(upbeat music) - Hey, guys. This is Inga. Today I am finally going to be
making some scallion pancakes at home. I know a lot of you have
been requesting this, and I have also been craving this. There are a lot of ways
to make scallion pancakes. I think different regions
have their own interpretations and preferences. The one that I will be making
today is a modification of my grandpa and my mom's recipe. I tweaked it a little bit because I like my scallion pancakes a little on the thinner side
with that chewy caky texture but still with a flaky crust. So, let's get started. In here, I already have
my flour measured out, and it's around two and a half cups, and I also have some hot water and some room temperature water. I like this combination because I feel it gives me the texture that I like. I'm going to add my hot water first and then keep mixing it
while I'm adding it in. The hot water also makes
the flour very, very soft. Once the hot water has been added in, we can add in the room temperature water. I remember my grandpa doing this a lot. I would just stand next to him. I was about maybe like this tall. You can't even see me. And I'd just stand next
to him and pester him. Also, before I forget, I'm just gonna add in some sugar and salt. This is around one tablespoon
of sugar, a teaspoon of salt. I'm just gonna go in with my hands now, squish that together. Kneading is one of the
most time-consuming things, but I also think it's the most rewarding. Also wanna make sure that
there's no more flour sticking to the sides of the bowl, too. That's when you know
you're on the right track. I feel like I've just been
doing a lot of dough ball stuff, but this is what we have right now, and we're going to keep
kneading it a little bit more before we let it rest. Knead it on my cutting board. It should feel very, very soft because of that hot
water that we poured in. If it helps, you could count to 100. Like you want to knead
this at least 100 times. Hopefully, that makes the
time pass a little faster. (jazzy music) This is my dough right now. It's still not perfectly smooth, but we're gonna let it
rest for a little bit. Put it in the bowl that we used earlier. We're gonna just cover it with a wet towel and then let it rest for
around 20 to 25 minutes. So while we're waiting for the dough, there's two things we should do. One would be to chop up the scallions, and two would be to make a sort of roux that we want to paint onto
our scallion pancake dough. But first, scallions. And I have a lot here 'cause I like having a lot of scallions in my scallion pancake. Cut off the butts here. I've got this little bag going on of just like the odd bits
and ends of vegetables that I have. So I'm just going to toss these in here, so then I can one day make some
really awesome veggie broth. Back to the scallions. I am just going to also cut
off most of these white bits. These have a lot of flavor, so I'm still going to
put some of these in, but for the most part, I would like my scallion
bits to be that vibrant, beautiful green, so we're
gonna use most of that instead. And then I can save these
for my other dishes. (gentle music) And then over here, on my stove top, I am going to make the roux, which is pretty much
just some flour and oil. Adding in half a cup of
flour, half a cup of oil. And I'm gonna turn the heat on. I know it doesn't look
super appetizing right now, but we're just gonna mix it gently, enough for it to combine. So this roux method is actually something that I didn't used to do. My family pretty much just
uses plain oil as it is to put on the scallion pancake, but my friend Eric, who
is a pretty amazing chef, he does this with his scallion pancakes, and they always come out
extra flaky and crispy, so I gave it a shot, and I
think it is totally something that we should be doing too. So credits to him for his little tip. Once it looks around like this and you can kind of see
the bottom of the pan, when you scrape through it,
then I think we're good. It has been, I think, over 25 minutes now while I was prepping everything, and we can check in on our dough. You can feel that it's a lot softer now. Let's scoop this little guy up. It is very, very soft now. I'm going to dust our work surface here. And we're just going
to roll out this dough, so then we can divide it
up into little portions. How many pieces you want
to divide this up into really depends on you and how big you want your
scallion pancakes to be. For today, I think I'm
gonna go with five pieces. Five balls here. I'm gonna set these to the side and then work on this baby first. Squish it down gently, and we're gonna roll it out
