Share
In one kitchen, the dough is sealed shut and steamed into a dumpling; in another, it becomes jiaozi or khinkali. Elsewhere, fillings are tucked into breads, buns or folded dough, creating forms that may look different but follow the same basic instinct. Strip away the regional identity and flour type, and you're left with one of the oldest tricks in food: take something soft, wrap it around something delicious, and hand it to someone hungry.
And now, that simple formula is having a distinctly stylish moment in India. Pillowy, steam-fluffed and folded around flavourful fillings, bao has moved far beyond its traditional associations to become one of the country's most talked-about Asian comfort foods. Scroll through to get some of the best desi bao makeovers.
Everything You Need To Know About Bao
Bao, short for baozi, is a yeasted dough bun that's steamed to make soft buns with a cloud-like texture and a faint sheen. Its two broad families are the fully sealed baos that are closed up like a dumpling and steamed, and the gua bao, which is folded open-faced like a bun taco around a filling. Both have their roots in Chinese culinary history, but bao has evolved well beyond its traditional form. It has travelled far beyond China, finding a place in Hawaiian plate lunches, Japanese convenience stores and, over the last decade, on restaurant menus across India.
Bao isn't simply a Chinese food that other cuisines borrowed. It's an idea that seems to travel naturally. Wherever a culture had grain and a filling, someone eventually landed on the idea of “soft bread, folded or sealed around it.” Vietnam has bánh bao, Georgia has its own steamed dumpling traditions, and in India, momos have become bao's close cousin in spirit, even if they don't share the same lineage.
Five Places Across India Doing Bao Their Own Wow Way
This National Bao Day, skip the usual plans and make a little bao pilgrimage instead to these five places across India that put their own delicious spin on the pillowy classic.
Farzi Cafe, Delhi NCR
Farzi has a unique identity of taking Indian classics and putting them through a modernist lens, and its bao menu is a fantastic example of that instinct in action. The very popular Kadhai paneer bao and butter chicken bao use bun less as a Chinese ingredient and more as a blank canvas for the country's beloved gravies. It might sound like an unlikely match on paper, but tuck makhani sauce into a pillowy Cantonese bun and somehow, it just works, a soft, saucy, and comforting combination that's hard to resist.
Image Credit: Pexels
Address: Multiple locations across Delhi NCR
Cost for Two: ₹3,000 for two people
Contact: 09599889701
Nadoo, Delhi
This restaurant takes bao in a decidedly South Indian direction, serving these pillowy buns with the fiery Andhra-style green chilli chicken and the rich, ghee-soaked flavours of chicken ghee roast. Chef Shri Bala draws inspiration from Sangam-era Tamil and Chola-era kitchens, with his menu bringing those old culinary traditions into a contemporary setting.
Address: Ground floor, property No.E-5, Masjid Moth, L.S.C, Greater Kailash Part 3, Greater Kailash II, Greater Kailash, New Delhi, Delhi 110048
Cost for Two: ₹3,000 for two people
Contact: 092176 79217
Kylin Experience, Chandigarh
Among its dim sum offerings, the cottage cheese bao stands out. The simple vegetarian filling gives the bao an Indian touch without relying on curry or tandoor flavours. It shows how easily bao can fit into a North Indian menu with a familiar filling.
Image Credit: Magnific
Address: 312A, 3rd Floor, Elante Mall, 178-178a, Industrial Area Phase I, Purv Marg, Chandigarh 160002
Cost for Two: ₹1,900 for two people
Contact: 098703 81007
D’Ley Chinese Eating House, Kolkata
Long before "fusion" was a menu category, the Chinese-Indian community of old Calcutta was quietly inventing Indo-Chinese cuisine. Tucked into Tiretti Bazaar, D’Ley has been carrying this legacy for decades. Its breakfast menu features both steamed pork bao and baked pork bao. This is bao filtered through a hundred years of Kolkata's own Chinese-Indian community, and it indeed tastes like it.
Address: 16, Black Burn Ln, Terita Bazar, Poddar Court, Tiretti, Kolkata, West Bengal 700073
Cost for Two: ₹500 for two people
Contact: 098306 83227
Social, Connaught Place, New Delhi
Its bao is less "Indian filling in a Chinese bun" and more a genuinely new hybrid bread, built specifically to carry desi flavours instead of adapting to them. Social took the boldest of structural liberties and bakes the bao like a pita, then folds it around fillings that are indeed desi. Its “Bao Chick(en) Bow bow” has a crispy fried chicken filling with a sweet, spicy kick, and its “Butter chicken pita bao” has hand-pulled tandoori chicken in makhani gravy stuffed inside a pita bao and served with a green apple chutney and salad.
Image Credit: Pexels
Address: First Floor, The Colonnade, Plot No 5, Middle Cir, Block B, Connaught Place, New Delhi, Delhi 11000
Cost for Two: ₹1,500 for two people
Contact: 092280 35641
