Hi Again,
I’m really trying to knock out my backlogged blogs this weekend, so here’s another one for you, and of course it’s another dumpling cookbook! If you recall, I have at least six books that are dumpling-focused (and this one might be the best one). Andrea Nguyen is a pretty well known recipe developer, cookbook author & chef. She has written many books on Vietnamese cuisine & guides on other Asian cuisines. She is a James Beard award winner for her Pho Cookbook, published in 2017. I own a handful of her books, so it certainly isn’t the last time you’ll see me write about her on this blog, but this was the first one I ever purchased from her collection!
Simply put, Asian Dumplings is a thorough look into dumplings from across the Asian continent. This isn’t focusing on dumplings we are typically familiar with from China, Japan, and Korea, we also see recipes for Tibetan dumplings, Indian samosas, Filipino dumplings, & more! When I was leafing through this book to try and decide what to make, I decided that I wanted to experiment with a few different types of dough & a few different fillings. I had only ever made one dumpling style from this book before and so I decided I would start there. What ended up happening was I made three types of dough, each with their own filling, and I also made one sauce from the book that was a suggested pairing with one of the dumplings… and I did it all on the same day. It was really fun to compare the different dough types side by side and we ate dumplings for a week! Of course I prepared this dumpling-centric meal for a Shabbat dinner and went against all of my “fewer dishes” rules, but it was tons of fun & epically delicious, and I learned several new tricks about dumpling making that will change my life forever.
The best place to start seemed like it would be with the Basic Dumpling Dough. I figured this would be the recipe I would turn to over and over again in future dumpling-making endeavors. There were many options for fillings for this dough, from the classic pork & napa cabbage to the more unique (to me) Momos. I landed on the Tibetan Beef & Sichuan Peppercorn Dumplings (Sha Momo), because I love a beef dumpling & I have Sichuan peppercorns on hand. There are a couple of really cool things about the Basic Dumpling Dough that I want to point out. For starters, anyone can make this dough. It is a two-ingredient dough that comes together easily either in a food processor or by hand. You can use it for the many Asian dumplings listed in this book, but I think it would also work well if you were trying to make filled Italian pastas. Nguyen also encourages her readers to “play with the dough” in a section for this recipe. Here you can find a few options for making the dough different colors, and even a dough that is a slight variation with a different texture by the addition of rice flour. I decided to stick with the classic preparation on this day.
When I turned the page to read about her method for forming wrappers, my whole life changed. For years I have agonized about making dumpling wrappers by hand: they taste better & function better than store-bought wrappers, but they are a pain (literally) to roll out… one after the other, after the other… and so on. Nguyen suggests here, a revelation, use a tortilla press for your preliminary flattening of the dough (from a measured lump to a flat-ish circle) and then the rolling pin to finish each wrapper individually! I quickly whipped out my tortilla press (you can buy a really simple one at most Mexican grocery stores or online) and got to pressing out my dough. This cut my usual process time in half (easily), and I will never not be using a tortilla press for this step again. Thank you Andrea!
The filling for the Momos was fairly straightforward, ground beef with several aromatics + the aforementioned Sichuan peppercorns which offer a numbing spicy kick! I started with the sauce first while my dough was resting, and then made the filling just in time to roll out my wrappers. The Spicy Roasted Tomato Sauce is fairly straightforward, and I feel that there must be other dishes this would be a delicious addition to (perhaps some chicken, fish, or tofu)! Simply put - you broil the tomatoes with a chile and then process everything together to make a beautiful, fragrant, piquant sauce!
The suggested fold for this dumpling is something Andrea calls a Closed Satchel. It looks very similar to the fold I used to make Khinkali, but without the little handle on top. This is also the same fold used for the very popular Xiaolongbao (soup dumplings)! I went through the process of making these dumplings and then popped them into the fridge while I worked on the next dumpling style. Although my folding is not perfect now, I know it is something I want to work on in the future. I have done a standard crescent fold for dumplings since I was about 10 years old, so this one may take me another 20 years to perfect as well. These are best prepared steamed, so I figured it would be easy to transfer them from fridge to steamer when it was closer to eating time!
