Easy & Flaky Chinese Scallion Pancakes Recipe

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Cooking With Anadi

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Are you looking for an amazing new bread experience? This Flaky Chinese Scallion Pancakes recipe was a staple appetizer at one of the restaurants I used to work at, and I’ve always wanted to make them myself! Who knew that they would be so easy to make? With only a handful of ingredients and a little bit of hands-on work, you can make your new favorite flatbread! While these Chinese pancakes appear to be simple, they’re nothing short of aromatic and flavorful thanks to the chewy bread and aromatic green onions.

If China is a destination unseen for you, then this Chinese Scallion Pancakes recipe is definitely unique to explore more of Chinese cooking! I encourage you to try these out as part of your Live to Cook one-month challenge! You can get started for free today by signing up to my free email newsletter, plus all of my latest recipes will be delivered right to your inbox!

To follow along with the entire process from making the dough to perfecting the layers and cooking this scallion pancakes recipe, be sure to watch the video! If you’re not already, please subscribe to my YouTube channel, and be sure to press the bell button to be notified when all of my video recipes are live! Let’s get cooking!

What Is This Chinese Scallion Pancakes Recipe?

Scallion Pancakes, named Cong You Bing, are a Chinese savory flatbread. They remind me of the Indian Laccha Paratha because they are soft, thin, and flaky, with lots of layers. They are a popular street food item in China and are one of the most famous types of Asian pancakes. While a modern favorite, they actually are thousands of years old. The “Cong” in the name refers to the Song Dynasty (960 to 1279), which is the theoretical period in time when these pancakes originated.

This scallion pancakes recipe is made with all-purpose flour, sesame oil and green onions, seasoned with Chinese 5 spice. You prepare your dough, roll it out, and then pan-fry to a crispy and flaky perfection. They are really simply made but they pack in so much flavor!

Equipment Needed for This Chinese Flaky Bread Recipe

• Chef’s knife
• Cutting board
• Measuring spoons
• Measuring cups
• Salt crock
• Rolling pin
• Bench scraper
• Mixing bowl
• Fish spatula or silicone spatula
• Cast iron pan
• Basting brush
• Wire rack

Ingredients to Make This Chinese Pancakes Recipe

All ingredients and their quantities for this Chinese scallion pancakes recipe are listed in the FULL PRINTABLE recipe card, which you can find by scrolling to the bottom of this post or by pressing the “Jump to Recipe” button. You can also save the recipe for later, and you can use the recipe card to scale the ingredient quantities based on how many Scallion Pancakes you’re looking to make without having to do any ratio calculations!

• All purpose flour
• Water
• Vegetable oil
• Green onions
• Sesame oil
• Chinese 5-spice
• Salt

How to Make This Easy Chinese Pancake Recipe

Add the all purpose flour into a large bowl and then add the hot water. Start to mix either with a pair of chopsticks or with your hands until you get a loose ball, with no dried bits of flour. Add more water or flour to reach this consistency. Cover the dough with plastic wrap and let it rest for 15 minutes.

Apply vegetable oil on your work surface and unwrap the dough. Coat the dough with vegetable oil and begin kneading the dough by hand or by using a stand mixer. Knead until you get a smooth, elastic dough. Let the dough rest for 5 minutes.

After the dough has rested, roll out the entire dough ball into a large, thin rectangular shape.

Brush the dough with sesame oil, sprinkle Chinese 5-spice evenly and then sprinkle on the chopped scallions. Then, start to roll the dough into a spiral from the longer edge of the rectangular dough. The roll does not need to be too tight, once you have rolled it, place it seam side down.

Portion out the spiraled dough into 6 equal portions for medium sized pancakes or 4 equal portions for large, thicker pancakes.

Place each portion spiral side down and flatten using a rolling pin into a thin disk.

Heat a cast iron or non-stick pan on medium heat. Once the pan is hot, brush oil on the pan and then lay the pancake disk on the pan. Cover with a lid and cook for a few minutes. Once the first side becomes golden brown, flip the pancake, cover and cook the other side. Once each side is flaky, golden brown and crispy, set the pancake over a wire rack to cool down. Repeat this step for the remaining portions.

To serve, cut the pancakes into triangles and serve fresh and hot.

Variations of This Flaky Scallion Pancakes Recipe

This version is vegetarian and vegan, with green onion being the highlight of the filling. However, if you wanted to, you could add in some cheese, such as a combination of mozzarella and cheddar to get the flavor and gooeyness. If you eat meat, you could try a beef or poultry filling, such as ground beef or chicken, flank steak, or shredded chicken from poached chicken.

How to Store Scallion Pancakes

In the Fridge

Simply place your cooked pancakes in an airtight container. You can keep them in the fridge for 3 to 4 days. This is because your dough will start to get hard if left in the fridge too long, so the less amount of time you keep them in the fridge, the better they’ll taste reheated.

