I’ll start this by saying that I’m by no means the oracle on dumplings. In fact, this was my first time making my own dumpling wrappers – which means that yes, you can absolutely make them too, and so many of you asked for my recipe I thought I’d jot it down here. This recipe was born out of necessity, rather than any kind of academic research: I wanted dumplings bad; had a load of leftover cockerel meat in the fridge begging to be stuffed into them; and as I wasn’t able to get hold of my usual shop-bought wonton wrappers, I thought I’d have a go at making my own. I got the idea while flicking through Tim Anderson’s brilliant new Vegan Japaneasy book, after reading his gyoza recipe, mouth-watering, and thinking ‘how hard can it be?’ The answer is, it’s actually surprisingly simple – and you only need plain flour, salt and water. I used his dough quantities as a starting point but scaled them down as I only had enough filling for about 20 dumplings. I also significantly cut down the kneading by resting the dough for much longer than he suggested, such is my jam. If you don’t know Tim, or his wonderful books about Japanese cuisine, you’re missing a trick: follow him here
If you want to really deep-dive into authentic dumpling-making, then I would suggest checking out the Instagram of Pippa Middlehurst, aka Pippyeats, who has become something of an expert on Asian cuisine – specialising in dumplings and noodles. Her food porn shots of her chilli-oil-slick creations, and her beautifully-shot cook-alongs on stories are seriously hypnotic, and give you an infectious desire to follow suit. She’s got a book coming out, aptly called ‘Dumplings and Noodles‘ which is available to pre-order – I will certainly be bagging a copy. Another chef who had a hand in this recipe is my friend Olia Hercules, a Ukrainian chef and food writer who runs dumpling workshops from her home in London, one of which I am determined to get to once lockdown is over. Olia specialises in the food of Ukraine and the Caucasus, and her gorgeous Central Asian and Georgian dumplings are to die for. I used this video on her Instagram to help me fold mine, and I’d suggest you check it out too.
These dumplings are total mongrels – the flavours are more Chinese than anything, but they were born out of reading a Japanese recipe, and folded according to a Georgian technique – so quite in the spirit of this globe-trotting comfort food. And my gosh they were delicious! You really do need to make this recipe. While I made mine with the glorious leftover Easter cockerel we enjoyed from Copas, you could sub the cockerel for leftover lamb or chicken, or minced pork or prawns in the recipe below. Making dumplings is a really great way of using up any odds and ends and miscellaneous ingredients you might have hanging around – particularly if you have lamb leftover from Easter, or meat from Sunday roasts to use. I wanted them swimming in the deeply-flavoured cockerel stock I made with the carcass, but you could also fry and steam these little beauties. If you’re frying them, start them off in a frying pan with a little oil to crisp up the bottoms, and cover with a lid to steam them and make sure they’re cooked through. I used chard as a green but wild garlic would be lovely, so too would spinach or kale. Enjoy!
Big Fat Leftovers Dumpling Soup
For the dumpling wrappers (makes 20)
200g plain flour
85ml-90ml water
1/4 tsp sea salt
For the filling
400-450g cooked chicken meat (I used cockerel leg meat, stripped from the bone)/ you could use chicken mince, minced pork or prawn, or a mixture – or add more mushrooms, tofu and greens to go veggie
4 mushrooms, chopped
3 cloves of garlic (I used a mix of fresh and black garlic)
2 spring onions, sliced
A knob of ginger, sliced
1/2 tsp ground white pepper
1 shallot, diced
1/2 chilli, chopped
1 egg
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp rice vinegar
1 tbsp sesame oil
For the soup
400ml chicken or vegetable stock (this serves two, allow 200ml stock per person if scaling up)
A knob of ginger, sliced
1-2 tbsps soy sauce
1 tbsp rice vinegar
100g frozen peas
2 large leaves of chard or pak choi, stems sliced, leaves cut down lengthways into thinner slices
To make the dumpling dough:
Boil the kettle. Combine the flour and salt in a bowl and pour over the water, stirring with a spatula or chopsticks to bring everything together. Once you have a scraggy dough, get your hands in there and squeeze it all together, picking up any crumbs from the bowl. Add a bit more water if it’s too dry, but be careful not to make it sticky.
Cover with clingfilm and rest in the fridge for an hour. Once rested, remove from the fridge, and grab some cornflour. Cut your dough in half – you’ll see it’s still probably a bit rough, in which case give it a brief knead until it’s smooth. You want it the consistency of playdough. I used ever-so-slightly-moistened hands at this stage to help things along – but do this only if the dough is dry and do so gingerly – you don’t want it to turn into a sticky mess.
Once you’ve got two lovely smooth doughs, roll then out into fat little logs, a bit like making gnocchi, but fatter – about 18-20cm long. Now use a knife to cut them each into ten little discs (about 2cm wide), and flatten the discs down. Dust some more cornflour, and roll each disc into little circles, about 6-7cm circumference. I found my stone pestle was perfect for doing this, rather than a rolling pin.
As you roll each one out, you want to dust the wrappers with corn flour between each layer to stop them sticking. When you’ve rolled them all out, place in a plastic food bag and refrigerate for at least another hour. You can actually do this the day before and leave them overnight if you like.
Making the filling
In the meantime, make the filling. In the bowl of a food processor, combine all your ingredients, and pulse lightly, until you have a sticky paste. I like it quite coarse rather than too smooth. Texture is good, people! You can fry a little edge off and taste for seasoning – tasting as we go is also good.
To fill your dumplings, grab your wrappers out of the fridge and dust a plate with corn flour. Scoop about a tablespoon of filling into the middle of each disc. Now either follow Olia’s folding video, or for something quicker and easier (but less beautiful), bring the edges of the wrapper up over the filling and squeeze and twist together firmly so that you have little parcels/pouches, as per the pics below:
Once you’ve made all your dumplings, it’s good to cook them near enough straight away, though they can be frozen carefully, between layers of corn flour dusted baking paper to stop them sticking. Allow four to five dumplings per person, depending on greed – and if you’re only cooking for one or two, freeze the rest.
To make the soup
Pour the stock into a pan along with the ginger and bring up to the boil. Season with soy and vinegar, turn down to a simmer and cook the peas in the stock along with the chard stems, until tender.
In a frying pan, heat a couple of tablespoons of oil, add in the sliced mushrooms and fry over a high heat, until caramelising, squeaking, and giving up their moisture. Turn the heat down and add in the garlic and white parts of the spring onions, frying until the garlic is golden, then splash over some rice vinegar – about a tablespoon: it will evaporate almost instantly. Set aside while you cook the dumplings.
When the broth is at a simmer, gently lower the dumplings in. Cover with a lid and cook for three minutes. After this time, remove the lid, add in the greens and recover the lid. Cook for another minute or two, until the leaves are wilted, and the dumplings are cooked through. Spoon the dumplings into the bowls and pour over the stock. Strew the leaves on top, followed by the mushrooms and garlic. Garnish with chopped spring onion, chilli oil and flowers, if using.
And that’s it! I really hope you enjoy this. Remember to tag me in any posts, and I’ll be back soon with more recipes.