July 2, 2020
July 4th is in two days. Kevin and I celebrated early together with some colorful treats. When I thought about what festive treats to make for our upcoming long weekend, pork and cabbage dumplings came to my mind almost immediately. Dumplings were one of the first recipes I worked on perfecting when I first started cooking. I had been eating dumplings my whole life and when I lived in New York City, I was able to easily access them. I could walk down a few blocks around my neighborhood and get phenomenal dumplings. Dumplings were one of the dishes my family and I ate almost weekly. I would travel all the way to Chinatown in Manhattan on weekends just to get my fix of dumplings. It didn’t matter to me how long the train ride would take. As long as the restaurant was a tried and true stop, I would travel from near and far to get there. Kevin, on the other hand, loved soup dumplings. They were his favorite food growing up in Hong Kong. Even now, whenever we traveled to Hong Kong to visit his family, we would always make a trip to an authentic Shanghai restaurant to get our fix of authentic soup dumplings. Sometimes, we would get soup dumplings multiple times throughout our travels to Hong Kong. When we moved to Ohio, I started to recreate all of the flavors and textures I remember in my favorite dumplings. After multiple trial tests and retests over the years, I came up with my absolute delicious pork and cabbage dumplings. My pork and cabbage dumplings are plump, juicy, and packed with flavor. The cabbage releases liquid when cooked and makes for a good soupy dumpling. I prepared the dough for my dumpling wrappers as usual by combining all-purpose flour, kosher salt, and lukewarm water in a bowl. To add a festive touch, I tinted the dumpling wrapper dough with red and blue gel food color. Once the dough started to come together, I divided the dough into three portions. I left one portion as is and tinted the other two portions with red and blue gel food coloring. The dough will appear pastel at first, but will deepen in color once cooked. I rested the dough for half an hour to allow the dough time to become more elastic. As the dough rested, I prepared my pork and cabbage filling. Kevin was on standby to help me capture the different steps in my dumpling making process. He didn’t mind the extra work because he knew the tastiest dumplings would be waiting for him in just a short while. Once the dough has had sufficient time to rest, I divided the dough up, shaped the portioned dough into balls, rolled them out, and pleated my way through all of the dough wrappers as quickly as possible. I fried and steamed the dumplings and served them right up with my favorite dipping sauce. The dumplings were pure perfection and made for the perfect way to kick off our July 4th weekend.
For the red, white, and blue dumpling wrappers:
· 2¾ cups all-purpose flour, plus additional flour for kneading the dough
· ½ teaspoon kosher salt
· 1 cup lukewarm water
· 6-8 drops red gel food coloring
· 6-8 drops blue gel food coloring
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
· 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
· ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
· ¼ teaspoon sesame seeds
· 1 stalk scallion, thinly sliced
Directions:
1) On a large baking sheet, sprinkle on some all-purpose flour. Set aside.
2) To make the dough, combine 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. Once the dough starts to form, divide the dough into three portions. Leave the first portion as is. Tint the second portion with red gel food coloring. Tint the third portion with blue gel food coloring. Knead each of the portions until a smooth dough forms, about 3-5 minutes each. If desired, wear gloves when kneading the tinted dough balls to prevent staining on hands. Cover the bowl with a large plate or a sheet of plastic wrap. 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, roll each dough ball out into a rectangular shape. Cut the dough into four logs and cut each log into about ½ 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 1 tablespoon of filling on each piece of dough. Bring one edge of the circle up to the other edge and pinch to 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 7-9 dumplings into the pan and fry for about 1-2 minutes, until golden brown. Pour about ¼ cup of water into the skillet. Use a pot cover to cover the skillet for about 2-3 minutes until the water is evaporated. Remove the dumplings to a plate and let the dumplings rest before serving. Continue the process of frying dumplings until all dumplings are fried.
7) To make the dipping sauce, combine soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, Chinkiang vinegar, red pepper flakes, sesame seeds, and thinly sliced scallions in a small bowl.
Takeaways: My pork and cabbage dumplings recipe typically yields about 27-29 dumplings. I was able to get 30 dumplings out of the dough and filling this time around. For a vegan dumpling alternative, check out my rainbow veggies dumplings.