Har Gow Wrappers substitute

Best substitute

Homemade Wheat Starch and Tapioca Starch Dough

100g wheat starch to 50g tapioca starch, 150ml boiling water, 1 tsp neutral oil, pinch of salt (makes about 20 wrappers)

Best for har gow

Close match

This is not really a substitute, it is the answer. Wheat starch dough is one of the cheapest and quickest doughs in any cuisine, and there is no packaged wrapper that beats it. Whisk the two starches with the salt, pour in water that is actually at a rolling boil, stir hard with a chopstick until it comes together as a lumpy paste, cover for two minutes, then knead in the oil while it is still too hot to be comfortable.

Other har gow wrappers substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Wheat Starch Alone
Different texture
150g wheat starch to 150ml boiling water, 1 tsp oil
If your shop had wheat starch but no tapioca starch, go ahead.
What changes
This is how the dough was made before tapioca became standard, and plenty of dim sum kitchens still use a higher wheat starch ratio.
Best for
har gow, crystal dumplings, when you only have one starch
Just as translucent but noticeably less stretchy, so it tears when you pleat and cracks if you roll it too thin. It also steams up more tender and a little chalky rather than having that faint springy snap between the teeth. Tapioca starch is what supplies the chew, so without it you get glass without bounce. Roll slightly thicker than you would normally, and expect to lose one or two wrappers to tearing.
3Tapioca Starch Alone
Different texture
150g tapioca starch to 130ml boiling water, 1 tsp oil
Widely stocked, cheap, and it makes a genuinely good translucent dumpling.
What changes
This is essentially the dough behind Vietnamese banh bot loc, which is a delicious thing in its own right.
Best for
translucent dumplings when wheat starch is unavailable, banh bot loc style shrimp and pork dumplings, gluten-free translucent dumplings
Even clearer than the standard blend and glossier to look at, but a lot chewier and gummier, closer to a mochi or a tapioca pearl than to a delicate har gow skin. It is also stickier to handle and will glue itself to the steamer, so oil the parchment properly. Because tapioca starch has no wheat in it at all, this version is the one to use if someone at the table needs to avoid wheat.
4Frozen Crystal Dumpling Wrappers
Close match
Use 1 wrapper for every dumpling, thawed in the fridge overnight
Look in the freezer of a Chinese supermarket for packets labelled crystal dumpling skin, shrimp dumpling wrapper or shui jing bao.
What changes
They are the same wheat starch dough, pre-rolled and stacked.
Best for
har gow when you do not want to make dough, large batches, first attempts at dim sum
Correct in flavour and transparency, but frozen wrappers dry at the edges and crack when you pleat, so thaw them slowly in the fridge rather than on the counter and keep the stack under a damp cloth. They are also usually rolled thicker than a good hand-rolled wrapper, which makes the finished dumpling a bit heavy and rubbery. Steam them a minute less than the packet says.
5Cornstarch Blended With Tapioca Starch
Taste and texture differ
100g tapioca starch to 50g cornstarch, 140ml boiling water, 1 tsp oil
The pantry-only version, made from two things most kitchens already have.
What changes
Worth trying if you have committed to making dumplings tonight and the shops are shut.
Best for
improvised translucent dumplings, when no specialty starch is available
Comes out cloudy rather than clear, more of a frosted glass than a window, and it is distinctly more fragile, so make small dumplings with simple folds and skip the fifteen pleats. Cornstarch also has a faintly powdery taste that wheat starch does not, most noticeable if the wrapper is thick. It works, but this is the version where you accept that the result looks homemade.
6Wonton or Gyoza Wrappers
Taste and texture differ
Use 1 wrapper for every dumpling, edges dampened with water
The honest fallback, and worth saying plainly: this will not give you har gow.
What changes
What it gives you is a very good steamed shrimp dumpling, which is not a bad dinner. Trim the square wontons into rounds with a glass if you want the shape.
Best for
steamed shrimp dumplings, shrimp wontons, when translucency does not matter, boiling or pan-frying instead of steaming
Opaque white and soft, with the distinct taste of cooked wheat flour and often a slight eggy note, and the texture is chewy-doughy rather than glassy and snappy. The trade in your favour is durability: wheat flour wrappers are far more forgiving to fold, they do not crack, and they can be boiled or fried, which a wheat starch wrapper cannot really take. Use these while you are learning the filling, then switch to starch dough once the filling is right.
7Rice Paper
Taste and texture differ
Use 1 sheet for every dumpling, dipped in warm water for 3 seconds only
The least-bad option if translucency is the only thing you care about and you have nothing else.
What changes
Use two sheets stacked for anything with a wet filling.
Best for
cold or lightly steamed translucent parcels, gluten-free improvisation
It is see-through, which is the only thing it gets right. Steamed rice paper goes slippery, tacky and unpleasantly slimy, it welds itself to the steamer and to the dumpling next to it, and it tears the moment the filling releases any juice. There is no pleating a rice paper dumpling. If you are here, a better move is to abandon the dumpling shape and make fresh summer rolls with the same shrimp filling, which rice paper is genuinely excellent at.

