Snackspert tests 11 supermarket bapao buns: which one is the best?
When we’re standing in front of the snack or sauce aisle in the supermarket and we genuinely have no idea anymore, our Snackspert is always there to the rescue. Thanks to him, we now know which supermarket garlic sauce to buy. Or where to find the best frikandel roll. Now we can also head to the supermarket for a bapao bun with peace of mind, because the undisputed snack hero has tested for us which supermarket has the very best bapao buns.
Making bapao buns yourself is of course an option. That would probably put you near the very top of the best bapao list. But you know what… You simply don’t always feel like it. Sometimes you want easy, quick and cheap microwave food, and that’s where supermarket bapao comes in handy. A minute in the microwave and voilà, you have a slightly too sticky, piping-hot bun that can perfectly pass as comfort food.
Bapao: top or flop?
To make it at least a little bit of a culinary highlight, Snackspert tells us which bapao bun we should pick from the supermarket aisle. He tests 11 of them, half refrigerated and the other half from the freezer. For this test, he chooses chicken bapao. After hearing the microwave beep 11 times, Snackspert has made up his mind. Which bapao is a top pick and which is a flop? Spoiler alert: the critical snack king thought the vast majority of the bapao buns were absolutely nothing special…
Here is Snackspert’s complete top 11
1. Wahid: dough that’s a little too spongy, but so well seasoned. Really very nice
2. Mayam: genuinely delicious. Nice and spicy thanks to the sambal. Maybe just a little too much soy sauce, but really very tasty
3. Jumbo: pretty good. Nice kick, well seasoned, and the dough-to-meat ratio is spot-on
4. Plus: fine. Nothing more, nothing less
5. Kadir Food: it has a nice kick, but the minced chicken doesn’t have a very pleasant texture
6. Javafood: very generously filled, but really lacks flavor. It’s rather bland
7. Lidl: a little boring, but not necessarily very bad
8. Aldi: seasoned very mildly. Meh.
9. Albert Heijn frozen: has more flavor than the refrigerated version, but still meh.
10. Albert Heijn refrigerated: seasoned rather poorly
11. Humapro: this bapao consists more of dough than meat—not good
Noteworthy: Kadir Food’s rather mediocre ranking. About 2.5 years ago, Snackspert gave the chicken (and beef) bapao from Kadir Food four stars. At the time, he was especially enthusiastic about the seasoning of the filling; the addition of coconut made him a fan. Maybe tastes change? Eke has always been lyrical about Mayam’s bapao buns. Some time ago, the pork version received a solid five stars from the snack expert. So Mayam’s chicken bapao turns out to be a winner too.
Want to try the winner—the Wahid bapao? You can find it at many Albert Heijn, Jumbo, Dirk and Vomar stores.
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