My ever-growing desire to become a citizen of the world first starts with food. As an American, I find our choices of cuisine nearly endless. Have a taste of Mexico, Italy or Cuba any night of the week. I think about how far away the Orient is from my humble flat in the middle of this vast country. How different it must be to live in a country where imperial palaces housed wise emperors and a wall built in the fifth century still stands tall today. The longevity of Asian countries is a stark contrast against the U.S., a 237-year-old nation. With my curiosity of these lands, it is no surprise that I've come to love Asian food. And for this - I have to share a favorite near and dear to my heart. Chinese pork dumplings. I first learned how to make these when I was living in Australia. One of my good friends whom I met in the land down under happens to be a native to China. And boy, could she cook! Her specialty were pork wontons (dumplings as we might call them here). I owe a lot of my cooking curiosity to her. Thanks, Betty! Chinese Pork Dumplings You will need... 1 lb. ground pork 3 tbs. soy sauce 2 tbs. sesame oil 1/4 cup chopped green onion 2 tsp. ground ginger 1 egg 3 cloves garlic 1 package of wonton wrappers
My grocery store didn't have wonton wrappers (damn) so I went for the egg roll wrappers instead. They're the same thing just built in a bigger size. You'll need to cut them down to bite size as I will demonstrate later.
Dump all the meat into a large bowl. Do not be frightened of ground pork. Although not traditional, it's much like ground beef. Except it oinks instead of moo's.
Mince up about three cloves of garlic.
Chop about three tablespoons of green onions. I am a firm believer in green onions. They just seem to add the right flavor. Amen.
Fresh ginger might look a little scary, but it has big flavor that you won't find in ground ginger from the spice aisle. I have made this recipe several times using ground ginger but this time around it was go big and go Asian. This little piece only cost me 22 cents!
To use: peel off the skin using a paring knife to get to the root.
I'm not fancy. I used a cheese grater for this and it worked perfectly. Ginger is very fragrant, so be prepared. Grate about two teaspoons.
Beat one egg separately.
Toss in the ginger, garlic and green onions.
Add the egg (note, this is not weird slime.. heh). You'll also need to add three tablespoons of soy sauce and two tablespoons of sesame oil. I found the sesame oil in the Asian aisle and it definitely makes this recipe. It gives the dumplings a nutty background. I mixed everything with my hands, it just seemed like the right thing to do. Now, we have a dumplin' stuffin' party.
Grab your wonton wrappers. In my case, I had to cut down the egg roll wrappers. Suppose you could make a large dumpling out of this? Hmm... (wheels are spinning)
Cut into quarters.
Place a small spoonful of the filling directly in the middle of the wrapper. You don't want to pile it on or else the wonton won't close. Wet the edges with water. I take a small dish, fill it with water and use my finger and run it over the edges of each wonton. It helps keep the dumpling from splitting open during the cooking process.
Make a triangle by folding the corners together diagonally.
Press the edges together to create a tight seal with a fork. I press both front and back to make sure they don't open during the cooking time. Set aside and repeat until all the mixture is used. A pound of pork makes roughly 35 dumplings so grab your sous chef to assist in prep!
Gorgeous little packets ready for boiling!
Use a large, wide-based skillet and fill up with water about half way. Let it come to a rapid boil before adding the dumplings. The larger the skillet, the more dumplings you can cook at a time.
Drop the kids off in the hot tub and let them cook, about 4 minutes. I flip mine about 2 minutes into cook time. Use tongs to gently grab the dumplings to flip them. Some of them may stick to the bottom of the pan due to the flour on the wrappers. Just try to grab them softly off the bottom without breaking the wrapper.
You'll know when they're cooked through when the wrapper skins start to wrinkle around the meat and the filling starts to look darker in color.
They're ready! Anything bite size is amazing in my book. How can you have just one? You can't.
That's why I chose to have eight instead. There's nothing wrong with eight. I ate the eight on my plate. Serve with side of soy sauce or dumpling sauce for dipping. The post about the dumpling sauce is forthcoming. Stay tuned!
Okay, it's not my motherland. It's my neighbor's. Her name is Fran. And it's technically her mother's motherland. Make sense? Fran has a big heart and it comes from Poland. The motherland. She taught us how to say cheers in Polish. This guy down yonder can teach you how:
But I did not venture the 50 meters or so from my parents house to hers for a language lesson. The purpose of our meeting was for an entirely different lesson on its own. I wanted to know how these Polish women cook. Specifically speaking, how they cook gawompkes. Ga-what?!
Gawompkes. Spelled in its most literal sense. Gah-wohmp-keys.
