Har gow wrappers substitutes

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.

Best for

har gow, crystal shrimp dumplings, fun guo teochew dumplings, crystal chive dumplings, any translucent steamed dumpling

Indistinguishable from a good restaurant wrapper, and better than most frozen ones because it has not dried out. The one thing you must respect is heat: the boiling water gelatinises the starch, and that gelatinised starch is the only reason the dough holds together, since there is no gluten doing it. Water that has gone off the boil gives you a crumbly dough that cracks no matter how long you knead. Keep the finished dough in a bowl under a damp cloth and work with one piece at a time, because it turns brittle within minutes of cooling.

If your shop had wheat starch but no tapioca starch, go ahead. 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.

Widely stocked, cheap, and it makes a genuinely good translucent dumpling. 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.

Look in the freezer of a Chinese supermarket for packets labelled crystal dumpling skin, shrimp dumpling wrapper or shui jing bao. 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.

The pantry-only version, made from two things most kitchens already have. 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.

The honest fallback, and worth saying plainly: this will not give you har gow. 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.

The least-bad option if translucency is the only thing you care about and you have nothing else. 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.