Potstickers

Tyrone and I took a trip to New York in January and while we were there we ate at this delicious restaurant in China town. I can't even tell you the name of it because it was in Chinese. Some friends of ours took us there and told us that the potstickers were the best. They told us what to order because again, nothing was really in English. I was shocked with how yummy they were. Ever since then, I have been craving them. 

Recently, we went out to lunch with some friends to a Japanese restaurant and they had gyoza, which I found out is basically the same thing as a potsticker. Then there are dumplings, which are yummy as well, dumplings are made the same way as a potstickers but they are steamed or boiled rather than fried.  I prefer the fried because I like the crunchy outside. Both are very delicious though, it just depends on preference. 

I decided to try and master potstickers yesterday afternoon. I knew it was going to be a lot of work so I was hoping that they would turn out yummy. They did! Sometimes I'll try really complicated recipes that take all day only to have it flop in the end. Those are disappointing days because I have nothing to show for and nothing to serve for dinner. These potstickers take a lot of work but they are not too difficult. If I can do it I think almost anyone can. 

I decided to make the potstickers homemade, from the filling to the wraps. The wraps do take a lot of time, but they really aren't that difficult. I learned how to make the potstickers from Use Real Butter. 

She has great pictures and descriptions. I would check out her page if you get a chance. She goes into much greater detail than I'm going to. I'm just going to go over the main parts. 

On Use Real Butter she has a recipe for a shrimp filling as well if you would rather do that instead. I used the pork filling so that's the only one I've posted on here.

Pork filling: 

1 lb ground pork

4 large napa cabbage leaves, minced
3 stalks green onions, minced
7 shitake mushrooms, minced (if dried – rehydrated and rinsed carefully)
1/2 cup bamboo shoots, minced
1/4 cup ginger root, minced
3 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp sesame oil
2 tbsp corn starch

The most time consuming thing of this entire process is chopping up all of these ingredients. Everything needs to be really small.

For the dough: 

4 cups flour

1 cup water

This will be enough for the filling recipe made with 1 lb of pork meat.

Mix the dough until it is smooth but firm. I had to add a little bit more water at a time until the dough stayed together. Depending on the climate you are cooking this in, the water amount could change as well. 

 Form the dough into a ball. Cut the ball into 4 even pieces. Take those 4 pieces and roll them out length wise into 1 1/4 in diameter. Then cut the rolls into 3/4 in pieces. Below are my 3/4 in pieces smashed into round balls. Now, I am no expert in rolling out dough. My round pieces are not perfectly round, as you can see, but they worked. They also recommended to roll the edges thinner and leave the middle thicker but I skipped that. I just rolled them out and they worked fine. I didn't have any problems with them tearing.

I was surprised with how good the wrapping turned out. If mine can look like this I'm sure yours will be much better.

Make sure you go to Use Real Butter to find out how to pleat the edges of your potstickers. She does a great job of explaining how to do it with pictures.

Now that you've made the delicious potstickers, lets cook them.
If making potstickers, heat up about 2-3 tbsp of oil in the bottom of a large, deep non-stick frying pan on medium- high heat. Cook the potstickers until the bottom of them turn a golden brown. Once the bottom is a golden brown, quickly pour 1/2 cup of water into the pan all at once. Make sure to stand back as you do this, the oil will want to pop everywhere. Then, immediately put on the lid and keep covered until all the water has cooked out. When the water has cooked out, take off the lid and turn the temperature to low-medium heat and cook for an additional 2-3 minutes.

If making dumplings instead of potstickers, bring a large pot of water to a boil, place dumplings into the pot. When the dumplings float, they are done. Simple enough, right?

Dipping Sauce:
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/8 cup red wine vinegar
a few drops of sesame oil
1 tsp minced garlic

This is what I used for the dipping sauce. There are a lot of varieties you could use.

some optional additions for the dipping sauce would be:
minced green onions
chili garlic paste
sugar
minced ginger

Here is the guinea pig enjoying his potstickers