Be a Wok Star!
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Talk about fresh seafood. Asians like to see them swimming!
Look at the choice of just shrimp alone.
You’re overwhelmed with choices of seasonings and sauces!
Preserved mustard greens, great to make soup with pork or duck, yum.
Wide choice of leafy veggies. So fresh, you can SMELL them.
Daily fresh noodles, made from rice or with egg.
Dried shrimp, squid, octopus, clams to put in soups, stews.
Dried nuts and beans.I miss all the variety and choice available in Hong Kong markets, why can’t we have it here in Miami?! It would make our dinners so much more interesting, no? This is only a tiny portion of the HUGE market but just wanted to give you an idea.
I can’t complain, at least we have a few Asian markets that do carry quite a lot of goodies including Asian veggies.
Crispy Potstickers, Fig Field Greens and KimchiCrispy potstickers are easy to love!
“Potstickers” are a type of Chinese dumpling. They have a slightly chewy, crispy skin with a filling of ground pork, shrimp or a combination of both and chopped veggies. They’re eaten with dips to give them extra oompf!
Potstickers have thicker wrappers than wontons but guess what? I prefer using wontons for ‘potstickers’. They’re crispier. I have used both. Wontons are so versatile, I always have a few packs of different flavors in my freezer. They can be broiled for an appetizer (which I call potstickers) or put into soup as a one-dish meal.
I recommend “Wei Chuan” brand. My favorite is Pork with Leeks or Green Onions. They’re a great standby and always a big hit. Cook the whole bag, any leftovers can be steamed, broiled or wok fried to warm up.
I don’t have time to make potstickers from scratch, so I concocted this wonderful shortcut which I think you’ll LOVE and VERY SIMPLE TO DO! And at $4.95 for a frozen bag of about 25 vs buying wrappers, ground meat, washing, chopping veggies, wrapping them, it’s a no brainer.
Boil the whole bag of potstickers or dumplings. This cooks/warms the inside filling. As soon as they float to the surface, drain them.
While they are boiling…
Switch on broiler, NOT oven.
Oil a foil lined tray that can fit all 25 dumplings! Instead of frying batches of potstickers in a pan, I broil all of them in ONE GO.
Make the dipping sauce in small bowls with just tamari, rice wine vinegar and chili garlic sauce or any chili sauce you have.
Here’s my Easy Kimchi which goes perfectly with potstickers.
I made a fig, edamame, field green, tomato salad in a big bowl so you can toss. You can substitute with any seasonal fruits like peach, pear, apple, pineapple, mango. Plate salad so you just have to add potstickers and you’re ready for dinner.
This wonderful colander with a handle transfers dumplings immediately to the tray. Make sure you don’t transfer any water to the tray. Spread them out so they don’t overlap.
Broil till golden brown. In another post, I’ll show you my experiment with Wok Fried Dumplings.
My good friend and top Asian food blogger, Bee at Rasa Malaysia has many dumpling recipes! She just added Pan Fried Dumplings.
Superstar food blogger, Jaden Hair’s Steamy Kitchen cookbook features a delicious Pork and Mango potsticker recipe and a pork and shrimp one on her blog.
If you’re a dumpling fan, here’s Andrea Nguyen’s Asian Dumplings cookbook, published last year.
Every country has their signature “dumpling”, here’s an interesting read.
What’s your favorite dumpling?