Potstickers

Hi there. Long time no see. I’ve had a busy summer and I really haven’t been cooking as much as I should. I stopped blogging when everything involved in the process became too time-consuming and stressful, but I have not forgotten about it. I’ve decided to start again, but I don’t think I’ll be doing a set schedule (i.e. every Thursday). Rather, I’ll probably just do it whenever I have the time and the itch to blog. I think that will take off some of the stress and I’ll probably end up doing it more often than I would if I tried to stick to a stringent schedule. I know I have a lot of loyal readers (although none of you like to comment, *cough* hint *cough*) and I can see that many of you still check every day, so I will do my best to try to update regularly.

Anywho, onto the eats! Raise your hand if you have a food crush on Alton Brown (or just a plain old crush). I definitely admit that I do. I watch Good Eats obsessively. I love Good Eats more than any other show on the Food Network because it’s so darn informative. I learn so much about food and cooking every time I watch it, and though his recipes are certainly not quick-fix type recipes, he is so good at explaining that I’m not intimidated by any of the dishes he makes.

This past week and a half I was back home in Denver visiting, and I was ridiculously sick the whole time. It wasn’t fun. However, one afternoon I was stuck at home watching TV, and a Good Eats episode entitled “Wanton Ways” came on. Alton made several different dishes using wonton wrappers, but I was absolutely drooling when he made Potstickers. I’d actually never had potstickers despite how much Asian food I eat, because I never really knew what they were. After watching the episode, I knew I had to make Alton’s Potstickers as soon as I got back to Savannah. So I did. And guess what?

They were awesome.

Like, really awesome. Holy crap. And though a little time-consuming, it was not difficult at all. Let’s do this.

Ingredients

• 1/2 pound ground pork
• 1/4 cup finely chopped scallions
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped red bell pepper (note: I did not include this because I don’t like peppers, so you will not see it in the below photos)
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 2 teaspoons ketchup
• 1 teaspoon yellow mustard
• 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
• 1 teaspoon light brown sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 35 to 40 small wonton wrappers
• Water, for sealing wontons
• 3 to 4 tablespoons vegetable oil, for frying
• 1 1/3 cups chicken stock, divided

Directions

Preheat oven to 200 degrees F.

Combine the first 11 ingredients in a medium-size mixing bowl (pork through cayenne). Set aside.

To form the dumplings, remove 1 wonton wrapper from the package, covering the others with a damp cloth. Brush 2 of the edges of the wrapper lightly with water. Place 1/2 rounded teaspoon of the pork mixture in the center of the wrapper. Fold over, seal edges, and shape as desired. Set on a sheet pan and cover with a damp cloth. Repeat procedure until all of the filling is gone.

Heat a 12-inch saute pan over medium heat. Brush with vegetable oil once hot. Add 8 to 10 potstickers at a time to the pan and cook for 2 minutes, without touching. Once the 2 minutes are up, gently add 1/3 cup chicken stock to the pan, turn the heat down to low, cover, and cook for another 2 minutes. Remove wontons to a heatproof platter and place in the warm oven. Clean the pan in between batches by pouring in water and allowing the pan to deglaze. Repeat until all the wontons are cooked. Serve immediately.

Your cast of characters. Note the lack of red bell pepper.

All your filling ingredients go into a bowl. To mix, use a wooden spoon, or better yet, just get in there with your hands. It really works much better. Just make sure to wash your hands before and after, of course.

All mixed up. Appetizing, no? It smells amazing already at this point though.

So. Making the wontons. It’s pretty simple. If you need help, you should watch the actual episode of Good Eats from which this recipe originated. Just make sure not to overfill them, and don’t use too much water to seal. I did them all on a cookie sheet and covered with a damp paper towel. They don’t have to be perfect, they just have to be able to close completely. Try to get most of the air out when you seal it.

The perfect amount of filling. Don’t overdo it, please. Oh, also, I’m using round wonton wrappers because that’s all my Kroger had, but feel free to use square ones! Remember, you only need to brush the outside of one half of the circle/square to seal.

This is right after I’ve brushed the pan with oil (I used canola because that’s what I had). Do not overcrowd the pan! If you’re using a smaller pan, don’t put so many in at a time. At this point, you do not touch them for 2 full minutes! Resist the urge!

After two minutes, pour 1/3 cup-ish of chicken stock over them and quickly clamp on the lid.

Now let them sit undisturbed for another 2 minutes. I got my nails done professionally for the first time a few days ago. They’ll never look this good again, so enjoy it. Back to the food…

After two minutes, take off the lid and remove your potstickers one by one. They will probably stick a little. This is the point. Don’t worry—just be gentle with your tongs.

Move them directly into your preheated oven so they don’t get cold while you cook the rest. I just put them on a pizza pan. It worked out pretty well.

Rinse and repeat—literally! Between each batch, deglaze your pan with some water. You don’t have to scrape everything up though—I found the more tenacious residuals actually helped crisp up the later batches. Dump it out and brush the pan with oil again. Make sure you let the pan reheat properly after each de-glazing.

Now, cook up the rest and serve any way you like! Appetizers, dim sum, whatever. We ate them with rice and sweet and sour sauce for dipping. It was beyond delicious.

This recipe would probably feed at least four hungry adults (and that’s if you’re having them as a main course like we did). But we have leftovers, which is never a problem! :)

There is so much flavor and texture in these tiny little packages! Definitely try out this recipe. It’s pretty fun to assemble the wontons, too—an excellent task to delegate to kids or significant others while you start cookin’. ;)

Special thanks to my significant other, Pranas, for taking the action shots and helping assemble the mass amounts of wontons!