Asian Ingredients Archives - Page 2 of 2

Chinese Daikon Radish Cakes Recipe (Luo Bo Gao)

All Recipes, Asian Ingredients, Books, Chinese Dumpling Recipes, Chinese recipes

Thanks to Wai Chu’s recipe in The Dumpling cookbook, I’ve now gotten my fix of daikon radish cakes. If you’re unfamiliar with luóbo gāo (lok bok gow in Cantonese, 蘿蔔糕) they’re a mainstay on Cantonese dim sum menus. Recall the crisp seared pieces of slightly soft whitish cakes that look like a deck of playing cards but don’t taste like them whatsoever. That’s what these are. The ones at dim sum rarely are cooked as crisp as I like them. The crispier they’re fried, the better the contrast between the exterior and interior.

Whenever I make daikon radish cakes at home, I’m guaranteed of a nice supply of the cake to fry up whenever I please. The cake, which is first steamed and then fried, keeps in the fridge for about a week. Once you’ve made daikon radish cakes yourself, you’ll also look at the ones at dim sum houses with new eyes! I can eat luóbo gāo (“lu-oh bu-oh gow”) all year long, but Wai and his co-author Connie Lovatt slotted it in October in The Dumpling cookbook, which I reviewed last week. I don’t know if that’s why I was jonesing for the cakes but now I have them! They’re also a favorite during Chinese New Year time so I’ll be making the again come February when Lunar New Year falls on Valentine’s Day.

Japanese Octopus Dumpling Balls Recipe (Takoyaki)

All Recipes, Asian Ingredients, Japanese Dumpling Recipes

Let me just say this upfront: Many dumplings are spherical in shape and can only be described as balls. Go ahead and giggle like I did during the four-day Asian Dumplings photo shoot when photographer Penny De Los Santos repeatedly said “balls” to break up the tension. But seriously, round shaped dumplings have a large presence in the Asian dumpling repertoire. Consider classic Asian dumplings such as fried Chinese sesame balls (jin duei) and Indian gulab jamum (once referred to in a recipe as cakey balls). I’ll stop with the innuendos.

What got me hooked on making Japanese takoyaki is not their shape, nor the fact that their name literally means octopus balls, reflecting that they are traditionally filled with chunks of cooked octopus. Takoyaki resemble French profiteroles but they combine an unusual array of savory ingredients – dashi stock hydrates the wheat flour batter, the filling includes raw, cooked, and pickled items, and garnishes comprise mayonnaise, seaweed, shaved bonito flakes and tonkatsu sauce, which tastes like Worcestershire sauce. All of these seemingly disparate ingredients give donut-like takoyaki a savory, rich, tangy, sea-like taste. These dumplings remind me of Japan’s quirky culture and its penchant for building layer upon layer of subtlety to create wonderful foods.

Banana Leaf Basics

Asian Dumpling Basics, Asian Ingredients, Cooking Tips & Tricks

Just like many other foods, Asian dumplings cooked in banana leaves are extra heavenly. Open one up and inhale the leaf’s grassy perfume, then marvel at the dumpling’s dough which will be stained pale green. Finally bite into the dumpling and you’ll savor the mild tealike flavor that the banana leaf imparts during cooking. Many Southeast Asian dumplings rely on banana leaf for their trademark taste, fragrance, and appearance. Prime examples include banana-leaf packets of Indonesian sticky rice and spiced chicken (lemper ayam), Thai banana and coconut sticky rice (kao tom padt), and Vietnamese rice, pork and mushroom pyramids (banh gio).

Aside from contributing culinary aesthetics, banana leaf is also a practical kitchen tool. As a food wrapper, it functions like plastic wrap, parchment paper, and aluminum foil to prevent drying and sticking and retaining heat. You can lay banana leaf down and serve food on it like a plate or placemat, and fold it into various shapes as to-go containers. It’s also a great for lining steamer trays to prevent sticking. It’s biodegradable too. That’s ancient green living.

