(Belated, Again) Chinese New Year Meal #2: Big Wontons

Alex and I love dumplings and wontons enough that we use the word "dumple" as a verb.  It usually means that we are going out to eat dumplings, but every once in awhile we get ambitious and decide to make dumplings at home.  These big wontons were our last attempt at "dumple-ing".  I have been waiting for a little while to make these Big Wontons and the Little Wontons (both available on Serious Eats).  I was originally planning on making the little wontons, but I wasn't sure how thin our dumpling wrappers were so I didn't want to take the chance that they would be too thick.  But I'm pretty sure that they were plenty thin enough so we will go for the little wontons and make some wonton noodle soup next time.  Yum.  What I liked best about these wontons was the addition of the bok choy (or cabbage) and chives in the filling - I like nice meaty dumplings but sometimes it's nice to have a little more veg mixed in.  I took a quick look at my Andrea Nguyen Asian Dumplings cookbook and tried a few different folding methods.  The one that I had the most luck with this time was "nurses caps" (my "flower buds" were a little wonky).  Actually, both Alex and I commented on the fact that my dumplings were unusually well-formed this time.  None of them broke apart while cooking, nor was there any filling ooz-age out the sides.  I was pretty impressed with myself.  We made 50 dumplings and only ate 20 or so (and froze the rest).  I can't want to make some wonton noodle soup with some of the leftover Asian chicken stock we made for our Khao Tom Thai Rice Soup!  Even more yum.  I am also tempted to try pan-frying them, although the skins are thin enough that I am a little nervous to pan-fry.  But let's be honest, when has that ever stopped me in the past?  Wish me luck.

Recipe after the jump!

(Belated) Chinese New Year Meal #5: Xi'an Potsticker Dumplings (Xi'an Guo Tie), Tofu Shreds with Baby Bok Choy and Tiger Salad (Lao Hu Cai)

When I first saw this recipe for Xi'an Potsticker Dumplings I got really excited because they look like the pan-fried pork dumplings from A&J Restaurant in Rockville, Maryland (pictured below).  A&J is one of my all-time favorite Chinese restaurants and I try to visit every time I find myself in Maryland.  The filling is different - I'm not sure that I have ever had Chinese dumplings with a beef filling, but I can't swear to it.  I know that I have never made beef dumplings at home.  I will be the first to admit that my dumplings don't exactly look like the ones at A&J (and their bottoms are a little bit more cooked than I had intended for them to be), but I did my best.  And I was really happy with the way they turned out.  I thought these wrappers were easier to make and less doughy than the wrappers from the Pork and Napa Cabbage Water Dumplings (Shuijiao) that we made last year for Chinese New Year.  There were errors in execution both times.  I am not a proficient dumpling maker and I am happy to admit that.  But I thought that all things considered, these wrappers turned out better and the dumplings themselves were easier to wrap.  And they they fried up really nicely.  While I really liked the wrappers, I was less enamored of the filling.  It was good, but when I want a dumpling I really want a nice juicy pork filling.  I think I would like to make the dumplings again (with pork) because the skins were awesome and they were easy to throw together. 

The tofu noodles were something of a challenge.  The problem with buying ingredients at an Asian grocery store is that sometimes you end up with ingredients with no instructions on how to cook them.  And that's what happened to us here.  Ours were labeled "tofu rolls."  When I got home and tried to search for "tofu noodles" all I ended up with were tofu skin noodles or yuba noodles that are much thinner.  So I had to wing it.  And it didn't occur to me until after we had already made dinner that I should have searched "tofu shreds."  Oops.  Luckily, our dish came out just fine.  I tasted a few of the tofu shreds prior to blanching them and decided that 2-3 minutes in a pot of boiling water should warm them through and make them tender enough to eat.  I originally wanted to make a variation on the liang pi cold noodles from Xi'an Famous Foods since we were making Xi'an dumplings, but it has been so long since I had them that I wasn't sure I could replicate them.  Instead we tossed them simply with the ingredients we had in the fridge - baby bok choy, garlic, ginger and dried chilis.  They were yummy.  I love how just a few ingredients - garlic, ginger and dried chilis tossed in the wok can really give a dish great flavor.  I know that some people might be put off by the texture of the tofu noodles, but I happen to enjoy how springy they are. 

