I’m gearing up to start on my professional baking classes tomorrow. I even packed all of my professional kitchen apparel into my work bag to bring along to class right after work. I’m feeling a wide range of emotions including excitement, nervousness, and general eagerness. This weekend has been a beautiful weekend of both warm and cool weather. During cooler days, I like to take morning walks to soak in all of the crisp fall air. Fall season means the absolute best seasonal fruits and vegetables. I’ve been stocking up on a wide variety of apples to incorporate into fall dishes. This week in particular, I had intense cravings for pork and cabbage dumplings. My pork and cabbage dumplings are reminiscent of Kevin’s favorite food of all times, Shanghai style Xiao Long Bao, also known as soup dumplings. These soup dumplings are typically made with a pork and cabbage blend similar to the filling I use in my dumplings. The filling is packed into thin wrappers and steamed in bamboo steamer baskets. My pork and cabbage dumplings can give Xiao Long Bao a run for its money. My version of dumplings are plump, juicy, and perfect to eat any time of day. Whenever Kevin and I visit my family in New York City, we always make a trip to Joe’s Shanghai in Manhattan’s Chinatown to get our fix of soup dumplings. In more recent years, my older brother, Pete, and his wife, Steph, brought us to Kung Fu Xiao Long Bao in Flushing, Queens for authentic soup dumplings. Kevin thought the soup dumplings at Kung Fu Xiao Long Bao were authentic and very similar to the ones he had growing up in Hong Kong. Since then, he would always request for us to stop by Kung Fun Xiao Long Bao if we had the chance. While I love soup dumplings, I love lightly fried pork and cabbage dumplings just a bit more. If I get the opportunity, I will always make my way to the outskirts of Chinatown to get dollar dumplings along the restaurants near Columbus Park. The strip of restaurants near Columbus Park in Chinatown has some of the best dumplings. I grew up eating all sorts of dumplings with my family. We would eat dumplings in restaurants and bring back any leftovers (if there were any left) at the end of each meal. My dad would also buy bags upon bags of frozen pork and crab dumplings from local Chinese supermarkets to make when our cravings for dumplings kick in. I didn’t start making my own dumplings from scratch until I moved to the Midwest almost a decade ago. It has been a bit more difficult to get access to fresh dumplings in the Midwest without driving quite a bit to the closest authentic Chinese restaurants serving dumplings. Thus, shortly after moving to the Midwest, I began perfecting my version of pork and cabbage dumplings. I continued to improve upon my dumplings over the years until I came up with the perfect pork and cabbage dumplings. My version of pork and cabbage dumplings feature a mixture of ground pork, Napa cabbage, a blend of aromatics, and a sweet and savory sauce. The filling is tucked into sheets of homemade dumpling wrappers, gently fried, steamed, and fried again to achieve its perfect flavor. The wrappers have a wonderful chewy texture once cooked. The dumplings are very hot once removed from the pan. The moment you bite into the dumplings, you get a stream of delicious soup and savory meat. I find it impossible to have just a few and usually end up eating way too many dumplings. Pork and cabbage dumplings are also one of Kevin’s favorite foods. Kevin and I can both eat dumplings any time of the day and any time of the year. We did end up enjoying some dumplings as we watched our favorite college football team play. Dumplings aren’t the traditional American tailgate food, but Kevin and I can agree on choosing pork and cabbage dumplings over many other traditional game day food any day.
For the pork and cabbage dumplings:
For the dumpling wrappers:
· 2¾ cups all-purpose flour, plus additional flour for kneading the dough
· ½ teaspoon kosher salt
· 1 cup lukewarm water
For the pork and cabbage filling:
· 3 cloves garlic, finely minced
· 1 inch knob of ginger, minced
· ½ pound ground pork
· 3-4 leaves of Napa cabbage, finely chopped
· 3 stalks of scallions, finely sliced, plus additional thinly sliced stalk of scallion for garnishing
· 1 teaspoon Shaoxing wine
· 2 teaspoons light soy sauce
· ½ teaspoon sesame oil
· 1 teaspoon oyster sauce
· 1 teaspoon confectioners’ sugar
· ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
· Dash of white pepper
· 4 tablespoons of vegetable or canola oil, for frying
· 1 cup water, for steaming dumplings
Dipping Sauce:
· 3 tablespoons soy sauce
· ½ tablespoon rice wine vinegar
· ½ tablespoon Chinkiang vinegar
Directions:
1) On a large baking sheet, sprinkle on some all-purpose flour. Set aside.
2) To make the dough, combine the 2 cups of flour and salt in a large bowl. Add the lukewarm water to the mixture. Use your hands to thoroughly mix the dough. The dough will be sticky at this point. Gradually add the remaining ¾ cup of flour slowly into the bowl as you continue kneading the dough for about 3-5 minutes. Let the dough rest for 30 minutes. While the dough is resting, you can start making the filling.
3) To make the pork and cabbage filling, combine the minced garlic, minced ginger, ground pork, chopped cabbage, sliced scallions, Shaoxing wine, soy sauce, sesame oil, oyster sauce, confectioners’ sugar, salt, and white pepper in a large bowl. Use your hands to combine all ingredients until well mixed. Set aside.
4) When the resting time for the dough is up, stretch the dough out into a rectangular shape. Cut the dough into three or four logs and cut each log into about ½ inch pieces. To make the dumplings, prepare a small bowl of water and small bowl of flour. Sprinkle a small bit of flour onto a surface and begin rolling out the pieces of dough into a circle one by one onto a floured surface. Place about ½ tablespoon of filling on each piece of dough. Dip your pointer finger into the bowl of water and moisten half of the circle of the dough wrapper. Bring the dry edge up to the moistened edge of the circle and pinch close at the middle. Beginning on one end, press or pleat the dough until you form 2-4 pleats. Repeat on the other side. Press the edges to seal the dumplings. Continue this process with the rest of the dumpling wrappers and filling.
5) Place the pieces of wrapped dumplings on the floured baking sheet until ready to fry.
6) Heat a deep skillet on medium heat. Add a tablespoon of vegetable or canola oil into the pan. Once the oil is hot, add 7-10 dumplings into the pan and fry for about 1-2 minutes, until golden brown. Pour about 3-4 tablespoons of water into the skillet. Use a pot cover to cover the skillet for about 2-3 minutes until the water is evaporated. Remove dumplings to a plate and let dumplings rest before serving. Continue the process of frying dumplings until all dumplings are fried. Garnish the dumplings with half of the additional thinly sliced stalk of scallion.
7) To make the dipping sauce, combine soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, and Chinkiang vinegar in a small bowl. Garnish with the other half of the additional thinly sliced stalk of scallion.
Takeaways: The recipe yields anywhere from 27-29 dumplings depending on how small or large you cut your dough pieces. This time around, I must have cut the dough into larger pieces since I ended up with 21 dumplings. You can always double the dough recipe if you want to make even more dumplings. If you have leftover filling, you can always brown the filling in a pan, add four whisked eggs and make some seasoned ground pork omelets. The omelets are exceptional and I have been making them for years whenever I have leftover seasoned ground pork filling.
Check out my pork, cabbage, and bok choy dumplings for another spin on dumplings. For a vegan alternative, check out my rainbow vegetable dumplings.