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Quick Wonton and Barbecue Pork Noodle Soup Recipe

All Recipes, Asian Ingredients, Asian Sauces, Stocks, and Condiments, Chinese Dumpling Recipes, Chinese recipes, Dumplings in Soup Recipes, Store Bought Dumplings

My Trader Joe’s Asian food product adventure continued. There were leftover frozen dumplings and Chinese-style barbecued seasoned pork and so I’ve been getting creative. Among the Trader Joe’s frozen Asian dumplings that I recently reviewed, the chicken and cilantro mini wontons were among my favorites. I wondered if I could pair the frozen wontons up with my shortcut Cantonese char siu pork. The result was this quick and fairly decent bowl of wonton noodle soup with char siu pork.

One caveat is that I had some homemade chicken stock and fresh Chinese egg noodles in the fridge, but you can use the shortcut Asian chicken stock from the Viet World Kitchen (my other site) and even top-ramen noodles. Don’t be shocked. Instant ramen noodles are a staple in many Asian kitchens, including mine. If you use ramen noodles, I suppose you could use their broth flavoring packet and water for the stock.

Parboiling the wontons first before poaching them in the stock prevents them from adding their starchiness to the stock. As the wontons cook in the stock, they absorb from of the stock’s flavor, thereby tasting better.

Serves 2

4 cups chicken stock, home made or shortcut version (on Vietworldkitchen.com)
1/3 pound fresh egg noodles or 2 Top-Ramen type of dried noodle flats
16 frozen Trader Joe’s chicken and cilantro mini wontons
1/4 pound Quick Char Siu Pork from Trader Joe’s
1/4 pound green vegetable, such as asparagus, bok choy, gailan, fresh peas, or broccoli, cut into bite-size pieces
Light (regular) soy sauce
Salt
Sesame oil
White pepper or chile oil, optional

1. Bring the stock to a boil in a saucepan, lower the heat and cover to keep hot. Have your soup bowls nearby as you’ll be working fast.

2. Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Use a long-handled noodle strainer or mesh strainer to blanch the vegetables. Remove, flush with cold water, and divide among the soup bowls.

3. Return the water to a boil and use the strainer to plunge the noodles into the pot. Let them cook until chewy-firm; the cooking time depends on the noodles. Remove the noodles from water, rinse them under cold water and divide among the soup bowls.

4. Return the water to a boil and add the frozen wontons. Stir gently to separate them. At this point, remove the lid from the stock, then increase the heat on the stock to bring it back to a boil. After the wontons float to the top, scoop them from the water with a slotted spoon and slide them into the stock. Let them poach gently in the stock for about 3 minutes, until done; poke into one with a paring knife to test. (As the wontons cook, doctor up the pork, if you haven’t done so. Or, warm them up in a skillet if you did it in advance.)

5. When the wontons are cooked, scoop them from the stock and divide them among the soup bowls. Taste the stock and make any flavor adjustments with soy sauce and/or salt. Then ladle the stock into the bowls. Drizzle on some sesame oil and then top with the pork. If you like extra heat, sprinkle some white pepper and/or chile oil to finish. Serve immediately.

Tofu Skin — A Vegan Dumpling Wrapper (Fu Pi)

Asian Dumpling Basics, Asian Ingredients, Vegan dumpling recipes

Many doughy, starchy dumpling skins can be made from scratch but dumplings encased in tofu skin require a trip to an Asian market. Dried tofu skin may sound odd to you, as it does not resemble the soft white blocks of tofu that most of us encounter at the market. Nor does tofu skin resemble the dense pieces of pressed (baked) tofu sold in cryovac packages. Tofu skin (腐皮, fu pí in Mandarin, yuba in Japanese) is basically the thin layer that forms as soy milk boils in a shallow pan. (Think of the film of milk that forms when boiling milk.) The sheets of tofu skin is removed and dried for later use.

While there is great nutrition in tofu skin, what I enjoy about it most is its silky-soft-rubbery texture, which can be dropped into broth for soup and rolled up and manipulated into mock meat. But the best application for tofu skin (in my opinion) is for Cantonese dim sum in which tofu skin is used as a chewy, silky wrapper or a crackly crisp wrapper. The two most common sightings of tofu skin at dim sum are crisp shrimp and tofu skin rolls (xiā fu pí juǎn) and steamed tofu skin rolls filled with meat and vegetables. I’ve always loved those kinds of preparations involving tofu skin but never attempted to make them at home. A few weeks ago, I purchased a package of “fresh tofu skin” from the refrigerated section of one of my favorite Chinese markets (Lion Foods on Saratoga (off the 280 freeway) in San Jose, CA, to be exact) and took it home to play with.

