My sister was over this afternoon with her daughter. While our kids were playing, my sister helped me to make some ‘fun guo’ dumplings, one of my favorite yum cha dish.
It is really simple to make. I first stir fried the filling with diced chicken, leek, five spice tofu, Chinese mushroom, salted radish, wood ear fungus and bamboo shoot; then I made the wrappers with wheat starch and tapioca. I used my pasta machine to roll out the dough to make the wrappers. Then we worked on wrapping the dumplings.
Ingredients – filling
- 150g chicken thigh fillets, finely diced
- 50g five spice tofu (or firm tofu), finely diced
- 25g Chinese mushrooms, soaked in hot water for 30 minutes, remove stems, finely diced
- 10g lily bud, soaked in hot water for 10 minutes, remove the hard tips, finely diced
- 50g leek, thinly sliced
- 50g bamboo shoot, finely diced
- 50g salted radish, finely diced
- 20g celery, finely diced
- 1 small carrot, remove skin, grated
- 10g coriander, stem part preferred, chopped
- 2 tbsp. shrimp shell
- 1/4 cup of roasted peanut, lightly crushed, roughly chopped
- 1 tbsp. sesame oil
- 1 tbsp. oyster sauce
- 1 tbsp. port wine / sherry
- white pepper to taste
- cooking oil for pan frying
- 1 tsp. corn flour, mixed with 1 tbsp. water
Method – filling
In a frying pan, bring cooking oil to high heat, add chicken and leek, stir fry until the chicken has turned to pale color; add the remaining ingredients (except for corn flour mixture) and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes; add corn flour mixture to thicken the filling, mix well and cook for a few more minutes until the filling has no observed liquid.
Ingredients – wrappers (makes about 30-40 wrappers)
- 1 cup wheat starch
- 1/2 cup tapioca
- 1 cup boiling water
- a few pinches of salt
Method – wrappers
- Mix wheat starch, tapioca and salt in a mixing bowl; add boiling water gradually while constantly string the flour mix
- Kneed the dough briefly until smooth (add a little more water or flour if required)
- Break the dough in smaller pieces; run the dough through the pasta machine to get large sheets (I used the thickest setting on my pasta machine)
- Cut out round wrappers from the sheets
Method – dumplings
Spoon some filling in the middle of a wrapper, fold up and seal the side; repeat with the remaining wrappers.
Steam the dumplings in a steamer for approximately 15-20 minutes. Serve the dumplings warm with chili sauce (optional)
