Dipping Sauce
- 1 cup Chinese black rice vinegar
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 1/4 cup light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp minced fresh cilantro
- 1 tsp toasted sesame oil
- 1/2 tsp minced fresh ginger
To make the dipping sauce, whisk together the black rice vinegar, ginger, sesame oil, cilantro, soy sauce, and sugar in a small bowl. Set aside.
Dumplings
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
- 3/4 cup water
- 3 tbsp vegetable oil
- 36 round dumpling wrappers (purchased premade or homemade)
- pinch of salt
- 2 tsp toasted sesame oil
- 1/2 tsp sugar
- 3/4 cup minced green onion, green and white parts
- 1 tsp minced fresh ginger
- 1 tbsp light soy sauce
- 12 oz ground beef or ground pork
To make the dumplings, combine the meat, soy sauce, cornstarch, ginger, green onions, sugar, sesame oil, and salt in a bowl and stir in one direction with a chopstick until just mixed. Fill a small bowl with some water. Hold a dumpling wrapper in the palm of your hand and place 1 heaping teaspoon of filling in the center. Dip your finger in the bowl of water and run it around the edge to help make a good seal. Lightly fold the wrapper over on itself, but don’t touch the edges together. Starting at one end, use your fingers to make a small pleat on the side of the wrapper closest to you, then press the pleat into the other side and pinch together firmly. Keep making pleats down the dumpling opening in this way until completely sealed. Repeat this process with the remaining filling and wrappers. Freeze any dumplings that you don’t intend to cook immediately.
Heat 1 tablespoon of the vegetable oil in a nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Place 12 dumplings pleat side up in the pan so that they are just touching each other. Cover and cook for 1 minute. Decrease the heat to medium-low, pour 1/4 cup of the water into the pan, and cook, covered, for 8 to 10 minutes, until all the water is absorbed by the dumplings and their bottoms are crusty brown. Repeat this process 2 more times with the remaining dumplings, oil, and water. Serve the dumplings with a side of the dipping sauce.
Recipe courtesy of Feeding the Dragon: A Culinary Travelogue Through China with Recipes by Mary Kate Tate and Nate Tate/Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2011.
