Bao are so many things: comforting, warm, soft, nourishing, savory (or sweet), and portable. But it’s the cloud-like, delicately chewy bun itself that wins over the most fans. When you’re craving that specific chewy texture, only bao will do.
While most places stick to the traditional fillings that revolve around pork or red bean, some modern bao outlets are trying to make the ancient food — supposedly first eaten by the Chinese military in the third century — more attractive to the young masses, who always hunger for something new and unusual to get excited about, wait in line for, and tease their social media followers with.
There’s no place in Thailand better to find this kind of clientele than in the heart of Bangkok’s Siam Square. A neighborhood known for youth-geared fashion and food trends, a walk around the area never fails to turn up something new, weird, and delicious to eat since the small shops and stalls are constantly opening and closing as food fads go in and out of style with lightning speed.
At the moment, the place is brimming with brown sugar boba milks, but it was the bao that caught our eye. Bang Bao’s stand has appeared around the city at a few pop up markets earlier this year, and one is currently at Emquartier’s Food Hall, but their first permanent stall opened behind Centerpoint Siam in September to long lines of hungry customers.
The owners are not new to bao, however — they market themselves as a heritage brand since their families have over 40 years experience in bun making. The East-meets-West ethos of Bang Bao means that their buns have the perfect steamed outer layer but are filled with things like cheese, butter, banana, and more.
We started with one of their most popular offerings: Chinese-style Curry Crab (small size, THB69) in a traditional white bao. We highly enjoyed the little pocket and found it tasted much like the famed dish, just shoved in a convenient, edible to-go container. There were discernible bits of real crab meat inside and the filling tasted fresh and hearty. Our only complaint is that they could have been a bit more generous with the stuffing.
The Ham Cheese Spinach (Small, THB59) is a European-style bun, stuffed with local spinach, German ham, and Australian cheese in a charcoal bun. This one gets rave reviews from fans, who love that the shop does not skimp on the warm, gooey cheese.
The Durian (Small, THB59) will suit fans of the fruit as well as those that are a bit leery of it. Since the filling is like a durian custard with low smell factor, the taste is more like eating a slightly funky cream bun than a full-on stink fruit experience like the one we recently had with this durian pizza.
At the recommendation of the staff, we also tried the Blue Flower (THB20) mantou (basically, a solid bao without filling), and found it strangely addicting. The dough is sweetened and tastes slightly of Thai butterfly pea.
Essentially, it’s wrapped layers of bao that can be satisfyingly pulled apart in chunks to share (or not). If you like the outside layer of the traditional bao, then you’ll like mantou — it offers that much more surface area. Due to how light and slightly sweet these are, it feels like you could easily eat a half-dozen of them without feeling sick, or even full.
Though they hype up their bao birthday cakes, posting photos on social media and including pictures of them in a video that runs on a loop at their shop, the staff said they had only made them a few times. For cake inquiries, they said they can make the oversized bao in various sizes and with various fillings, but that people should inquire directly.
Other menu choices include Hong Kong-style BBQ Pork or Japanese Curry Chicken, both served in a matcha bun; Matcha Cream served in a strawberry bun; and Banoffee-style Almond Nutella Banana in yellow cake bun.
We would not hesitate to stop back in and try some of the other offerings next time we’re in the area. Bang Bao’s options offer a good, creative quick snack or light meal option in the hectic shopping district where people often don’t want to sit down for a long repast.
FIND IT:
Bang Bao
Behind Centerpoint Siam mall
Open daily, 10am-9pm
BTS Siam