In the Freezer

You can keep your Scallion Pancakes in a freezer-safe container or in large Ziploc bags. You can keep them in the freezer for up to 4 months, because longer than this runs the risk of them getting freezer burnt. When you’re ready to enjoy your Scallion Pancakes, there’s no need to defrost them in the fridge overnight - you can reheat them directly from frozen as I’ll describe in the next section. They’ll just take a bit longer to reheat compared to as if you were reheating from the fridge.

How to Serve This Chinese Savory Pancake Recipe

From my restaurant experience, Scallion Pancakes are served as an appetizer. I’ve personally had these as a snack when I was recording the recipe! However, I’ve read that in China, it can also be enjoyed as a savory breakfast! Whatever time of day you make it, in my opinion you can enjoy them with a nice dipping sauce, such as soy sauce or chili garlic sauce.

If enjoying these Chinese Pancakes as an appetizer, here are some mains that you can pair with them!

• Chinese Egg Fried Rice
• Chicken Hakka Noodles
• Indo-Chinese Drums of Heaven
• Asian Fusion Chicken Tacos

Why This Is a Hot Water Dough — and Not a Batter

The first thing to be clear about is that this is a dough, not a batter. If you have made a Korean pajeon you may be expecting to stir something pourable together in a small bowl; that is a different dish entirely. Traditional Chinese scallion pancakes are built from 2 cups of all purpose flour and 2/3 cup of hot water, which is roughly 250 grams of flour if you prefer to weigh. Pour the hot water in and mix with chopsticks or your hands until you have a loose ball with no dry bits of flour left, adding a little more water or flour to get there.

The hot water is the whole trick. A cold water dough — the same flour brought together with cool water — develops far more gluten and fights you when you try to roll it thin, which is why it is the right choice for noodles and the wrong one here. Hot water partly cooks the starch and relaxes the gluten, so the dough rolls out tissue-thin without springing back and the finished pancake stays tender rather than chewy. Cover the loose ball and let it rest at room temperature for 15 minutes before you touch it again.

After the rest, oil your work surface and your hands with vegetable oil and knead — by hand, or in a stand mixer on low speed — until you have a smooth ball with an elastic feel to it. Let that rest another 5 minutes. Neither rest is optional; they are what let the gluten settle so the rolling goes easily.

Rolling the Coil: From Rectangle to Snail to Flaky Layers

Roll the whole dough ball out into one large, thin rectangle. Brush the surface with sesame oil — 2 tablespoons across the sheet — then sprinkle the five-spice powder evenly and scatter over 2 finely chopped green onion stalks. I use both the white part and the green part; the white brings a sharper onion note and the green stays bright and grassy through the frying.

Now roll the rectangle up from its longer edge into a cylinder, like a jelly roll. Do not roll it tight — a slightly loose coil traps more air between the turns, and those turns are the flaky texture you are after. Set the cylinder seam side down, then cut it into pieces of dough: 6 portions for medium pancakes or 4 for larger, thicker ones.

Take each piece and stand it on its cut face so you are looking down at the spiral, then coil it in on itself into a snail shape and press it flat with a rolling pin into a thin disk. Rolling it from the coil rather than from a flat scrap is what stacks the oiled layers on top of each other. Roll each one to whatever diameter suits your pan — the recipe does not fix a size, and a pancake that fits comfortably with a little room around it will cook far more evenly than one crammed edge to edge.

Pan-Frying, Dipping Sauces and What to Do With Leftovers

Heat a cast iron or nonstick skillet on medium heat. Not medium-high heat — this is the single place people go wrong. Too hot and the outside colors before the interior layers have had a chance to steam apart, and you get a pancake that looks right and is dense inside. Brush the hot pan with oil, lay the disk down, cover with a lid, and give it a few minutes. When the first side is golden brown, flip it, cover again, and cook the second side. When both sides are flaky, golden and crisp, move it to a wire rack rather than a plate so the underside does not steam itself soft. Vegetable oil is what I use; peanut oil or canola work identically. Many traditional versions in Chinese restaurants use lard or another animal fat for extra richness, which is worth knowing if you are chasing that flavor — my version stays free of it, which also keeps the pancakes vegan.

Cut them into triangles and serve hot with a dipping sauce in a small bowl. A tablespoon soy sauce with a drizzle of chili oil and a little rice vinegar is my default; the chili garlic sauce I mention above is just as good. They are an appetizer in most Chinese restaurants and a street-food staple in Shanghai, but a green onion pancake alongside a bowl of one of my soups makes a full lunch, and adding a protein such as shredded chicken turns it into dinner.

For leftovers, cooked pancakes keep in the fridge in an airtight container for 3 to 4 days. Reheat them in a dry skillet over medium heat for a minute or two per side, or spread them on a baking sheet in a 350°F oven — do not use the microwave, which turns every crisp layer limp. You can also freeze an uncooked scallion pancake if you would rather cook them to order: stack the raw disks with parchment between them, freeze flat, and fry them straight from frozen over slightly lower heat so the middle catches up with the outside.

Other Tasty Stuffed Bread Recipes

• Palak Paratha - Spinach Parathas
• Mini Broccoli Cheese Paratha
• Paneer Paratha
• Pyaaz Paratha