For the many of you who are googling for a dumpling recipe on Chinese New Year! Have fun!  When I lived in HK and China, I always enjoyed getting together with friends and rolling out the dough and shaping the dumplings during CNY.  Somehow this tradition didn’t make it to South East Asia.

Chef’s tip: You can also use “sui kow” skin instead of making the dough from scratch.

Dough:
1 ¼ cup of all purpose flour
½ teaspoon salt
2/3 cup of water

Filling:
1/2 lb of ground pork
2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger2/3 -1 cup of cold water
1/2 egg
1 tablespoon Shaoxing wine or sherry
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons scallions, finely chopped

Dipping sauce:
1/2 cup light soy sauce
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon sesame oil
2 teaspoons fresh ginger, cut into thin matchsticks
2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 cloves finely chopped garlic
2 spring onions (green onions, scallions), chopped

Preparing the dumpling skin
1. Mix salt and flour together.  Make a well in the middle and add water to make a stiff dough.
2. Knead till dough is smooth and elastic.
3. Cover with a damp kitchen cloth and let rest 20 mins.
4. Roll out dough into long rods, cut into small pieces – the size of a cherry
5. Roll each dough into a round ball, flatten with your palm, and then roll out on a floured surface till it forms a small disc about 2 inch in diameter
6. Sprinkle corn flour on each piece so that they would not stick together

Preparing the dipping sauce
7. Whisk together all the dipping sauce ingredients

Preparing the dumplings
8. Finely chop the bokchoy stems. Mix with 2 teaspoons salt and set aside for 5 minutes. Squeeze out the excess moisture.
9. Mix meat, bokchoy, egg, ginger, wine, salt and pepper.  Add water till it becomes a paste.
10. Brush the upper half edges of the dumpling skin rounds with water.  Place a dumpling skin on your palm and mound about 1 teaspoon of filling in the center of each skin.  Fold into a half moon.  Very carefully, insert your left index fingers between the wrapper on the open edge, then using your right index and thumb, create 3 small pleats on the upper skin, then press firmly to seal with the lower skin.   Press lightly to seal.  Make sure seams are well-sealed and place on a tray dusted with cornstarch.
11. Boil water to a rolling boil.  Add dumplings.  When the water has returned to a boil, pour in a cup of cold water.  Allow water to return to boil again, and add another cup of cold water.  When the water returns to boil the third time, the dumpling should be cooked through.

Assembly:
12. Place 4 -6 dumplings in a bowl, serve with dipping sauce

Serves: 6-8

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Sweet succulent diver scallops, pan seared and topped with crispy bacon in a bacon-miso vinaigrette.   I had better post this recipe before the new year’s resolutions kick in.  Or perhaps the new resolution is to eat more bacon?  Or this may qualify for a salad diet?

Chef’s tip: To make the nutty flavored clarified butter, heat 4 tablespoons of unsalted sweet butter under medium heat till solids separate.  Spoon off the foam, gently pour out the clarified butter leaving the golden brown solids and more liquid moisture behind, if you hadn’t boiled off the watery part of the butter already.  You can pass the clarified butter through a cheesecloth to remove all solids.  Make a large jar of it and store it in the fridge.  Or you can buy clarified butter in a jar, typically labeled as ghee.
To perfectly sear scallops. make sure the scallops are totally at room temperature, pat it dry and salt just before it hits the pan.   Do not move the scallops until the brown crust forms, which will naturally release the scallop.  The temperature of the pan should be medium to hot.  Lastly, look out for the 1/4 inch thick white opaque layer that forms on both side of the seared scallop face.  The middle should be a little translucent, it will cook in its own heat to perfect tender.

Vinaigrette:
4 strips apple smoked bacon
1 small shallot, finely diced, reserve 1 teaspoon
3 Tablespoons rice wine vinegar
2 Tablespoons mirin
1 Tablespoon sherry
3 Tablespoon orange juice
2 Tablespoons white miso
1 teaspoon finely grated ginger
1 teaspoon sugar

16 large diver scallops
2 Tablespoons clarified butter
Kosher salt
White pepper

3 cups baby spinach

1. In a small saucepan, render the bacon till the bacon is somewhat crispy,  remove bacon.
2.  Add chopped shallots to the bacon fat, and sweat shallots under medium low heat until golden brown.  Add rice wine vinegar, mirin, sherry and orange juice and deglaze the pan.  Mix in miso, ginger and sugar.  Let simmer till reduced till half and liquids is thickened.  Add in reserved shallots, set aside.
3. In a cast iron pan, heat clarified butter on medium heat until smoky.  Thoroughly dry the scallops with paper towel, rub with salt and pepper.  Add to the pan and turn up the heat.  Let scallop cook without turning until a brown crust forms or a whitish opaque forms about 1/4 inch up.  Flip the scallops and cook till the opaque white goes up 1/4 inch again on the other side of the scallop.  Remove scallops and set aside.
4. Remove pan from heat, add spinach and toss to warm but not wilt the spinach.  Add half the vinaigrette when tossing.
5.  Place a serving of spinach on a plate, top with 4 scallops and sprinkle with reserved bacon.  Drizzle in a tablespoon of vinaigrette.

Serves: 4

Tags: Californian, Fusion, Japanese, salad.

Yum! Another dumpling to add to your repertoire.  This dim sum uses store-bought siu mai skins.

Chef’s tip: You can use the potsticker skins (which is thicker) or just wonton skins (which is thinner) depending on your preference.  I find that placing the dumplings tightly together holds the shape better.

1 package of siu mai round wrappers, about 30 pieces
2 salted duck egg yolk (optional)

Filling:
4 oz raw shrimp, shelled and deveined, chopped (about 10 size 31/40 shrimp)
8 oz ground pork
1 cup / 5 oz canned water chestnut, chopped finely (about 10 water chestnut)
3 tablespoon scallions, white part, minced
1 tablespoon minced ginger (bottled)
3 tablespoon soy sauce
4 tablespoon Chinese rice wine or pale dry sherry
1 tablespoon sesame oil
2 tablespoon cornstarch
½ teaspoon sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
A twist of black pepper

1 large thick carrot, cut into thin rounds

Preparing the filling
1.    Mix all the ingredients together.
Assembling
2.    Place the wrapper in your palm. Place 1 teaspoon of filling into wrapper.
3.    Gather up the edges of the wrapper.  Hold the dumpling between your thumb and your fingers, lightly squeezing it to form a cup.  Squeeze with your index finger to form a waist.  Use a spatula to push the filling down.
4.    Flatten the base by tapping on a floured surface. Smooth the top with a knife dipped with water.
5.    Top with a small dot of duck egg,
6.    Placed onto a steamer, setting each dumpling on a slice of carrot rounds.
Steaming
7.    Steam over simmering water for 15 minutes. Add water if necessary so that wok is not dried out.

Serves: 6

Tags: Cantonese, dim sum, dumplings.