Gawompkes. You probably have no idea what a gawompke is. I shall share the wealth of knowledge I have gained in a short day's time on this treat. Gawompkes are cabbage rolls, primarily stuffed with beef and pork. Interested? Keep reading... These little babies are a labor of love - the cabbage has to be hand-selected by said Polish woman and if said Polish woman does not approve of it's greenness, the gawompkes process is dismissed immediately and nobody can eat them and we are all sad. Luckily for me, it's summer in the Americas and green heads of cabbages are bountiful! There are four parts to the Gawompke process: 1. Boiling the cabbage 2. Making the meat mixture 3. Creating the sauce 4. Rollin' (in a non-illegal substance way, c'mon people) Step 1: Boiling the cabbage Like I said before, green heads of cabbage are essential. You'll want to find about medium-sized little guys like this one:
Size is also important (get your mind outta the gutter!) I say medium and not large because you'll want them to fit in the pot for boiling. The bigger they are, the more time they have to spend in the pot and the process is slower. You'll want to try to boil several at a time if your cooking gear can accommodate. Cut out the core so that when the leaves cook, they can easily separate. Get a big pot, and I mean GIANT pot, for the cabbage. Get the water raging and carefully drop the cabbage into the water.
Let the cabbage boil and slowly, ever slowly, the leaves will soften and separate from the rest of the cabbage. Poke the middle vein of each leaf with a knife. If it feels soft and the knife can slide easily into the vein, it's ready! Take a pair of tongs and gently lift out of the pot and lay in a colinder for straining out any excess water. Continue this process of letting the leaves separate and poking for softness until you reach the white center. The cabbage has provided its bounty at this point. You may save the white part of the cabbage for another dish. Cornbeef and cabbage, plain, polish sausage and cabbage. Ya dig? At the end of the cooking process, save the cabbage water. Why? Because we will use it for the sauce. And also because your Polish mama says so! Step 2: Making the meat mixture Combine 1 cup chopped onion and 1 cup chopped celery and cook over a small skillet with butter and olive oil until soft. You will add this to the meat!
You'll want to get two pounds of pork and two pounds of beef. About 1 cup of cooked white rice will go into this mixture as well. Small grain rice works the best, we used the Water Maid brand. Combine onion/celery, meat and cooked rice into a big ol' bowl. Grab one egg and throw it in there too. I don't mean literally. That would be bad, heh.
Take your big Polish hands that you may (or may not) have and go to town combining everything. Aggression, stress or shit goin' down in life? This is the part of the recipe that you can take all of it out on the meat. It works. It's fun. I feel better. Set that aside. Step 3: Creating the sauce The sauce is what brings this around town. It is the glue of the gawompkes. In a medium sized pot, mix 2 cans of tomato soup (we used Campbell's), 3 cups of cabbage water and 1 bottle of ketchup or about 26 ounces. You may add any seasoning to the sauce if you'd like but at the House of Fran, we did it her way. And simple is best. Bring to a simmer until all ingredients are combined.
Step 4: Rollin'
This is best done at the kitchen table. Get a work station set up - bowl of the cooked cabbage leaves, bowl with the meat mixture and a cutting board to work on.
Take one leaf and lay it flat on your cutting board. You may take a small knife and cut off the bottom part of the leaf to create a straight line. Fill the leaf with a large spoonful of the meat mixture. Fold over both sides of the cabbage leaf and roll up, just like a burrito. Make sure the leaf lays smooth and everything's tucked in.
There. You just made your first cabbage baby! Aren't you so proud? You'll make more babies - probably about 30-40. Yowza! Keep rollin' and remind yourself to stop and take a sip of your Bloody Mary. Because those are also delicious and good cooks reward themselves with a good cocktail.
Line up the cabbage rolls and a large dutch oven roaster. Create one solid layer on the bottom and then stack on top as you go. Keep going til you run out of cabbage leaves and/or meat mixture. (Tip: if you have extra meat left over, these are great to make meatballs out of)
Grab the pot of sauce and ladle over the rolls. Save about 2 cups of the sauce to use towards the end of the cooking process. Put the roaster in the oven at 325 for 3 hours. This is a low and slow deal. Polish lady told me so. Check on your cabbage babies every hour and ladle more sauce over the top to keep them from drying out. After 3 hours, pull out the roaster and let the babies sit awhile to cool off. But who am I joking, you'll want to immediately grab the first dish you see and load up on a few rolls.
Savory, tomato-y, meaty, Polish-y. Welcome to gawompke heaven. Ingredients: 2 lbs. ground round 86% lean beef 2 lbs. ground pork 2 cans Campbell's tomato soup 26 oz. of ketchup 3 heads of green cabbage 1 cup yellow onion 1 cup celery 2 tbs. butter 3 tbs. olive oil
