The traditional method of making these dumplings was to cook fresh pig skin in water for 36 to 48 hours so that the skin dissolved in the resulting soup. When it cooled, it became gelatin. But because this takes an enormous amount of time, and the prospect of cooking pig skin for two days might not be pleasing to some, I use gelatin.

These dumplings, here made with a fresh chicken-stock base, are possibly the most famous dim sum of Shanghai, and justly so. Each dumpling, when steame