweak. When it comes to home, I just want a slow-cooked broth or a tomato sauce pasta with a really good cheese and tomatoes. I do the adventurous stuff here.

“I’ve come to see that with English food, or general European food, there’s actually so much going into it, even though it comes out as appearing more simple perhaps. I think it’s equally impressive but just different in its way of preparation.

“On Sundays we make roasts, and stews quite a bit, which I love. Steak and chips sometimes. If we’re going to make Chinese food it will be a variety of things, like tomato and egg, fried rice, sometimes broth noodles, or duck vermicelli.  

“We used to entertain a lot at home but our flat is really small now, so we don’t so much anymore. When we lived in south London we had friends over for Chinese New Year, or my birthday and we would cook a lot. I remember a big feast we made for Chinese New Year once, with lobster, glutinous rice, steamed baskets, baos, and loads of crazy stuff – it was fun. But we’ve been so busy too, and we don’t have the time anymore!

“I hope people who come to eat at our restaurants feel like they have been transported to another place, but what I hope most is that they have a really amazing time and enjoy themselves. I hope they come into a space that feels comfortable and have a really good lunch ­or dinner – I think that’s really important.”

Erchen’s recipe for prawn shia song rice with soy cured egg
Prawn shia song is a classic Taiwanese dish that is often served in weddings and banquets as an appetiser. The chopped prawn is seasoned with garlic, fermented chilli and white pepper, and by combining cornflour and egg white it creates a juicy, fluffy prawn which is spooned over lettuce cups that provide a refreshing crunch. When I am craving something comforting and heart-warming, I make prawn shia song and have it over rice and a soy cured egg.

To prepare this dish, you can begin by preparing the soy cured egg yolk and rice dressing. 

Soy cured egg yolk
200ml soy sauce

200ml mirin

2 egg yolks

To cure your egg yolks, first begin by preparing your soy cure mix by simply combining the soy and mirin together. You will need one egg yolk per serving, so separate out six egg yolks, in case any break. Drop they yolks carefully into the soy cure and let them sit for about 15 minutes.

If it’s more than half an hour the egg will be over cured and risk being too firm. The result you are after is a runny egg yolk which has intensified in flavour with the soy and mirin. Splash the soy cure mix over the yolk once or twice throughout the marinating period.

Rice dressing
30g soy sauce

25g caster sugar

40g mushroom oyster sauce

15ml sesame oil

A pinch of five spice

15ml water

75ml chicken stock (or water)

10ml Ching Kiang vinegar (black vinegar)

Prepare the rice dressing ahead of time. The dressing is especially tasty if you have some chicken stock handy. Don’t worry if you don’t, you can always substitute it with water. As the prawn is the star of the dish, the dressing is there to make sure that as you dig deeper into the bowl it is still full of flavour.

You can now begin cooking the rice. I would highly recommend using a Taiwanese rice grain, Chi Shang. This particular rice grain is a short grain rice, which has a great bite and is very plump. A good substitute would be a sushi rice.

Rice
300g Chi Shang Rice 

300ml filtered water

Wash the rice three times and soak in filtered water for 30 minutes. Bring 300ml of water to boil in a saucepan. Drain the rice and put it into the boiling water. The temperature of the water will drop but when the water has returned to boil, turn the heat down to low and place the lid on. Cook for 18 minutes.

Once cooked, open the lid and give it a good mix, making sure the rice at the bottom is scraped up. Put the lid back on again, turn off the heat and let it sit for about 10 minutes before serving, to let the moisture from the steam lock into the rice to make it more plump.

Prawn shia song mix
500g peeled and cubed prawns

45g peeled and finely diced carrots

45g finely diced celery 

45g finely diced water chestnuts 

15g minced garlic 

2 tsp caster sugar 

1 tsp salt 

15g corn flour 

70g egg white 

A pinch of ground white pepper 

1/2 tsp fermented chilli 

2l vegetable oil

Whilst the rice is cooking, prepare the prawn mix by peeling and de-veining the prawns. Cut them to around 1cm cube size and set aside in a large mixing bowl. Prepare the vegetable mix by finely dicing the carrot, celery, water chestnuts and minced garlic and put all the veg straight into the mixing bowl.

Put the salt, sugar, white pepper, corn starch and egg white all into the mixture and use your hand to combine them properly, making especially sure that the salt and sugar is fully incorporated. Let it sit for 15 minutes to let the seasoning and flavours meld together.

Find a wok, or the deepest non-stick frying pan you can find. Fill the pan so the oil is about 8-10cm deep. Heat it up to 130C. 

Whilst the oil is still reaching the temperature, set up your frying station. Prepare a ladle, a slotted spoon and a sieve over a large wide bowl. Once the oil is heated to 130C, put two ladles of prawn mix into the oil and stir with the slotted spoon. A pasta spider is even better as it will allow you to keep things moving and separate the prawn mix to ensure it cooks evenly. 

Cook the prawns for about two-three minutes, until the colour of the prawn turns opaque pink. Drain the cooked prawns by putting them into a sieve over a bowl. Let the oil drain properly. Be very careful at this stage as the oil is very hot. The cooking of the prawn will take a few goes. Once all the prawns are cooked, mix through the fermented chilli. 

To Serve
Taiwanese Chi Shang Rice or short grain rice

Prawn shia song mix

Soy cured egg

Rice dressing

Chilli oil

Fine chilli flakes

Find a large rice bowl, fill two thirds with steaming rice, drizzle the dressing over the rice and then pile the cooked prawn mix to cover the surface of the rice. The more the merrier. Use a slotted spoon to take out the cured yolk and place in the middle of the prawn shia song. Drizzle chilli oil over the prawn mix and sprinkle the fine chilli flakes all over.

Side Note
I always find chilli oil is one of the best ingredients in the pantry. The method again is very simple and keeps for a long time.

400g Chinese dried red chilli 

1l vegetable oil

Toast the dried red chilli in a dry frying pan until it takes on a dark crimson shade. Let it cool and blitz to a powder.

Heat up the oil with the toasted chilli powder. It will take about 25-30 minutes for the infusion. When you get a smoky aroma and the colour of the chilli turns dark, take off the heat and let it cool down completely.

Pass the oil through a sieve and the result should be a bright red smoky chilli oil. Store in a sterilised glass jar. You can always turn the waste oil from cooking the prawns into chilli oil.