The next dumpling I made was the Sheng Jian Bao which uses the Basic Yeast Dough recipe from the book. This is the dumpling I had made once before. Years ago I was watching some cooking show or another and someone made a variation of these dumplings which I had never heard of before. They looked absolutely divine. Sheng Jian Bao are prepared similarly to a pan-fried dumpling method, however, the yeast in the dough makes the top extra fluffy and the bottom extra crispy! How can you go wrong? They are classically filled with pork and scallions, and I decided to keep them that way (we don’t keep kosher, but rarely eat pork). I started by making the dough as it needed time to rise before being rolled out and filled. One interesting thing to note about these dumplings is: you use the same closed satchel fold as before, but when you’re storing them for their second rise, you place them bottom up & pleat down! You don’t really want the same raised pleat on top when cooking them, so this causes them to have a sort of flat appearance on either side of the dumpling once it is cooked.
When cooking mine, I think they got a bit more color than I anticipated, but weren’t as burnt as they look in the photo. As I mentioned before, the dough is pleasantly fluffy (because of the yeast) but it doesn’t taste bread-like or too heavy. These are delicious and I think you could easily sub out the pork for a different meat if you do not eat pork! Traditionally Sheng Jian Bao are served with a vinegar & soy sauce mixture with some shredded ginger. I have all of those ingredients on hand, so that’s likely what I made to serve it with. If you like a little spice, you can also add some chile oil/chile crisp to the sauce mixture when serving!
The third dough/dumpling combination was the one that really threw me out of my comfort zone, but when I was initially making my decisions on which recipes to cook, it’s the one my mind kept going back to. I knew I had a dumpling that was going to be steamed, and another one pan-fried… that’s a lot of real estate on the stove, so I decided my third and final dumpling should be baked. Baked Filled Buns are really a treat, and I am so glad I decided to make them, and I’ve even made them again since this first attempt! The dough is a milk-based yeasted dough with a little bit of sugar (this causes the dough to be slightly sweet). You can fill this dough with savory or sweet fillings, which makes it extremely versatile. I found the dough easy to handle & work with, and I think we all agreed it was our favorite dumpling of the day! Because I had two meat fillings already on deck, and a different plan entirely for dessert, I decided to make the Vegetable and Tofu Bun Filling for this dough.
After bringing the dough together, I prepared the vegetable filling which you cook before using as a filling (unlike meat fillings which are mostly raw). The reason you have to cook the vegetables for this filling is because if you didn’t, they would release too much water raw and you would end up with soggy dumplings. The filling is flavored with white pepper which has a slightly different flavor from black pepper, and I don’t recommend using black pepper for this (even though the book says you can use either). The tofu requested is a brown pressed tofu which you will most likely find at a Chinese grocery store. I did not have time to make the trip to our Chinese grocery store, so I used the Trader Joe’s baked teriyaki tofu instead (it’s really not the same thing AT ALL but it was the best I could do, and it was delicious either way). For these dumplings you also utilize the closed satchel fold & place it pleat-side down, but you also cook it with the pleat-side down to reveal a beautiful, smooth, golden top to these dumplings.
Out of the three doughs, this baked filled bun dough is the most like bread. The top is brushed with egg before baking, and then a mixture of honey and water just as it comes out of the oven which helps to both sweeten & soften the crust.
When we were finally eating all of these dumplings side-by-side, my husband mentioned that the baked buns reminded him a bit of the Russian Pirojki I make (something my paternal grandmother taught me to make). I decided that the next time I made the Pirojki I would try this dough instead of my usual sour-cream dough. Sure enough, within a month, I made them and they were delicious (even my stubborn, stuck in her ways, grandmother agreed). From now on, there is really no other choice for me when making Pirojki, I have to use this dough. It’s kind of poetic in a way, the Russians/Ukranians in my family of generations past all left Eastern Europe and moved (temporarily) to China before eventually coming to the United States. My grandmother (Same one who taught me to make Pirojki) was born & raised in China. I feel like the combination of our family recipes for Russian Pirojki fillings alongside this Chinese dough is the perfect thing to bring our immigrant ancestral history full circle!
Love & Happy Spatulas,
Alyssa