Daylight savings is among us. Kevin is bummed about losing an hour of his day. I’ve been waiting anxiously for warmer weather and longer days. In preparation for spring, I’ve been cleaning our home and preparing my closet for the long-awaited warm weather. Projects at work have started picking up earlier this month. I’ve had to work some weekends to assist with the planning for a major project. Outside of work, I look forward most to the weekends. Weekends are the perfect time for testing and developing recipes and just letting my creative juices run wild in the kitchen. This weekend, I was craving some dumplings. Whenever I make dumplings, Kevin always requests my pork and cabbage dumplings. They’re Kevin’s favorite type of dumplings. I’ve made them quite a bit over the years and they’re always a hit with my family and friends. When my parents came to visit over the Thanksgiving holidays last year, I made them some pork and cabbage dumplings and they absolutely loved them. My mom did comment on the thickness of my dumpling wrappers. Kevin chimed in and commented when I think the dumpling wrappers are thin enough, I should roll them even thinner. Otherwise, all other aspects of the dumplings are always on point. When Kevin and I first started dating, dumplings were one of the first recipes we tackled together. He had a strong craving for dumplings one day and suggested we make some from scratch. We ended up making a decent batch of dumplings from scratch. We had such a good time cooking and bonding over our shared love for dumplings. Over time, Kevin’s interest in cooking dwindled. My interest in cooking only grew as I tried to refine my dumpling recipe over the years. It took a few years before I came up with my truly phenomenal pork and cabbage dumplings recipe. Since then, it became the go-to dumpling recipe whenever either of us craved dumplings. This weekend, I set out to make dumplings again. I had some leftover baby bok choy in the fridge and ended up incorporating them into my dumpling recipe. Thus, my pork, cabbage, and bok choy dumpling recipe was born. Making dumplings from scratch always transports me back to my childhood days growing up in New York. I would wake up early on Saturdays, take the train out to Chinatown in Manhattan, and soak in all of the wonderful aromas of the restaurants sprinkled throughout the neighborhood. I loved walking up to windows of dumpling restaurants and watching cooks prepare large batches of dumplings. I was always impressed by how efficient the staff were. It seemed as if they were able to fill, wrap, and cook dozens of dumplings in only a few minutes. I was always in awe of how efficient the process was and how delicious the final product was. Even thinking back to those moments makes me hungry. When I make dumplings, I like to take my time enjoying each step of the process from kneading the dough, to preparing the filling, to frying up batches of fresh dumplings. The combination of Napa cabbage and bok choy yielded some of the juiciest pork dumplings we’ve ever had. These dumplings turned out so good, they set a new bar for dumplings in our household.
For the pork, cabbage, and bok choy dumplings:
For the dumpling wrappers:
· 2¾ cups all-purpose flour, plus additional flour for kneading the dough
· 1 teaspoon kosher salt
· 1 cup lukewarm water
For the filling:
· 3 cloves garlic, finely minced
· 1 inch knob of ginger, minced
· 1 pound ground pork
· 4 leaves of Napa cabbage, finely chopped
· 4 baby bok choy, stems removed and finely chopped
· 3 stalks scallions, finely sliced, plus additional thinly sliced stalk of scallion for garnishing
· 2 teaspoons Shaoxing wine
· 4 teaspoons light soy sauce
· 1 teaspoon sesame oil
· 2 teaspoons oyster sauce
· 2 teaspoons confectioners’ sugar
· ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
· Dash of white pepper
· 8 tablespoons of vegetable or canola oil, for frying
· 2 cups of 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 filling, combine the minced garlic, minced ginger, ground pork, chopped cabbage, chopped baby bok choy, 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 eight strips and cut each strip into about 1½ inch pieces. To make the dumplings, prepare a 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. Place about 2 tablespoons of filling on each piece of dough. Bring two edges of the circle up and pinch close at the middle. Beginning on one end, press or pleat the dough until you form 3-4 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 two tablespoons of vegetable or canola oil into the pan. Once the oil is hot, add 6-8 dumplings into the pan and fry for about a minute, until the bottoms are golden brown. Pour about ½ cup of water into the skillet. Use a pot cover to cover the skillet and let the dumplings steam for about 2-3 minutes until the water evaporates. Remove the dumplings to a plate and let the 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: My recipe typically yields between 27-29 dumplings. This time around, I ended up with about 29 dumplings. Check out my pork and cabbage dumplings for a classic take on dumplings. For a vegan version, try my rainbow vegetable dumplings.