What is Har Gow Wrappers?

Har Gow Wrappers is Har gow wrappers, also sold as crystal dumpling skins or shrimp dumpling wrappers, are made from wheat starch and tapioca starch mixed with boiling water, which is what makes them turn glassy and translucent when steamed instead of white and doughy.

Cooking tips

The water has to be at a full rolling boil when it hits the starch, not merely hot. Wheat starch dough is held together by gelatinised starch rather than gluten, so if the water is even slightly off the boil the dough will never stop crumbling and no amount of kneading will rescue it. Boil the kettle, pour immediately, and measure the starch out before you start.
Work with the dough hot and keep the rest covered. A ball of wheat starch dough is silky and pliable at close to hand-hurting temperature and turns brittle and cracked within about ten minutes of cooling. Roll one wrapper, fill it, fold it, then take the next piece. If the dough has gone stiff, microwaving it for ten seconds under a damp cloth brings it back.
Do not use a rolling pin. Dim sum cooks flatten each piece by pressing and smearing it with the oiled flat side of a cleaver or a broad knife against an oiled work surface, which gives a paper-thin wrapper with a thicker centre in one motion. Oil the blade and the bench rather than dusting with flour, because extra dry starch makes the wrapper cloudy and dry.
Steam for six to eight minutes over strong steam and no longer. Har gow skins are thin and already partly cooked, so they need only enough time to set and to cook the shrimp. Over-steaming makes the wrapper sag, split along the pleats and slump into a puddle of starch, which is the single most common reason a batch looks defeated coming out of the basket.
Line the steamer with oiled parchment or oiled cabbage leaves, never with a dry cloth. Wheat starch dough sticks ferociously and will leave the bottom of every dumpling behind. Brush the tops with a little oil after steaming too, which is why restaurant har gow arrives glossy rather than matte and dull.

Frequently asked questions

Can I use all-purpose flour instead of wheat starch?

No, and this is the most common mistake. Wheat starch is what is left after the gluten has been washed out of wheat flour, so it behaves in the opposite way: it turns clear and tender, while flour turns white and elastic. Dough made with all-purpose flour will hold a filling well, but it steams up opaque and chewy, which is a dumpling skin rather than a crystal skin. If all-purpose flour is what you have, make boiled or pan-fried dumplings and enjoy those instead of fighting for translucency you cannot get.

Why did my wrappers crack when I pleated them?

Almost always one of three things. The water was not boiling, so the starch never fully gelatinised. The dough cooled while you worked, which makes it brittle within minutes. Or there was no tapioca starch in the mix, which is what supplies the stretch. Fix all three by boiling the kettle properly, keeping the dough under a damp cloth over a bowl of warm water, and using roughly a third tapioca starch to two thirds wheat starch.

Are har gow wrappers gluten-free?

Not reliably. Wheat starch is made from wheat, and although the gluten is washed out, the residual amount varies by producer, so in the United States it is not treated as a gluten-free ingredient unless the label specifically says so. If you are cooking for someone with coeliac disease, make the dough from tapioca starch alone, or from tapioca starch with a little rice flour, and check the packaging on everything else in the filling too.

Can I just leave the wrapper out and cook the filling on its own?

You can, and it is a decent dinner, just not dim sum. A har gow filling is chopped shrimp with bamboo shoot, a little pork fat or sesame oil, white pepper and starch, and if you press it into small patties and pan-fry them you get very good shrimp cakes, or you can drop spoonfuls into a light broth as shrimp dumplings without skins. What you lose is the entire point of the dish, which is the contrast between a slippery glassy skin and the snap of the shrimp inside.

How thin should the wrapper be, and does it matter?

It matters more than the recipe does. A har gow wrapper should be thin enough to see the pink of the shrimp through it, roughly the thickness of a business card, with the centre slightly thicker than the rim so the base does not blow out. Too thick and it steams up rubbery and pasty and no filling can rescue it. If you cannot get it thin by rolling, make fewer and bigger dumplings from more dough rather than accepting thick skins.

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Har Gow Wrappers substitute

Other har gow wrappers substitutes

2Wheat Starch Alone

3Tapioca Starch Alone

4Frozen Crystal Dumpling Wrappers

5Cornstarch Blended With Tapioca Starch

6Wonton or Gyoza Wrappers

7Rice Paper