Dumplings

For this dinner, a friend and I got together all the ingredients for dumplings. We decided right before that we'd do spring rolls another time, so sorry to get your hopes up last time. But, we did make two different types of dumplings: pork and shrimp. Although the pictures all look the same, so I guess that doesn't really make it up to you.

We also set out to deep fry some more vegetables, but this time in a tempura batter. I got started on that, while the dumpling materials were being prepared. I used this recipe. I had three recipes in front of me, and I picked the one that seemed the second easiest (or second hardest for those glass-half-empty folks) of the three.

I cut up the veggies, mixed up the tempura batter, and got started deep frying and...these weren't that good. They weren't bad, and dipping them in soy sauce helped a lot, but they didn't take on the golden brown color described in the recipe, and the tempura itself seemed a little bland. The first batch was also really thick, because the recipe said not to over mix the batter.

But, I went back and mixed it very thoroughly, and kept at it. This next batch was a little better and a little browner, but I still had to keep it in way longer than the one minute they described. These were also good with soy sauce, but, in my opinion, still a little bland. I won't blame the recipe, since I am not really a great cook. I might have messed something up, but I do have to say I wasn't very impressed.
We kept at it and kept snacking on these for a while though, because the dumpling took a lot of prep time. First, the pork and cabbage was mixed together and the shrimp and other stuff were mixed, and each of these were heated up. Then little bits of it were put into the won ton dough, and these were sealed over. When sealing, you want to keep as much air out as possible, because the air expanding in the deep fryer will cause the dumplings to open up. They are still good if they open up, but a couple totally emptied out their insides in the deep fryer and only the shells were recovered.

Here's the exact recipes:

Pork dumplings:

"3/4 lb of pork mince
8 oz bag of shredded carrot/cabbage mix
2 tbs of minced garlic
2 tbs of minced ginger
3 tbs of oil
4 tbs of soy sauce or teriyaki
won ton wrappers

Cook the pork mince in the oil, garlic and ginger on medium heat. Then when the mince is browned add the cabbage/carrot mix and the soy sauce or teriyaki. When stuffing is cooked let it cool. Then layout won ton wrappers. Place one teaspoon of the pork and cabbage mixture into the center of each won ton. Then outline with a wet finger tip one half of the wrapper. Then fold the wrapper in half and seal. Then steam until the dumpling looks vacuum packed and then grill or deep fry!"

And the shrimp recipe can be found here.


We even classed it up a bit with a fancy presentation:
Actually, this was just a photo op. We ate pretty much all of them standing over the deep fryer, which is how I eat pretty much everything I deep fry. Very few finished items actually make it to the dinner table.

These were excellent. The won ton shells got way crispier than normal dumplings. They were more like crab Rangoon, which I realized I really need to make at some point. Both the shrimp and pork were really good. I think I liked the pork slightly more, but both were delicious. And, we made about 50 of them, so I was stuffed by the end.

So, this is probably the most work intensive thing we've made so far, although, I really shouldn't take much credit, all I really did was dip the basket of dumplings into the oil and somehow mess up the tempura batter. But it felt a little classier, and it was nice to cook something fancy for a change of pace.

The following day, I cooked my lunch and dinner in the deep fryer (breakfast was leftover dumplings). Both of these meals were less classy, as each involved hot dogs. Those will be my next two posts.

Veggie Night

I made a big list of vegetables I wanted to deep fry at some point (a subset of the HUGE list of all foods I want to deep fry). At the top of the list was zucchini. In my high school, the cafeteria made deep fried zucchini sticks, which everyone really liked. Actually, even better were the vegetable sticks, which just had a bunch of ground up vegetables mashed into stick form and deep fried. They also deep fried okra occasionally, but okra is tougher to find up North. Since I was deep frying zucchini, I got some squash too, because I figured there were some economies of scope there. I rounded out the meal with broccoli and cauliflower, which I have also had deep fried before and enjoyed. Other vegetables that I'll deep fry at some point include: corn (one of the ingredients in the above-mentioned vegetable sticks), green beans (one of my roommates raved about these), okra, and a few more.

I found this recipe for zucchini and squash, which called for just dipping the two in a cornmeal and flour mixture. That sounded good, since that's how I cook fried fish, but I was surprised in didn't include an egg wash in the process. Nonetheless, cut the veggies into sticks and discs and tried it out. These were good.

Then I went back and made an egg wash and just inserted that step into the process for round two. These were also really good. This time the outer shell really reminded me of the fried fish I love cooking. Others eating with me were split on whether this was better or worse than the first batch. We were also using ranch as a dipping sauce, and I thought that was very good with all of these.
Then, I tried using breadcrumbs. I couldn't find a recipe that called for breadcrumbs, but as you have no doubt gathered from my recent posts, I LOVE dipping stuff in egg, then bread crumbs and deep frying it. It hasn't failed yet. This batch blew the others away. It wasn't even close. As much as I liked the first two preparations, these were outstanding. I just skipped the recipes for the broccoli and cauliflower and just dipped these in an egg wash, then breadcrumbs. Also, I bought the biggest container of breadcrumbs I could find at the store, so I should be stocked for a while. Of the broccoli and cauliflower I prepared for deep frying, I steamed half of it before deep frying and the other half just went into the fryer raw, so I could test whether that had any effect on the overall taste.

Both batches were excellent, and there was no discernible difference between steaming the stuff beforehand or not.
All of this was so good with the breadcrumbs, that I had the epiphany that looking up all these recipes and trying all these different preparations might be over thinking it all. I think it breaks down like this: There are normal foods and there are sweets. All the sweets can probably be covered in pancake batter and deep fried and all the normal foods can probably be just dipped in an egg wash and then covered in breadcrumbs. for deep frying. All the other in-depth recipes may be unnecessary. Sure, there will be occasional other things to try, but I think this is a good, general rule of thumb.

While contemplating how good everything is with breadcrumbs, I thought, "I really want to deep fry a pickle in breadcrumbs. Wait...I have pickles! I'll do this right now!" And I did. I didn't worry about the detailed recipe I followed last time, I just dipped it in the egg, then the breadcrumbs and fried it. It was awesome! And totally easy! It's in the foreground of the picture below.

Since I know you all look to me for thorough research on all things deep fried, I'll keep looking at other recipes when frying new things. But I am going to be partial to the ones that involve breadcrumbs. And don't worry, I still want to try other types of batters, like beer batter.

For dessert, we deep fried a few more Oreos (why not?) and a Cadbury Caramel Egg, so I could get a picture. In the first picture, there's a normal (half) Cadbury Caramel egg next to it. I was about to deep fry that one, but it just looked too delicious and I started eating it on the trip from the fridge to the deep fryer. The next one made it into the deep fryer intact, and was very delicious.

Next time, I'll put my new breadcrumb deep frying theory to the test with fried fish. This is a tough first challenge, because all my life I have made fried fish the same way. It will be quite a shock if I like this new way more. We'll see what happens...