Lunar New Year: Chicken and Chive Dumplings

Next Monday 24 January we shall enter the year of the Dragon. This excites me because I was born in the year of the Dragon and can only hope that it means this year will be good.


L and I decided to have a bit of a pre- Lunar New Year feast, complete with home made dumplings. Ok well we cheated with the wrappers but really there is only so much of your Sunday that you can justify not doing the things you need to do to prepare for the week ahead! In anticipation of the feasts ahead I thought I would share our dumpling experience!


Chicken and Chive Dumplings (makes about 20 dumplings)

Ingredients:

• 20 gow gee wrappers
• 250g of chicken mince
• 50 g of chives, chopped nice and finely (don't be tempted to skimp on the amount or your dumplings will be solid balls of chicken!)
• 1/2 teaspoon of minced garlic
• 1 teaspoon of shao xing
• 1 teaspoon of soy sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon of sesame oil
• 1/2 teaspoon of cornflour 
• Dash of salt
• Dash of white pepper

Method:

1. Add all the ingredients except for the wrappers in a bowl. Mix them together nicely before covering and putting in the fridge for about 30 minutes.

Don't forget the chives!

Looking at my picture you might think 'hmm, that doesn't look like 50g of chives'. You would be right. It is experiences like these that teach you, always use the right amount of chives!

2. Get the mixture out and get your production line ready. The best way I find is to have a board or tray lined with non-stick paper as well as a finger bowl with a bit of lukewarm water ready to go.

Store bought gow gee wrappers

3. Take a gow gee wrapper and place it in your left hand. Place a teaspoon of the mixture into the centre of the wrapper. 

Then, use a small dab of water to moisten the outer edge of the wrapper. Don't make it too wet or your dumpling will be soggy! 

4. Time to seal the dumpling. I found the easiest way was to take the bottom centre and match it up with the top centre, then to join the edges along. This way I could ensure none of the mixture fell out and also keep some consistency to the shape of the dumpling.

5. Place it on the tray and keep going until all the dumplings are filled. By the time we were done out tray looked like this:

Our dumpling factory line

Pan fried 

6. If you want to pan fry the dumplings, heat some oil in a thick based fry pan and once the oil is hot add the dumplings and cook until golden brown. Take care not to let the pan get too hot or you shall have burnt dumplings with raw chicken inside!

7. If you want to boil the dumplings, fill a saucepan with enough water to cover the dumplings. Once it is boiling simply drop them in. They will float once they are cooked but it's a good idea to leave them for another minute after that, salmonella is no one's friend! We found that they were good to go after about 4 or 5 minutes.

Boiled

8. Plate up and serve with some dipping sauce! If you don't have any mixed up, some shao xing and soy mixed works well as does Chinese black vinegar. Delish!

We pan fried half and boiled half for our feast. Unfortunately the pictures are not great as my hunger was substantial and because my camera is on its last legs. 

I hope you all enjoy the Lunar New Year wherever you are and that the year of the Dragon is a happy one!