Peking Duck Pancakes (Chun Bing, 春饼) (2024)

What are duck pancakes

An essential element of the classic Peking duck meal, Peking duck pancakes are known as Chun Bing/春饼 meaning spring pancakes as they’re a traditional food for celebrating the beginning of Spring (Li Chun, 立春). Sometimes they might be referred to as Mandarin pancakes.

Made with wheat flour and water, Peking duck pancakes are cooked either in a steamer or a pan. Compared to the popular tortilla, they are much thinner and have a smoother appearance. Apart from Peking duck, many other Chinese dishes, such as Aromatic Crispy Duck, Moo Shu Pork, Bean Sprout Stir-fry, etc., can be enjoyed inside these pancakes.

This recipe introduces an efficient method to make them in a frying pan (without any oil). It also includes many useful tips to help you succeed. A tutorial video is placed inside the recipe card at the end of the post.

Make a hot water dough

Peking duck pancakes are soft, moist and very thin. To achieve the right texture, you need to get the dough right.

• All-purpose flour (aka plain flour) containing 10-12% of protein works very well for this recipe.
• It’s important to use hot water (soon after being boiled) to mix with the dough. This way the dough is partially “cooked” thus taking less time to cook through in the pan. Also, hot water dough produces a supple and tender texture (It’s also used for making steamed dumplings).
• To make 16 pancakes, you’ll need 360g flour and 230g hot water. The ratio may vary slightly depending on the brand of the flour. Adjust accordingly. The finished dough should be soft but not sticky.

Once the dough is formed, coat it with a little oil and leave to rest for 30 minutes in a bowl covered with a lid.

Afterwards, divide the dough into small pieces and shape them into round discs. Try your best to divide them as equally as possible. This will make the next step neat and smooth.

Roll and cook two pancakes at a time

Once the dough pieces are ready, it takes two simple steps to turn them into Peking duck pancakes: flatten with a rolling pin until very thin, then briefly cook in a pan without any oil.

To make rolling easier and speed up the process, apply the “double pancake” method and follow a good workflow. Here are the procedures and tips (see tutorial video below for reference):

• Brush a layer of oil on the top of a dough piece, then place another piece on top. Repeat to stack up every two pieces. Roll out the first double-layer dough into a very thin circle (about 18 cm/7 inches).

• Transfer it into a heated pan. Cover with a lid and leave to cook over medium heat. When air pockets appear, flip over and cover to cook the other side. It should take no more than 2 minutes. Adjust heat level if necessary.

• While waiting for one pair of pancakes to cook (check and flip over when necessary), roll out another pair. When the first pair is done, the second pair should be ready for the pan. Follow this workflow to finish the rest.
• Remember to always cover the cooked pancakes with a clean kitchen towel. This way they’ll stay soft and pliable.

🛎Troubleshoot: If you find the pancakes on the dry side, this could be caused by: 1. You didn’t cover the pan while cooking so too much moisture has evaporated; 2. You didn’t cover the cooked pancakes with cloth so they’ve dried out. To fix the problem, simply steam them for a couple of minutes.

Separate the pancakes

Once you finish cooking, gently separate all the double-layered pancakes into single pieces. This needs to be done while they’re still warm. If you do so when they’ve gone cold, it’ll become impossible to separate them neatly.

What to serve with

▲ Homemade Peking duck with pancakes and vegetables

Not only are these pancakes essential to a Peking duck meal, they’re also served with many other dishes in Chinese households. As I mentioned earlier, they’re a festive food to eat on Li Chun Day. The typical fillings include raw ingredients like cucumber, scallions, pickled vegetables, and stir-fried dishes made with meat, egg, tofu, vegetables, etc. Each diner picks up what he/she wants to wrap in the pancakes.

Here are a few dishes that would make delicious fillings:

• Sichuan Pork with Garlic Sauce
• Egg with Pickled Chili Garlic Sauce
• Hunan Pork Stir-fry
• Xinjiang Lamb Skewers

How to store and reheat

You may store leftover Peking duck pancakes in air-tight bags in the fridge for up to 3 days or in the freezer for 1 month or so. They can be reheated in two ways.

• In a steamer: Steam for 3 minutes if chilled or 6 minutes if frozen.
• In an oven: Defrost first if frozen. Sprinkle a little water between each pancake. Then wrap them in aluminium foil. Put into a preheated oven at 180°C/350°F. Heat for about 6 minutes.