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wellownedbkupThe Challenge: Chinese dumplings/potstickers (aka gyoza in Japanese)
Ok, so the last time I cooked this, it was pretty much a so-so event. My sister had come up to the house and we made a day of it. Some pork chops had been in our fridge and nobody was cooking them, even post my brother's "marinading" attempts (note to self: brother shouldn't be allowed to marinade ANYTHING. ever.) with some random beer that I'd bought and immediately disliked. So, industrious kiddies that we were (I was 22 at the time, my sister, 21), we ground up the pork in a food processor, used whatever recipes we could find and bought everything-- hoisin sauce, sesame oil, bamboo shoots. Did it up right. Rolled out the dough as thin as we could get. All said and done, we steamed a third in our rice steamer (strange contraption, didn't do what we planned, took longer to steam than necessary), fried 2/3 in our wok and basically stood on our feet for HOURS. The pork tasted funny to me, but only because I hadn't realized it was marinated in NASTY NASTY BEER. Plus, we may have gone and added too much sesame oil. But I swear it was the beer.
So, anyway. So-so memory. But I LOVE DUMPLINGS. So this challenge was a walk in the park.
It's a basic concept: a filling inside a dough wrapper, sealed, and cooked. This delicious theme runs through many cultures and is among the more popular bites at Chinese restaurants - especially dim sum. The plan was to roll out the dough to a ridiculously thin wrapper, then fill with the desired filling. I made mine by hand (which was apparently a no-no, but since I called this challenge done after I'd finished, I didn't go back and retry. Besides... I DON'T CARE.
Fillings: the beauty of the Chinese dumpling/potsticker is that the filling is very versatile. That's why there are so many different kinds of dumplings when you go to dim sum. The two most common are pork and shrimp. You can make them with other ground meats (beef, chicken...) or vegetarian (tofu, mushrooms, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, glass noodles, Chinese chives - oh yum!). The important thing to keep in mind is that the filling needs to "stick" to itself or else you will make your life incredibly miserable wrapping up filling that keeps falling apart. When I made mine, I filled it with what I had in the fridge: some scallion, some shredded parmigiana, some ground beef, oregano, and some egg to bind it. Very Italian Meatball-esque.
So, the dough recipe for gyoza and potstickers:
dough: (double this for the amount of filling, but easier to make it in 2 batches - or just halve the filling recipe)
2 cups (250g) all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (113g) warm water
flour for work surface
My filling was kinda... catch as catch can. I had maybe 3 scallions, 3 oz of cheese, a pound and a half of burger, one egg and the rest was just... tossed in as I had it. No recipes here, bud!!
Combine all filling ingredients in a large mixing bowl and mix thoroughly (I mix by clean hand). Cover and refrigerate until ready to use (up to a day, but preferably within an hour or two).
Make the dough, by hand: In a large bowl mix flour with 1/4 cup of water and stir until water is absorbed. Continue adding water one teaspoon at a time and mixing thoroughly until dough pulls away from sides of bowl. We want a firm dough that is barely sticky to the touch.
Knead the dough about twenty strokes then cover with a damp towel for 15 minutes. Take the dough and form a flattened dome. Cut into strips about 1 1/2 to 2 inches wide. Shape the strips into rounded long cylinders. On a floured surface, cut the strips into 3/4 inch pieces. Press palm down on each piece to form a flat circle (you can shape the corners in with your fingers). With a rolling pin, roll out a circular wrapper from each flat disc. Take care not to roll out too thin or the dumplings will break during cooking - about 1/16th inch. Leave the centers slightly thicker than the edges. Place a tablespoon of filling in the center of each wrapper and fold the dough in half, pleating the edges along one side (see images in post for how to fold pleats). Keep all unused dough under damp cloth.
To boil: Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add dumplings to pot. Boil the dumplings until they float.
Ok. So, that was pretty much where the recipe left off. Here's my rundown of the good, bad and ugly. Good was that I've made dumplings before and generally know how to make them. Bad was that I was tired whilst doing them. Ugly was the way they turned out. The challenger wanted stupidly thin wrappers. I? Don't have the time or the care to want wrappers that thin. If I did, I'd buy them. End of story. So basically my dumplings were little round dough balls with surprise!meatball inside. Did I mind? NO. I actually kinda prefer a little dough on my dumpling. My favorite place to get them at the moment has a rather large amount of dough on the amount of filling in their steamed dumplings.
So, ok. Maybe it didn't turn out as she planned. I'm cool with that. I like my dumplings thick and chewy. It makes me feel like I'm actually eating something. I came up with maybe 50 or so dumplings out of my batch, which was about 2/3 of what I should've had, I think. WHATEVER. They tasted good and went well with breakfast and lunch the next day.
And the other ugly? My lack of camera. Photos taken with my Treo.
So, next time? Probably will try some new fillings. I've gone from beer-soaked pork (worst dumplings ever... too much sesame oil, nastiest beer ever) to random ground beef. Could also, maybe, try out rolling the dough thinner. Granted, I don't like standing on my feet that long, so maybe I'll bring in my favorite little helper and her mommy again. We'll split the work effort, and boil more this time. Should turn out fine, yeah?