The tiger salad was a last second addition to lunch after I realized that we only ended up with 12 dumplings.  I think we were supposed to have 16 (although the recipe never specified), but I ran out of filling after we made 12 dumplings.  I really liked the freshness of the dish and the bright flavor, but if I were to make it again I would cut down on the amount of Chinkiang vinegar because the dish was a little too acidic for me.   

Recipes after the jump!

Chinese New Year Meal #1 - Pork and Napa Cabbage Water Dumplings (Shuijiao) with Daikon Slivers in a Spicy Dressing

Gong Hei Fat Choy!   It took us a little while to get around to it, but we finally made our first Chinese New Year meal!  And it was a very traditional one - dumplings (shuijiao).  Dumplings and daikon, but more on the daikon later.  So before I even start talking about this recipe I have to made an admission.  I totally didn't read the recipe right.  We were supposed to make 32 dumplings total - divide the dough in half and make 16 wrappers from each half.  Instead I made 16 total.  I missed the step of dividing the dough in half.  So each dumpling was roughly the size of an empanada and each wrapper the size of a small tortilla.  They were monster dumplings.  Oops.  The size of our enormous dumplings aside, they were really tasty.  The wrappers were silky.  And maybe a little doughier than they should have been, but again, they were monster dumplings.  The filling had really good flavor and texture.  The dumplings were juicy too, not dry and hockey puck-like.  I was really happy with them.  They only took two-three hours to make from start to finish and made a mess of our entire kitchen, but I thought it was worth it.  Once or twice a year I like to take on an overly ambitious cooking project.  This was mine for the next few months.  And it was a really good one. 

I chose the Daikon Slivers in a Spicy Dressing (Liang Ban Luo Bu Si) as the side because it was simple and didn't need to be cooked.  I wanted a vegetable side dish that would be tasty and refreshing, but not too much trouble to prepare.  I was trying to avoid making smacked cucumbers or Sichuan cucumbers because I feel like we make them too often.  So I decided to go with daikon radish instead.  And in the end, it was the daikon dish that really stood out for me.  I loved the freshness of the cilantro and scallion, added to the hint of sweetness that all offset the spicy, saltiness of the dressing.  And I really enjoyed the crunch of the raw daikon.  Don't get me wrong, the dumplings were delicious.  But they were a lot of trouble to make.  The daikon was equally delicious (albeit in a very different way), and it was relatively easy to throw together.  I could definitely see myself making the daikon again in the future to round out a nice Chinese meal.

Recipes after the jump!

Wonton Noodle Soup (Wonton Mee)

Up until middle school my Chinese grandmother (popo) lived with us.  And I always got excited when my other non-Chinese grandmother came to visit because popo would then make us all homemade wonton soup.  And I loved her wonton soup.  It was amazing.  I wouldn't eat wonton soup at any restaurant, except for one restaurant in Wheaton, MD called Full Kee, because I thought it just didn't compare.  Years later my mom told me that the secret to her wonton soup was the jar of MSG she kept in the pantry.  Whatever her secret was, those wontons were delicious.  And now that popo is no longer with us, I have had to resort to wonton soup or wonton noodle soup (aka "wonton mee") from restaurants for years.  I have found a few decent bowls of wonton mee here in the city, including the one at Great NY Noodletown, but none that are as good at popo's wonton soup or even as good as Full Kee's.  And I can't tell you how many mediocre bowls I have had throughout the years.  But it is still my go-to soup at Chinese restaurants.  It's also a benchmark by which I judge all Cantonese restaurants, although I only order the noodles when I am confident that I am in a true Cantonese restaurant.

