Steal This Recipe® Shrimp & Pork Siu Mai | Xino, Santa Monica

Dim Sum Dumplings

This tasty Dim Sum recipe was ‘stolen with permission’ from Owner/ Executive Chef Chris Yeo of Xino; located at the Santa Monica Place shopping and dining destination, in Santa Monica, California. The menu offers patrons authentic Chinese dishes with a modern twist, and unusual blends of spices and fresh herbs add another element to the restaurant’s extensive menu of Dim Sum and classic Chinese offerings, all served in a sophisticated setting which includes an outdoor patio with cabanas.

As well as Dim Sum, dishes at Xino include: Kung Pao Chicken ‘Lollipops’ with crushed cashews, Char Siu Sea Bass with Chinese ratatouille, Chinese BBQ Roasted Rack of Lamb with kabocha squash and a ginger glaze, Mu Shu Pork with Mandarin Pancakes and citrus hoisin sauce, Classic Peking Duck with gold coin buns and cranberry hoisin, and Hong Kong Style Seafood Crispy Noodle with crab, shrimp and sea scallops. If you happen to be shopping at Santa Monica Place, whether you are a local or just visiting, don’t forget to check out Xino!

About the chef: few restaurateurs get their start as a hairdresser, but Chris Yeo, Xino’s executive chef and owner, was once more familiar with coiffing hair than shredding coconut. A graduate of Singapore’s Hotel and Catering School, he left Singapore to study hair at Vidal Sassoon in London. After a five year hairstyling stint in London, he headed west to San Francisco and, in 1980, opened Yeo’s Hair Design in the Haight Ashbury district.

A lover of good food, Yeo dreamed of bringing the cuisine of his native Singapore to the Bay Area. He says, “I missed sharing the food of my youth. I enjoyed cooking at home, but couldn’t fit all my friends and family and clients into my house—with a restaurant, I could!” In 1987, he opened Straits Café on San Francisco’s Geary Street, followed by a sleek Palo Alto location in 1998. After opening this second location he made the decision to focus on restaurants full-time, much to the chagrin of his salon clients.

Yeo opened a more refined version of Straits on San Jose’s acclaimed Santana Row in 2003, and then another in Burlingame, California one year later. In September 2005, Yeo launched a new restaurant concept in the Santana Row area -Sino Restaurant & Lounge was designed to showcase a new concept in Chinese cuisine. Yeo says, “I wanted to build a Chinese restaurant that was elegant, sophisticated, and accessible to all.”

In 2008, Yeo partnered with GRAMMY® award-winning artist and actor Chris “Ludacris” Bridges to bring Straits’ modern Singaporean menu to Atlanta, Georgia and Huston, Texas, and In 2010, Yeo introduced his take on contemporary Chinese cuisine to Los Angeles with Xino Restaurant & Lounge.

Outside of the kitchen, Yeo is a founding member of the ACA (Asian Chefs Association), and he fights hunger through twice-weekly lunch donations - fresh from the Straits kitchen - through his involvement with the CYC (formerly Chinatown Youth Center, now Community Youth Center) which feed hundreds of San Francisco’s neediest kids. He co-authored ‘Cooking of Singapore’ with Joyce Jue and has served as a guest chef at The Smithsonian Institute, the James Beard House, and the Singaporean embassies to the United States and the United Nations. Chef Yeo lives in San Francisco with his wife Kelly and their two sons, Julian and Andrew.

Please note: this recipe calls for an electric mixer and uses Sui Mai wrappers or wonton wrappers which can be bought at your local Asian Grocery market (if they are the thicker variety they can be rolled out thinner).

Xino
395 Santa Monica Place, Suite 308
Santa Monica, CA 90401 
310 755 6220

Shrimp & Pork Siu Mai are served at Xino for $3.50 for 4 dumplings.
This recipe makes 25 dumplings.

Shrimp & Pork Siu Mai Ingredients:
1 Pack thin Sui Mai wrappers or wonton wrappers

Sui Mai Filling Ingredients:
¾ lb chopped shrimp
1 ½ lb rough chopped pork with 25% fat
1/8 lb chopped hydrated shitake mushrooms
½ oz salt
½ oz sugar
1/4 tablespoon white pepper
1/8 oz soy sauce
2 oz canola oil
1 oz cornstarch

Steal This Recipe® Step by Step Instructions:
Combine all ingredients together and mix thoroughly in a mixer with a paddle attachment for 2-4 minutes until the mixture develops a sticky texture. (This will help it to hold its shape when cooking.) 
Take the Sui Mai wrapper, fill it with 1 oz of the filling and mold it into the shape of a Sui Mai dumpling, using about the size of a quarter of the mixture and shaping into an open face dumpling. 
After shaping the entire amount of the mixture into dumplings steam the Sui Mai for 11 minutes in a large steamer.
Serve and enjoy!