Today we went over to Papa Beezy's house for a visit. It was so stormy outside, the perfect day to make dumplings. I've been wanting Jenny's mom(also Popo) to teach me how. She makes them the best, makes the skins from scratch and everything! She poured about a half a bag of flour in the bowl, added 4 eggs, and then about a cup of water...slowly. The thing about Chinese cooking is that there isn't any recipes, which makes it hard for someone like me. I love my recipes. This is also why I can never duplicate my mom's delicious food either! She then kneaded the dough and let it sit on the counter while she prepared the filling. She told me you can put whatever you want in them. This time she used ground turkey, green onions, shitake mushrooms, and napa cabbage. What amazes me is how the pieces of veggies are diced up so fine, like she used a food processor (but she didn't').
She then cut off a slice of dough, rolled into a tube shape, like cookie dough, and cut that into about 2 inch pieces. Each of these pieces were rolled out into the dumpling skin. I then filled them with the meat and veggie mixture and folded the edges. Voila, dumplings! I am challenged when it comes to folding things or wrapping things, like presents, so my dumplings did not look as beautiful as hers, but I'm also a beginner! :)
The best part was that Kaiwei wanted to help too. He sat right next to me and folded down his little pieces of dough...no meat though for Kaiwei. Just like when I was little, Kaiwei only likes the skins. He was soooo excited to eat the dumplings he had made! :) I remember making dumplings when I was little too. We would all sit at the table, around the large bowl, filled with the meat mixture. My mom taught me how to fill the skins and fold them up. We would rub egg yolk on one side, it acted like glue, to make sure the little dumplings stayed stuck together! But, we never made our own skins, we always had the store bought kind.
Thank you so much Popo for teaching me your trade secrets!
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