This soup was a pretty decent first attempt at homemade wonton soup.  I think the broth needed more depth of flavor (I wish we had added some pork so it wasn't just a chicken stock), but since we made the broth separately that's a whole separate critique.  The next time I make this soup I will whip up another batch of stock with a heartier flavor.  I also wish I had some veggies to throw in the soup because a lot of the time wonton mee has random wilted greens (sometimes baby bok choy) floating in the broth.  But the wontons were pretty darn good for our first attempt.  I was fairly impressed with us.  I did look at Asian Dumplings: Mastering Spring Rolls, Samosas and More for some guidance, but the recipe there was for pure shrimp wontons and I was in the mood for mixed pork and shrimp.  So I decided to just wing it.  I had some trouble deciding on the proportions of shrimp and pork, but decided that 50-50 sounded safe.  And I remembered my popo's wontons tasting like sesame oil and white pepper so I added a decent amount to the wontons themselves and also to the soup.  I can't remember if she used scallions in her dumplings, but I happen to like scallions in my dumplings so I threw those in too.  The soup was a bit labor intensive, but it was comforting and very satisfying.  And for me, it was more than a little nostalgic.  Alex and I both enjoyed it.  If I made it again I would make a few tweaks here and there - making a better stock being the most important one, and potentially blanching the wontons and the noodles in a separate pot of boiling water like they do in most restaurants before adding them to the broth so as to not dilute/muddy the flavors of the broth.  If you cook the noodles in the broth they release starch into the broth, which makes it a little starchy and changes the flavor a bit.  It also makes the broth a little cloudy.  I just have to decide whether the purity of flavor of the stock is really worth using (and cleaning) another pot...

Recipe after the jump!

Siu Mai (Pork and Shrimp Cups)

Siu mai is one of my absolute favorite dishes for dim sum.  Two of the cookbooks that I have purchased in the past year have recipes for siu mai - The Asian Grandmothers Cookbook: Home Cooking from Asian American Kitchens and Asian Dumplings: Mastering Gyoza, Spring Rolls, Samosas and More.  But I've never felt the need to make them at home when there are so many good Cantonese restaurants down in Chinatown where I can get them without having to go to the trouble to make them at home.  I know.  That's a pathetic reason for not making them at home, but sometimes I get a little lazy.  But I promised a friend that I would do some posts on different dim sum recipes and this was one dish that I just couldn't imagine doing dim sum without.  So I finally went ahead and made one of the two recipes that I had already marked (although I will post both recipes below).

I have to say that I probably won't be making siu mai at home again anytime soon.  It was fine, but the versions I have had at every Chinatown restaurant were so much better.  Somehow the filling on these got really dry and the dumpling skins we bought were really dry and hard to use.  Asian Dumplings contains a recipe for the dumpling skins themselves, which would probably result in much better results, but goodness that's a lot of work.  I think if I were to make the siu mai at home again, I would definitely add more liquid to the filling to keep it a little more moist and delicious.  I think that the balance of pork, shrimp and vegetables was spot on, I just think that the filling needs a little more moisture.  And I would probably steam the dumplings for less time - maybe 10 minutes instead of 15 because I think that contributed to the dryness.  And the Andrea Nguyen recipe only called for steaming the dumplings for 6-8 minutes so I think 10 minutes should be more than sufficient.  But my real problem with the siu mai (aside from the slightly dry filling) was the store-bought dumpling wrappers, which were dry, which caused them to be really fragile and difficult to work with.

Recipes after the jump!

Chinese New Year Meal #6 - Sichuan Dumplings in Chili Oil and Chinese Broccoli in Oyster Sauce

For our sixth Chinese New Year meal, I decided that we had to make dumplings.  I was going to make potstickers (fried dumplings), but I decided that Sichuan dumplings sounded like more fun.  Plus I didn't want to go to the trouble of making the dumpling wrappers for my potstickers and I didn't think that the dumpling wrappers you buy at the grocery store would withstand being fried very well.  But I promise to make the potstickers at some point.  Maybe not in the month of February as part of my series of Chinese New Year meals, but definitely by the end of the year at the very least. 

My one problem with the dumplings was the that filling was a little dry.  After the ridiculously delicious dumplings we had in Flushing these just couldn't compare.  I wish that instead of adding kosher salt to the dumplings we had added soy sauce to give the filling some moisture.  I might also add some more herbs and things to the filling to freshen it up a bit.  We made some Pork and Chive Dumplings awhile ago and they were much juicier and a little more flavorful.  So these are the changes I think I would make to this recipe if I were to make it again: use fattier ground pork, add some finely grated gingerand a tbsp soy sauce (instead of the salt) to the filling.  To go with the dumplings I wanted to use up the rest of the gai lan (Chinese broccoli) that we bought in Chinatown.  Luckily, we had a recipe from The Asian Grandmother's Cookbook: Homecooking from Asian American Kitchens.  I was a little nervous about the recipe because it seemed to have serious potential for being totally bland - blanched gai lan topped with oyster sauce, sesame oil, and fried shallots.  But the gai lan was actually quite tasty and not bland at all.  I enjoyed it quite a bit.  Alex and I disagree about where this meal ranks against the other five Chinese New Year meals that we have already made.  I said that these dumplings were my least favorite.  Alex maintains that the Red Braised Beef Noodle Soup (Hong Shao Niu Rou Mian) was his least favorite.  Both were good, but some of the dishes we made earlier were phenomenal so they have some pretty steep competition.  As a side note, we have now made noodles, dumplings, chicken, beef, lamb, and pork belly.  Next we either need to make tofu or duck...  Since we will be out of town this weekend, I think we're going to have to wait until next week to plan what we should make next!

Recipe after the jump!

Pork and Chive Dumplings

When I was at Chapel Hill, my favorite restaurant was a place named Lantern.  It was an upscale Asian restaurant that opened sometime during my junior year.  Years after graduation I came across this recipe for Pork and Chive Dumplings from Andrea Reusing in Gourmet.  I made it a few times, along with the dipping sauce, before putting it together and realizing that it was the same Andrea Reusing who is the chef-owner of Lantern.  Random, but very very cool.  So when I was considering dumpling recipes to serve as a part of my Chinese New Year menu, I had to serve these.

I really enjoy the combination of the ginger, cilantro, and scallions in these dumplings.  They provide it with wonderful flavor.  And it makes a huge difference that you use fatty ground pork, rather than leaner ground pork for your filling.  That will ensure that the dumpling filling remains moist and succulent, rather than drying out.  I also like the addition of sriracha, sesame oil, and rice vinegar.  It's a nice little touch.

Instead of serving the dumplings with the Lantern dipping sauce, we decided to try out Fuchsia Dunlop's dipping sauce from her "Zhong" Crescent Dumplings recipe in Land of Plenty: Authentic Sichuan Recipes Personally Gathered in the Chinese Province of Sichuan.  Her dipping sauce is sweet and thick, a nice variation on the typical dipping sauce.

Recipes after the jump!

Shrimp and Scallion Dumplings

I love dumplings - boiled, steamed, or pan-fried.  I love eating them, I just don't particularly like making them (although every time it does get a little easier/better).  Usually when we try to make dumplings we end up making a HUGE mess of the kitchen.  I am talking flour and filling all over the place, and stuck under my nails.  Gross.  And we usually end up with at least a few dumplings that weren't sealed properly and thus explode in our pot of simmering water.  I don't know if that has ever happened to any of you, but it isn't pretty.  The same thing tends to happen when we try to make ravioli, which means that we give dumplings and ravioli a shot about once a year each - maybe twice if we're feeling really ambitious.  That is actually kind of sad considering we almost always have wonton skins in the freezer, which makes it all so much easier.

I've actually been thinking about buying Andrea Nguyen's new cookbook, Asian Dumplings, for awhile now but seeing as we make dumplings so infrequently, it just seems like a waste of good shelf space.  Then again, if we had a book full of delicious dumpling recipes we would probably try at least a few of the recipes out this year...

Speaking of dumpling recipes, I have been dying to make these shrimp and scallion dumplings ever since I saw the recipe in Gourmet last year.  I think I actually emailed the recipe to myself 3 times from Gourmet's website.  Side note - have I mentioned recently how absolutely bummed I am that Gourmet didn't make it through 2009?  I really loved that magazine.  Anyway, these are some delicious dumplings.  We usually make pork and chive dumplings, but I figured we should try something new this evening.  These dumplings were much lighter than our usual pork dumplings, and were just as flavorful.  Maybe this will be our year of the dumpling!

Recipe after the jump!