Vegetarian pot stickers (素鍋貼)

(makes 36)

Adapted from Woks of Life and Red House Spice

 One of my thoughts when contemplating whether or not to give up meat was, but what about dumplings? Second thought was, what about Peking duck? Had to laugh at myself and how Chinese I am at heart... Anyhow, we haven't been strictly vegetarian as we still need to finish our stash of wontons in the freezer that we made with mum last December (and then another bunch in February), but as they are coming to an end I've been thinking about what to do. So I did a bit of research and tried to remember the best vegetarian dumpling I have ever had. Not many came to mind, but the closest was probably a gyoza that was like jap chae inside! So I was keen to try something like that, especially excited about the noodles! The recipes I found looked so legit they even inspired me to try to make dumpling wrappers from scratch for the first time! 

Our first attempt was pretty good, thank God for my husband who happens to be very good at rolling pastry (pizzas usually but same idea). My toddler was also trying to help, but not sure if that really improved the time efficiency though it was very adorable, especially when she wanted to get her play dough rolling pin to help with the baby dumpling she wanted to make :) I guess making dumplings from scratch was always going to be a labour of love, not a quick and simple meal. The results were actually really good, not sure if it's just the amazing dumpling sauce that I came across that completely won me over or if it was the dumplings themselves! 

Our second attempt we tried making these half green (spinach-mix) dumplings!
Served with egg noodles and stir-fry greens

Prep time: 3 hours (1 hour prep for wrappers / filling, then 1.5 to 2 hours with 2 people to roll wrappers and fill) 

Cooking time: 15 min

Ingredients

For the dumpling wrappers (alternatively, you can just buy a package of pre-made dumpling wrappers);

3 cups plain flour

1 cup warm water

For the filling

200 g Chinese cabbage, blanched

200 g bok choy or spinach

1 to 2 carrots (170 g)

30-45 g dried mung bean vermicelli, pre-soaked (15min)
1 brown onion
5 dried Shiitake mushrooms, pre-soaked (takes 8-12 hours, or at least 4 hours if thin ones)

1 tsp mince ginger

2 eggs 

1 pinch ground Sichuan pepper or white pepper

1 tsp sugar

2 tsp sesame oil

2 Tbsp soy sauce

1/2 Tbsp Shao xing wine
1 stalk shallot, finely chopped
1 Tbsp vegetable oil

Dumpling sauce (from Woks of Life)
1 tsp sugar
1 Tbsp hot water
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp rice vinegar
1 tsp chili oil
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp toasted sesame sees
1/2 tsp sesame oil

Method

1. Start by making the dough for the dumpling wrappers. Put the flour in a large mixing bowl. Gradually add the water to the flour and knead into a smooth dough. This process should take about 10 minutes. Cover with a damp cloth and let the dough rest for an hour.

2. In the meantime, make the filling. Roughly chop the Chinese cabbage and bok choy and peel the carrot. Using a food processor, grate the carrot, then food process the carrot, Chinese cabbage and bok choy altogether. Add in the mung bean vermicelli and process again. 

3. Remove from the food processor and squeeze out the liquid. 
NB. I found this was easiest by putting it in portions in a tea towel and just wringing the liquid out. It works ok with paper towels and putting the mixture in a colander too, but you end up going through heaps of paper towels!

4. Finely dice the onion and the shiitake. Heat a small frypan and place 1 teaspoon oil in. Lightly fry the ginger for 30 seconds, then add the onion and shiitake and cook for a few minutes with half a tablespoon soy sauce and a pinch of salt. Remove and add to the vegetable mixture.

5. When the dough is almost ready, finish the filling mixture by adding the eggs, pepper, sugar, sesame oil, soy sauce and shao xing wine and stir to combine. Lastly, place the shallot on top. Heat 1 teaspoon of oil in a small pot and then pour over the top of the shallots and toss through.

6. To assemble the dumplings, cut the dough into small tablespoon-sized pieces, or you can roll the dough into logs and then cut into smaller pieces. Roll each out into a circle approximately one millimetre thick. 

NB. You will need extra flour when rolling out to avoid the mixture being too sticky. This part is definitely the part where the more help the better! If you're doing this on your own then you probably want to roll out the majority of the dough before starting to fill, otherwise we found that with two people that if you start wrapping after about a dozen wrappers then the pace evened out. 

7. With each dumpling, place a small teaspoon-sized amount of filling in the middle, use your finger and brush some water on the top half of the circle and fold it over, and pleat (if desired), ensuring you seal it properly and try to minimise any trapped air inside. 

NB. You will also need to keep getting rid of excess water in the filling as you go as you don't want soggy pastry.

8. To pan-fry the dumplings, heat 2 tablespoons oil in a non-stick pan over medium heat. Place the dumplings in the pan and allow to fry for two minutes (or until the base is crispy). Pour about half a cup of water in, or until it reaches about the third of the height of the dumplings), then place the lid on, reduce the heat to low-medium and allow the dumplings to steam for approximately 8 minutes (or until the water has evaporated). Remove the cover, increase the heat to medium-high and allow to fry for a few more minutes until the bottoms of the dumplings are golden brown and crisp again.

9. To make the dumpling sauce, melt the sugar in the hot water, then add in the rest of the ingredients and stir through.

Storage: If you're not having a big party and going to eat all the dumplings in one go, then you probably want to freeze on a baking paper-lined tray (or mum always uses old cake-boards). Freeze the first batches that you make so they don't go soggy, and cook the last batch so they don't go cold!

Side experiment (Bok choy look-a-like dumplings!)

Saw this on the Red House Spice website and after squeezing out all that green juice from the filling, we thought we'd put it to good use.

Green outside, white inside - First a white sausage inside, then wrap the green dough around and put together. We found we needed much more white dough inside even though it looked like we had a lot.

After you cut and rolled it out, somehow the green part expanded a lot

Best thing to do was work out where the white bit showed the most and wrap accordingly. After all, mostly for aesthetics, no difference in taste.