POT STICKERS! >_<

[Arundel Pajo]

POT STICKERS! (vegetarian, substitute ground pork or chicken for mushrooms if you want meat)
<ul>
<li>1 red onion, chopped
<li>1-2 tbsp fresh minced ginger
<li>1 cup chopped napa cabbage
<li>1 cup chopped shiitake mushrooms
<li>1 cup grated carrot
<li>1/4 cup garlic chives, or 3 cloves minced garlic
<li>1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
<li>2 tbsp dark sesame oil
<li>salt and pepper to taste
<li>wonton wraps</ul>

Heat wok with a little bit of canola oil, and toss in ginger and onion. Let that cook until it's just translucent, and add mushrooms, carrot, cabbage, and garlic. Cook all that down until it's soft, and transfer to a colander to drain and cool.

When cool, transfer to a bowl and mix in sesame oil and cilantro. Adjust salt and pepper to taste, and fold into wonton wrappers to make dumplings. Place a dollop of mix on center of wrap, wet edges with water, and fold corners in. Then seal all edges by pressing. You should have dumplings that resemble little pouches or bags.

Heat some more canola oil in the wok, and (when hot) add the dumplings, flat side down. Cook until bottoms are brown and crispy.

Quickly add 1/4 cup water to the wok, and slam the lid down fast (don't want grease to splatter). Let the water cook off with the lid closed, and the steam will cook the tops of the dumplings. Remove lid to ensure that all water is gone, and continue cooking until bottoms are crisp again.

Serve hot on a bed of shredded cabbage to help facilitate draining.

Any variety of dips are good with these...I like a mix of soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, sesame oil, fresh minced ginger, and just a touch of chili paste.

edit: cabbage...cabbage...serve on cabbage, not lettuce. Lettuce is all wet. That was a typo

[Spankes]

I worked in achinese restaurant years ago and the filling was basically the same (with pork) but they were wraped and cooked differently. Basically there were wonton wrapers that were circular made specifically for pot stickers. The filling was placed in the center and the wrapper was folded over and creased to make a sort of half moon shape. The bottom was flat and the rest was sort of rounded. This made for almost half of the dumpling to be crispy (yummy).

To cook we threw the dumplings in hot stock to cook/heat completely. Once done the water is trained and the dumplings rest for a moment while you heat a wok up super hot, then add cool oil (this will make the pot stickers not stick). Place the pot stickers in the oil flat side down, they will crisp up in about 10 seconds. remove, strain and eat.






edit: added pictures.

[Arundel Pajo]

Those wraps would make it much easier - I wish the local market had those instead of the square ones! Thanks for the tip!

[Canelek]

I have been wanting a good dumpling recipe. Will try this one soon! Thanks!

For sauce, I like to mix soy sauce and Sriracha (Vietnamese serrano chili + garlic) sauce.