I’ve often been accused of cheating with my answer to the “If you could only have one food on a deserted island…” question and I’m completely at ease with that assessment. I have two answers that meet the technical criteria of the query but each is so wildly diverse in its real-world application that I’ll have myself a proper feast on that lonely beach, assuming I can find someone to deliver. The first answer as most of you regular readers can guess is ‘pizza’. An answer with so many sub-answers that we could be stuck at quiz night for hours. The second answer, and by no means second place, is dim sum. Countless tiny dumpling and bun permutations will keep me fed and happy on Spork Island.
The simplest and perhaps most familiar dim sum is a steamed or pan-fried pork dumpling. They go by many names but ‘pot stickers’ or ‘New Year’s dumpling’ seem to be the most common, the latter from a belief that eating the addictive crescent-shaped little devils by the plateful on Chinese New Year’s is good luck. Who am I to argue with an excuse to make dumplings? While pork is the classic, I also make a vegetarian version with spinach-flavoured wrappers and mushroom filling that’s absolutely delicious. I’ll share those adjustments to the original in a later post. Let’s get the old-school classic down first, shall we?
There are two big components when making pot stickers – the dumpling ‘wrappers’ and the filling. I’ve separated the former into another post because they’re useful for other types of dim sum. The filling couldn’t be simpler but I’ll advise you that it’s much better made the the night before dumpling day so the flavours have time to come together in the fridge.
The quality of the pork is paramount so avoid the pre-ground packet and select a decent piece to grind yourself in the food processor. Don’t cheat on this because it’s a huge uptick in the final flavour between grinding your own from a single piece versus the industrial grab bag made from many. Depending on availability, I’ve used less expensive shoulder cuts or a solid piece of loin that had a good proportion of fat cap attached. Ask your butcher for daily recommendations. You ARE talking to your butcher regularly, right?
Better yet, connect to your farmer if you can manage that. Get as far away from the cheap polystyrene packaging as possible. Factory farmed pork on sale at the SuperDiscountMegaGrocer tastes like garbage and supports a nasty industry hell-bent on cheap, tasteless, unethical profits. Find your local farmer or butcher and demand better or you might as well skip it altogether and buy some interesting mushrooms instead. All politics and economics aside, I’m telling you this for flavour reasons. I’ve done the tastes tests myself and it’s a fact. Pay a little more, dig a little deeper, eat a lot better.
Baking soda is a classic meat tenderizer used in Chinese cookery in case you were wondering what that was doing in the ingredient list. Even the best food processor seems to have trouble mincing fresh ginger so take on that task by hand where you can ‘align’ the natural fibres and cut across them. Everything else the machine can handle but judicious use of your knife skills will give you more interesting textures. Play around but remember that smaller pieces cook more evenly.
Traditional Pork Pot Stickers
450 grams (~ 1 pound) fresh pork, any cut with roughly 25% fat and trimmed of any tough fibres
25 grams (about five large cloves) freshly peeled garlic
40 grams fresh ginger root, peeled and minced finely by hand
1-2 medium heat chilies, stems, seeds, and ribs removed (optional)
1 bunch (4-6) spring onions, trimmed and chopped finely
80 grams (1/2 cup) water chestnuts chopped (or substitute 1/4 cup very finely minced celery)
1 small head bok choy, chopped fine
1 tablespoon baking soda
1 tablespoon corn starch
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black peppercorn
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons light soy sauce
1 tablespoon dark soy sauce
2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
4 tablespoons Shaoxing wine (or substitute good quality sherry)
1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
Wrappers for 32 dumplings (see how to make your own here)
Cut the pork into roughly two-inch pieces and place in the freezer for half an hour to firm slightly.
In a food processor with a standard cutting blade, process the garlic, ginger, and chiles to a fine mince. This can be incorporated by the machine as you process the pork in small batches with 10-20 pulses each to achieve a ground texture, removing each batch to a separate mixing bowl as the correct texture is achieved. Do not over-process into a paste unless you feel like having Chinese pate.
Add all the remaining ingredients and mix well by hand until consistent throughout. Cover and refrigerate for at least an hour and up to two days before making dumplings.
To assemble, place 2-3 tablespoons of filling in the centre of each five-inch wrapper. Do not overfill lest you have dumpling blowouts. Using a fingertip, apply water to half of the circumference of the wrapper. Hold the filled dumpling in one hand with the wet edge towards the inside of your hand and pinch two opposite sides together tightly at the point farthest from your palm. Gather a short quarter-inch length of the ‘dry’ side together in a small fold and crimp it to the ungathered wet side, effectively shortening one side of the dumpling. Repeat this step until you’ve closed the entire dumpling into a crescent shape. (Bugger, I’ll do a video on this so it makes more sense shortly)
When ready to cook you have a choice. Traditionally, they’re fried briefly in an oiled pan on one side to give a ‘crispy’ side and then water is added with a lid so they finish cooking throughout with steam. For six dumplings, I add about 100ml of water after seven minutes frying on medium high heat and know they’re done when all of that moisture has been absorbed. This method has so many variables however (temperature of the pan, fit of the lid, etc.) that the only sure way is to get out your instant read thermometer and test internal temps.
They can also be steamed from the outset on parchment paper squares placed in a large bamboo steamer if you want to skip the pan altogether. I aim for an internal temperature of around 85C (185F) there. I genuinely like them both ways as long as you have plenty of homemade dipping sauce.
