New Recipe #25: Potstickers

Right now, our house is an Olympics House. We suspend the Wednesday TV Ban, eschew sleep, and learn obscure athletes’ names for two weeks of gasping in awe of physical prowess, mental stamina, and “holy crap, they did not just do that”-ness. When JG was a kid, his mom would hold an Olympics party where every guest would choose a country and bring a dish of that provenance. While I was completely on board with the party idea, the thought of guests bringing foods of all different courses, tastes, cooking styles, and qualities all willy nilly made my skin crawl. Like a good married couple (ahem), we compromised to have the party, but I would have a tighter rein on the food. I immediately started dreaming up a complicated menu of ethnic finger foods, especially for the summer Olympic powerhouses. Dumplings for China, of course. Shrimp skewers for Australia? Pigs-in-a-blanket or apple turnovers for the United States? Ooh, antipasto for Italy! Pretzels for Germany! Tea cakes for Russia! Sangria for Spain! It would be awesome!

Oh, and also cripplingly difficult, not to mention pricey.

JG talked me off the ledge, and I settled on our regular scheme of munchies like taco dip, a vegetable tray, and something baked for dessert. We sent out the e-vite, but to our dismay, no one could come! Oh, well. At least I still had Alton Brown’s potsticker recipe printed out, and it fit nicely into the Whip It Up theme of appetizers, so what the heck? JG liked the idea of a potsticker dinner, so we slated it into this week’s meal plan.

[Note: Yes, Nancy Pearl Wannabe and I tried the same recipe this week, but it was not planned, alas. Next time, we will have matching, puff-painted aprons, if I have anything to do with it.]

Method
Thanks to packaged wonton wrappers, the process of making these potstickers was surprisingly smooth. I got home at 6:15 last night, and with JG’s help in folding the dumplings, we ate dinner at 7:30, so that’s not bad, at least to me. The filling came together in a snap, and I cooked the potstickers in four batches that each took four minutes. I was afraid of the actual cooking process, but once I was protectively garbed with long sleeves and a silicon oven mitt, I was surprisingly at ease.

That said, there are there major points of which every aspiring potsticker-maker should be aware:

• Wonton wrapper availability, or lack thereof: JG went to three grocery stores before he found the wrappers in the chilled part of the produce section; that is how dedicated we are to the potsticker.
• Folding the wontons: JG and I wrapped 50 wontons in about 20 minutes, but there is no way I would undertake this task alone. It’s simple and nonfussy, but doing anything that many times is tiresome and lengthy. We had filling left over after using up all of the wrappers, so JG simply added breadcrumbs to the mixture and formed seven cute little Asian meatballs. I think that we would prefer to have extra meat than wrappers, so be conservative when buying the latter.
• Dishes: The dirty dish casualties of this dish were: a cutting board, a knife, three bowls, two small plates, two baking sheets, a cast-iron skillet, a lid, a platter, a spatula, a pair of tongs, a flat spatula, and a fork. That tally does not include the two kitchen towels I moistened to prevent the dumplings from drying out or any of the dishes we used during the meal or to prepare rice and sugar snap peas. So, beware.

Taste
The potstickers stayed warm in the oven as I finished cooking each batch, and I triumphantly bore the hot platter of steamy dumplings to the table. The wonton wrappers had shrunk into the nooks and crannies of the meat filling, and seeing that warm, crinkled pile of goodness sent a thrill down my spine. I dabbed soy sauce on my first bite with my chopsticks, and — hurray! — they tasted just like the dumplings I would get at a dim sum restaurant in New York. I stuffed my face with the crispy little envelopes and reveled in my success.

Repeat appearance
I will definitely make these potstickers again … but not on a weekday. It’s not practical to shape dumplings on a busy night during the week, but I think a Saturday afternoon of folding dumplings sounds downright relaxing. I may make a big batch sometime in the future and flash freeze them, so that we can cook them up at our leisure. I was mightily impressed with Alton Brown — seriously, he has never let us down — but I was mostly proud of myself. Holy crap, I did not just make my own potstickers!

Perfect Potstickers
Good Eats

• 1/2 pound ground pork
• 1/4 cup finely chopped scallions
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped red bell pepper
• 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

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.