Chinese Dumplings

Who can resist the alluring call of these little packages of flavour and soft comfort. Today we share the crispy skin version of the versatile Chinese Dumpling or known locally as 鍋貼 (literally means pan stick).

Dumpling skin

(you can skip this step if you use ready-made dumpling skins ;-)
60g Plain Flour
1tsp Cooking Oil
3tbsp Water
pinch of salt

Sift flour and mix in oil, water and salt slowly. Knead well into a dough and let it rest in a warm place (~40°C) for 30 mins.

Then roll the dough into a skin of ~2mm thickness and cut out circular skins using a round tool (here we just use a pudding cup). Spread some flour on the surface of your rolling table so that the skin is easy to lift off the surface.

The size of your dumpling will be determined by this, for us we are using 7cm diameter skins. You can re-roll the left over skins into a sheet again so not to waste. You should be able to get at least 8 dumpling skins with the recipe above.

Filling

(we are going with a classic but simple filling, feel free to be creative!)
90g Minced Pork
15g Shredded White Radish
10g Shredded Carrot
1tbsp Oyster Sauce
1tbsp Corn Flour
Salt to taste

Folding the dumplings

(the tricky part)
Scoop the fillings onto the skins, try to place them in a kinda oval shape (imagine the resulting dumpling shape).

Start by brushing water on the skin edge so that they stick and fold the skin to form a closed package while pinching the edge together. Follow the video here for the exact method, it might take some practice but it is easy when you get the hang of it.

Frying in a pan

(finally the last step)
Arrange the dumpling in a oiled pan (be generous with the oil cause they will need to fry for sometime) and pour in 50ml of water per 8 dumplings. Close with a lid and cook under mellow heat, periodically check on the dumplings and if the bottoms are brown then they are done on that side.

Then flip all the dumplings to their sides and cook again till slightly brown, repeat with the other side.

That's it and you can serve those piping hot dumplings with your choice of dipping sauce.

Enjoy ~