These flaky spring onion pancakes (con you bing) are a popular Chinese street food snack. You may also know them as "Scallion Pancakes". Find out how to make them below.

Vegan savoury pancakes

I first came across these spring onion pancakes while travelling in China. It was often hard to work out what was, and wasn't vegetarian (or vegan) when touring the street market but when I discovered these flaky pancakes they soon became a staple when I needed a snack on the go!

I would spot them being made on the roadside and watch as the thin discs of dough were added to hot oil, puffing up slightly but getting crisp and golden on the outside. Now when I make them at home I think back to my trip to China and all the wonderful things we ate.

You could borrow the technique for making these pancakes and flavour them with anything but I love the combination of earthy sesame and grassy spring onion. There's not much more to it than that! Simple flavours are always the best.

How to make your spring onion pancakes extra flaky

Unlike ordinary pancakes, they aren't made with a batter. Instead, they are made from a dough of flour and (nearly) boiling water. Making the dough with hot water and rolling and re-rolling the dough a number times is what gives these pancakes a really light, flaky texture.

It can be tempting to skip the steps of boiling the water or rolling the dough out so many times. But, I promise you it will be worth it. The more effort you put in the more flaky the pancake.

Why are spring onion pancakes made with hot or boiling water?

I've mentioned that this is a vital step for achieving flaky spring onion pancakes but what's the science behind it? When the boiling water hits the flour you will notice something strange happen. The flour will look as though it is puffing up and foaming. What's really happening is that the water is denaturing the protein. This will prevent gluten forming when we bring it together and knead it into a dough. When making a normal bread dough we want to build up gluten to create a chewy texture. But not for this recipe.

Some recipe will call for half boiling water and half cold water, but I didn't notice enough difference using that technique. I just let my boiling water cool slightly as that makes it easier to handle the dough and achieves a similar result.

How do you create the layers in a spring onion pancake?

Although the layers aren't quite the same as those you'd get in puff pastry we're going to use a simillar-ish technique. If you're familiar with making Indian parathas then you will know this technique well.

First, roll out your hot water dough on an oiled surface. Get it as thin as you can as this will create more layers. Brush it with a little sesame oil. Take the top edge of the dough and loosely roll it towards you until it's like a long piece of rope or a thin sausage shape. Next coil this piece of rope into a tight spiral. Pinch the end to the rest of the dough so that it does't unravel and then roll it out flat again.

Repeat this process as many times as you like but at least once more. On the final time of rolling it out flat, spread the surface with your thinly sliced spring onions. Roll it back up into a rope, coil it and roll it out to an 8 inch circle then fry.

The result will be a super tender, flaky spring onion pancake.

The recipe

Here you'll find a simple recipe for Flaky Spring Onion Pancakes along with a classic dipping sauce.