Ok, so the last time I cooked this, it was pretty much a so-so event. My sister had come up to the house and we made a day of it. Some pork chops had been in our fridge and nobody was cooking them, even post my brother's "marinading" attempts (note to self: brother shouldn't be allowed to marinade ANYTHING. ever.) with some random beer that I'd bought and immediately disliked. So, industrious kiddies that we were (I was 22 at the time, my sister, 21), we ground up the pork in a food processor, used whatever recipes we could find and bought everything-- hoisin sauce, sesame oil, bamboo shoots. Did it up right. Rolled out the dough as thin as we could get. All said and done, we steamed a third in our rice steamer (strange contraption, didn't do what we planned, took longer to steam than necessary), fried 2/3 in our wok and basically stood on our feet for HOURS. The pork tasted funny to me, but only because I hadn't realized it was marinated in NASTY NASTY BEER. Plus, we may have gone and added too much sesame oil. But I swear it was the beer.
So, anyway. So-so memory. But I LOVE DUMPLINGS. So this challenge was a walk in the park.
It's a basic concept: a filling inside a dough wrapper, sealed, and cooked. This delicious theme runs through many cultures and is among the more popular bites at Chinese restaurants - especially dim sum. The plan was to roll out the dough to a ridiculously thin wrapper, then fill with the desired filling. I made mine by hand (which was apparently a no-no, but since I called this challenge done after I'd finished, I didn't go back and retry. Besides... I DON'T CARE.
Fillings: the beauty of the Chinese dumpling/potsticker is that the filling is very versatile. That's why there are so many different kinds of dumplings when you go to dim sum. The two most common are pork and shrimp. You can make them with other ground meats (beef, chicken...) or vegetarian (tofu, mushrooms, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, glass noodles, Chinese chives - oh yum!). The important thing to keep in mind is that the filling needs to "stick" to itself or else you will make your life incredibly miserable wrapping up filling that keeps falling apart. When I made mine, I filled it with what I had in the fridge: some scallion, some shredded parmigiana, some ground beef, oregano, and some egg to bind it. Very Italian Meatball-esque.
So, the dough recipe for gyoza and potstickers:
dough: (double this for the amount of filling, but easier to make it in 2 batches - or just halve the filling recipe)
2 cups (250g) all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (113g) warm water
flour for work surface
My filling was kinda... catch as catch can. I had maybe 3 scallions, 3 oz of cheese, a pound and a half of burger, one egg and the rest was just... tossed in as I had it. No recipes here, bud!!
Combine all filling ingredients in a large mixing bowl and mix thoroughly (I mix by clean hand). Cover and refrigerate until ready to use (up to a day, but preferably within an hour or two).
Make the dough, by hand: In a large bowl mix flour with 1/4 cup of water and stir until water is absorbed. Continue adding water one teaspoon at a time and mixing thoroughly until dough pulls away from sides of bowl. We want a firm dough that is barely sticky to the touch.
Knead the dough about twenty strokes then cover with a damp towel for 15 minutes. Take the dough and form a flattened dome. Cut into strips about 1 1/2 to 2 inches wide. Shape the strips into rounded long cylinders. On a floured surface, cut the strips into 3/4 inch pieces. Press palm down on each piece to form a flat circle (you can shape the corners in with your fingers). With a rolling pin, roll out a circular wrapper from each flat disc. Take care not to roll out too thin or the dumplings will break during cooking - about 1/16th inch. Leave the centers slightly thicker than the edges. Place a tablespoon of filling in the center of each wrapper and fold the dough in half, pleating the edges along one side (see images in post for how to fold pleats). Keep all unused dough under damp cloth.
To boil: Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add dumplings to pot. Boil the dumplings until they float.
Ok. So, that was pretty much where the recipe left off. Here's my rundown of the good, bad and ugly. Good was that I've made dumplings before and generally know how to make them. Bad was that I was tired whilst doing them. Ugly was the way they turned out. The challenger wanted stupidly thin wrappers. I? Don't have the time or the care to want wrappers that thin. If I did, I'd buy them. End of story. So basically my dumplings were little round dough balls with surprise!meatball inside. Did I mind? NO. I actually kinda prefer a little dough on my dumpling. My favorite place to get them at the moment has a rather large amount of dough on the amount of filling in their steamed dumplings.
So, ok. Maybe it didn't turn out as she planned. I'm cool with that. I like my dumplings thick and chewy. It makes me feel like I'm actually eating something. I came up with maybe 50 or so dumplings out of my batch, which was about 2/3 of what I should've had, I think. WHATEVER. They tasted good and went well with breakfast and lunch the next day.
And the other ugly? My lack of camera. Photos taken with my Treo.
So, next time? Probably will try some new fillings. I've gone from beer-soaked pork (worst dumplings ever... too much sesame oil, nastiest beer ever) to random ground beef. Could also, maybe, try out rolling the dough thinner. Granted, I don't like standing on my feet that long, so maybe I'll bring in my favorite little helper and her mommy again. We'll split the work effort, and boil more this time. Should turn out fine, yeah?
