My mom works as an insurance agent based in an office in Flushing, NY, an essentially bigger chinatown in Queens. Just a 45 minute drive away, this city has been a staple for our family brunches, haircuts, and grocery shopping. On the weekends that she had client meetings, the whole family would join her to enjoy dim sum or beef noodle soup afterwards. We ended every trip to Flushing with a stop at a Cantonese bakery– the Starbucks of that city, there’s one on every block. On the drive home, everyone munched on their chosen bun; my parents shared hot tea while my brother and I sipped on bubble tea. When my mom’s client meetings fell on weekdays, she always came home with a bag of bakery goodness.
Today these Cantonese bakeries remind me of home. Thus, they have become a non-negotiable stop in my trips to Chinatown in Boston. My absolute favorite is called the pineapple bun [Bo Lo Bao], a bun topped with a golden brown crust which looks like a pineapple but doesn’t have any pineapple in them. Their pillowy soft texture simply can not be captured by my mediocre baking skills. Peach buns [Shoutao Bao], a fluffy bun with red bean filling that again resembles a peach but doesn’t contain any peaches, was always a common family breakfast item. Admittedly, it took me an embarrassingly long time to try egg tarts [Den Tat] because I’m not a fan of eggs but they’re delicious. A loaf of milk bread, which I always referred to as “square bread,” easily took the place of any American grocery store loaf of bread on our kitchen counter.
Just in case you’re not acquainted with them, here is a graphic I made to Cantonese bakery classics:
