Recipe: Simple Everyday Dumplings

November 14, 2010 | Filed under Food

We made dumplings for the first time last night, sat in front of the TV together watching The Fifth Element. I love dumplings – I could eat them for breakfast, lunch, and dinner (and often did when I was studying overseas in Shanghai). It’s fairly cheap to make (the ingredients cost us about $6AUD, and it’s about two meals worth), it’s satisfying and filling, and it doesn’t necessarily require much culinary talent, as I clearly made it with no problem!

Simple Everyday Dumplings

Dumplings

Makes approximately 50-60 dumplings.

Ingredients

Measurements are approximate – you can have more mince, or more vegetables, or more seasoning. It really depends what type of flavouring and stuffing you personally prefer.

Method

  1. Mix together mince, mushroom, bokchoy and rice wine until fully combined. Season with salt, pepper and chicken stock to your liking.
  2. Place small amount of mixture in the middle of a dumpling skin.
  3. Dip your finger in water and dot water around half of the edge of the dumpling skin. Fold over and pinch shut.
  4. You can close the dumpling skin however you like – I like to have a scalloped edge (you can see it in photo), but Dylan’s lazy and simply pinched the edges shut so that it looked like moneybags. You’ll figure out the style that works best for you.

We ended up pan-frying them (cover the base of a pan with oil, place dumplings close together in pan when hot, pour half a cup of water into the pan and cover for ten minutes), but if you prefer traditional soup dumplings, you should be able to just pop these in boiling water (making sure to stir occasionally to stop them from sticking together).

8 Responses to Recipe: Simple Everyday Dumplings

  1. 饺子！Fried jiaozi is the best. I eat it almost every day here in Beijing; I’ve scoped out the best jiaozi places and find myself craving jiaozi if I am eating something else!

    Reply: And it is just so goddarn versatile that you can eat it any time of the day!

    Manda on November 14, 2010 #

  2. I LOVE DUMPLINGS! I prefer them steamed or cooked in broth but I do like pot stickers too. My mom grinds up some shrimp to go with the pork and those are divine. And a few drops of sesame oil goes a long way with these.

    Reply: Mmm…shrimp…we’re thinking of putting in some prawn meat next time to go with the pork.

    Felisa on November 14, 2010 #

  3. Yum, gyoza/dumplings are the best! D needs one of these – http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.22523 – I bought one when I was last in Japan, and they are absolutely brilliant!

    Reply: $1.49 with free shipping, are you kidding me?! No wonder it’s sold out…

    Bobbi on November 14, 2010 #

  4. Going to make these next week. I’ve been craving xiao long bao as well, although I can’t seem to get the dumpling right

    Reply: My mum has problem with those too, and she’s like a cooking queen. I think it’s all in the pastry – you have to make it yourself to get it as thin as it should be so that the soup bursts in your mouth.

    FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com on November 14, 2010 #

  5. YUM I love potstickers. I was just thinking the other day about how nearly every culture has some form of dumpling. It’s interesting! These look awesome – wish I could find a really good vegetarian recipe.

    Reply: Come up with your own! The stuffing is really up to you…if I was doing veggie stuffing I’d probably do mushroom, bokchoy, maybe some picked veggies for extra flavour…

    Becky on November 15, 2010 #

  6. Oh man, I’m going to have to make these soon. XD Meat/vegetables covered in some sort of dough or wrapping is always delicious no matter how it’s done.

    Donna on November 15, 2010 #

  7. I’ve bought dumplings from the supermarket, but it’s difficult to find ones that match up to homemade so I’m bookmarking this if you don’t mind!

    Charlie on November 19, 2010 #

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