What is tofu skin like? How do you work with tofu skin?

Right out of the packaging, it’s oddly weird, like thin oil cloth. There were 3 skins in the package I bought and each one unfolded into a large circle resembling a small tablecloth. You’d think that the stuff wasn’t meant for consumption. I researched a number of reliable cookbooks, such as Florence Lin’s terrific Chinese Vegetarian Cooking to figure out how to make tofu skin pliable. Many authors suggested soaking tofu skin in hot water “until soft enough to handle.” I didn’t quite know what that meant.

So I put hot water into a brownie baking pan (a square baking pan like what I’d use for making steamed rice sheets, sha he fen) and dropped in a piece of tofu skin. YOWZA(!) within about 30 seconds, the skin went from translucent tan to opaque buff. What’s more, the skin expanded in size by roughly 25 percent. When the skin was left for 2 to 3 minutes, it became so soft that it could be easily torn if not handled with care. For my purpose of making dim sum tofu skin dumplings, soaking the skins for too long yielded overly wet results and how was I to seal the skin up for frying? Cantonese tofu skin dumpling preparations require that the filling be encased in the skin and then deep-fried and served, or deep-fried and steamed with some sauce/gravy before serving.

Just a little moisture please!

Several tries later, I realized that soaking wasn’t going to work. The skins absorbed too much water. Then I found that some authors sealed up their tofu skin dumplings with a slurry of water and cornstarch or flour. So I mixed some cornstarch and water up and brushed it on both sides of the pieces of skin and they ended up becoming just soft enough to fold and roll, and as they sat, they self-sealed. The cornstarch helps to crisp up the skin too during deep frying. So that’s what I did to make one of my husband’s favorite dim sum, crispy shrimp and tofu skin rolls.

How to buy and store tofu skin

My experience is limited to purchasing tofu skin at Chinese and Vietnamese markets where they are shelved in the refrigerated section, near other tofu products and fresh noodles. The package says “keep frozen” but what I buy is never frozen. I don’t get that. In the freezer section, there are packages of tofu skin, already cut into neat pieces, but I’ve not ventured into that territory – yet! Once home, refrigerate your package of tofu skin. Keep leftover pieces of tofu skin or precut pieces in a zip-top plastic bag to prevent drying.

Cutting and keeping tofu skin moist for dumpling making

Think of it as fabric and cut with scissors. You don’t have to be neat. For dumpling wrappers, I cut the tofu skin into 5 by 5-inch squares – basically the same size as a small eggroll skin. Once cut, keep the tofu skin covered with a damp towel or in a plastic bag to prevent drying. As you work, keep the awaiting skins covered, lest they dry out. If they do, you can pat each one with a damp kitchen towel and it should soften just a tad.

For the purposes of Asian dumpling making, aim to moisten the skin just enough to fold them up and seal them. Otherwise, it’s hard to get them nice and crisp during deep-frying.

Building a Pantry for Asian Dumplings

Asian Dumpling Basics, Asian Ingredients

I’ve been making dumplings for years but for the past 12 months, as I’ve been developing recipes for the new cookbook, I’ve led a 24/7 life of Asian dumplings. (There was some weight gain, if you must ask.) What I’ve learned along the way is that you definitely don’t need much to make a bunch of different kinds of Asian dumplings. In fact, dumplings are prepared from everyday ingredients. That is their nature and genius. Most ingredients for making Asian dumplings are available at regular supermarkets. Ethnic food aisles are better stocked now than ever so do check them out. However, some ingredients will require a trip to an Asian grocery store.

I kept replenishing certain pantry ingredients, and have provided a list here for you, should you want to share in my fanaticism. If you already make lots of Asian food, you’re likely to have these items in your kitchen. Believe me, with these ingredients around, you’ll be ready for many kinds of Asian dumplings: