Easy Japanese Steamed Pork Buns (Nikuman) Recipe

These steamed pork buns, also called ‘nikuman’ in Japanese, are staple Japanese snacks as well as a familiar option in Chinese Dim Sum.  The white pillowy buns surrounding the warm savory pork filling that melts in your mouth make them such a satisfying comfort food.

Secret ingredient for easy steamed pork buns

If you love these pork buns, this is an easy recipe that completely cuts down the time by not making the dough from scratch. Even with this unexpected ingredient as the alternative for the made-from-scratch dough, these buns taste just as authentic as the Japanese nikuman you get in Japan. Here is that secret ingredient:

Mushroom options

Try not to skip the shiitake mushrooms in the recipe. They have become more common in the regular grocery stores in the States. Substitute with regular button mushrooms if you must. Or, better yet, have these dried shiitake mushrooms handy to simply soak them in water and they are ready to use!:

Tools you’ll need

Before you start cooking, there are a few items I want to make sure you have.  There’s nothing worse than getting all the ingredients ready and start following the instructions to find that you are missing a critical tool!  You may already have them in your kitchen since they are fairly standard cooking tools. But make sure you have these items on hand:

• Wax paper or Parchment paper 
• Stainless Steamer Basket
• Deep, 12 inch skillet or 8-quart Dutch oven – with a lid

How to serve steamed pork buns

When these buns are done cooking, they may look brown from the moisture. Take them out of the pot and let it dry out a little bit. Once they have cooled enough to touch, serve with a simple, optional dipping sauce made with soy sauce and little bit of karashi, Japanese hot mustard, on the side (like soy sauce and wasabi for sushi). Don’t forget to remove the wax paper from the bottom before serving!

Japanese Steamed Pork Bun Recipe

Pin it for later!