to as thin as we possibly can. (gentle music) Look at how thin this is. Don't do that. (upbeat music) All right. Once it's around this thin, I am going to paint on our beautiful roux. It is this beautiful
consistency right now. It's cooled a little bit. Just go in with it, making
sure to cover every single bit, because this will help
the scallions stick. "Don't be shy" is what I always say. Looks about good. It is time to make it
rain with some scallions. Ooh-hoo. I can smell the scallions. The smell is... scallions smell so good. I like it when every single
bite has a lot of scallions. I love scallions, if you
haven't noticed that yet. And then I'm also gonna
add some five-spice powder 'cause I like the taste it gives. And then this is the fun part. We are ready to roll. Make sure all of that
goodness is tucked inside. Gently peel up these
corners and roll it in. This is actually also what we did when we went to that scallion
farm with the Worth It Crew, and I personally think
this is the most fun part of scallion pancake making. And there we have it. Here's our little scallion pancake dough. Once we reach this point, what I'm gonna do is
actually roll it one time. Take the edges here, which you can see is already sealed tight, and I'm gonna roll it on top
of itself just like that. And this is what our little
baby scallion pancake kinda looks like right now. It looks like a little pinwheel cushion. All of the sides are pinched together. It's okay if there's holes in it. Gently squish it down. We have our first scallion pancake dough. What I like doing now though is to just sprinkle some
flour on another plate. Put the dough on there. And as I'm letting it rest, I just like putting a
little bit of oil on top 'cause that's what my grandpa used to do. Just a thin layer. And just let it sit a little bit while we work on the other ones. Now that all of my scallion
pancake dough is done, they've been sitting here for a while, here, we're missing one because
I couldn't fit in my plate, but it is time to roll this
out before we fry them up. I'm gonna take the first one we made and we're gonna gently roll it out. The key here, again, is
to try and roll it out as much as you can, as thin as possible. I maybe went a little too
crazy with my scallions, but that just means it's
going to taste really good. It's barely holding on together. Ha ha. Once it's spread out thin
enough, we can fry it up. Adding a generous amount of oil. Then I just went ahead and
added my scallion pancake in before the oil got too hot, so the scallions won't burn immediately. And now we're just going to wait and inhale this nice,
fragrant scent of scallions. It smells really good. I always kind of just eyeball this part, but basically, once it's
golden brown on one side, I flip it, and then once that
side is also golden brown, then it is done, so
what's I'm gonna do now. (upbeat music) Ready and flip. Yeah. I also like trying to flip
it up a little on the sides. It's okay if it breaks apart. This kind of helps make it even fluffier and crispier and flakier. All right, now it's pretty much done. I'm gonna transfer it over
onto some paper towels. And here it is, our
first scallion pancake. Because it's so thin, it
doesn't take too long to fry. Can you hear? It is very, very flaky. Doesn't it look like the ones
that you see in restaurants? It's that beautiful golden color, and you see all of these crispy bits. This is the kind of
style that I really like. I like to floof it up a little bit. I am very excited to try this, and I'm just waiting for it
to cool down a little bit 'cause I don't want to burn myself. Also, just as a quick tip, this is how I like storing
my scallion pancakes. I like to roll them
out on parchment paper, kind of just stacking
it on top of each other to make sure it doesn't stick. And I just get a Ziploc bag, and I put our little package
here right into the baggie. That's it. Super easy. All right, now for my favorite part. I want to try this flaky one first. Oh my god. I didn't even really have to do anything, and it's already coming apart. This is already what it's like. It's so flaky and it
still has that chew to it, which is what I love
about scallion pancakes. It's almost like a Chinese croissant. And it is incredible. But yeah, I hope this was helpful. It always means a lot to me, being able to share these
family recipes with you guys, especially ones that I grew
up eating my entire life. So do give this a try. I feel like a lot of you will, because a lot of you have
been waiting for this, but I'm excited to see your results. And I will gladly enjoy
my scallion pancakes now. See you guys next time. Bye.
