Dumplings are our weakness.We could eat them everyday, and sometimes, we actually do. I've been meaning to cook from Andrea Nguyen's "Asian Dumplings" for a while but haven't had the time until our friend Suzanne decided to organise a dumpling lunch at her place. There was no choice, I had to make dumplings despite all the other thousands of recipes I wanted to try. 

I have modified the recipe here and there, and then, only as a matter of personal preference. Dumplings turned out delicious, filling texture was smooth, flavours were balanced and very authentic. I know this because mum makes the best dumplings (this is no exaggeration...ask my friends) and not only did she approve, she had seconds and then thirds. I used organic, coarse plain flour (that's all I had in the house) and they added a bit of substance and colour to the dumplings but next time I will try make with bleached flour. I may yet find an organic version.
 
Pork and Napa Cabbage Water Dumplings (Shuijiao), recipe adapted from Andrea Nguyen's "Asian Dumplings"

You will need dumpling dough, pork filling and dipping sauce. Here are the steps:

Ingredients for dumpling dough:

Unbleached plain flour: 285 grams or 2 cups

Boiled water: 3/4 cup, left to rest for 2 minutes after boiling

Preparation:

I made the dough by hand although you can use a food processor. I find dealing with the aftermath of using a food processor too much work for this amount of dough.
 
Put a bowl atop a kitchen towel to prevent it from slipping while you work. Put the flour in the bowl and make a well in the centre. Use a wooden spoon to stir the flour while you add 3/4 cup water in a steady stream. Aim to evenly moisten the flour. When all the water has been added, you will have lots of lumpy bits. Knead the dough in the bowl (don't burn your fingers, if it's too hot just wait a few minutes for it to cool down a bit) to bring all the lumps into one mass. Add water by the teaspoon if dough doesn't come together easily.
 
Transfer the dough to a work surface which you lightly dusted with flour. Knead the dough with the heel of your hand for about 2 minutes. The resulting dough should be nearly smooth and somewhat elastic; press on the dough and it should slowly bounce back with a light impression of your finger remaining. Place the dough in a  container and cover with plastic wrap or lid. Set aside for at least 15 minutes and up to 2 hours. The dough will steam up the container and will make the wrappers easier to work with.
 
After resting, the dough can be used right away to form the wrappers or can be refrigerated overnight and returned to room temperature before using. 
 
Ingredients for dipping sauce:

Regular soy sauce: 1/3 cup

Chinkiang vinegar: 2.5 tablespoons

Chilli paste: to taste
 
Sesame oil: 1 teaspoon
 
Preparation:

Mix above ingredients in a bowl...done, easy.
 
Ingredients for pork filling:
 
Napa cabbage: 2 cups lightly packed, finely chopped and cut from whole leaves

Salt: 1/2 teaspoon plus an additional scant 1/2 teaspoon

Fresh ginger: 1 tablespoon, finely minced

Garlic chives: 1/4 cup, chopped

Spring onions (or shallots, or scallions): 1/4 cup, chopped, white and green parts

Fatty ground pork: 305 grams, coarsely chopped. My ground pork was 75 percent ground pork (the type readily available at the butcher) and 25 percent ground pork fat

Ground white pepper: 1/8 teaspoon

Chicken stock or water: 1/4 cup

Regular soy sauce: 1.5 tablespoons

Shaoxing rice wine: 1 tablespoon

Vegetable oil: 1 tablespoon

Sesame oil: 1 tablespoon

Preparation:

Place the cabbage in a bowl and toss with the 1/2 teaspoon salt. Set aside for 15 minutes to draw excess moisture from the cabbage. Drain in a strainer, rinse thoroughly and drain again. Squeeze cabbage and wring it out in your hands to extract more moisture until you end up with about 1/2 cup firmly packed cabbage.
 
Transfer the cabbage to a bowl and add the ginger, chives, and pork. Stir this mix so that they start coming together.
 
In a small bowl, stir together the remaining scant 1/2 teaspoon salt, the pepper, chicken stock, soy sauce, rice wine, vegetable oil and sesame oil. Pour this over the pork and fold ingredients together with hands. Once the pork has broken up, briskly stir and massage to blend the ingredients into a cohesive, thick mixture, about 5 minutes. I did this, again, with bare hands. Set aside for 30 minutes. You should end up with about 2 cups of filling. Filling can be made a day ahead and refrigerated and brought to temperature before assembling the dumplings.
 
Assembling the dumplings:
 
Make 16 round wrappers from half of the dough, about 8.5 cms or 3-1/4 inches in diameter each. Keep the other half of the dough wrapped in plastic. Use a small wooden rolling pin to roll out wrappers. Place them on a flour dusted large plate and cover with a clean cloth.
 
Before assembling the dumplings, line a baking sheet with wax paper dusted with plain flour. For each dumpling, hold a wrapper in a slightly cupped hand. Scoop up about 1 scant tablespoon of filling with a teaspoon and position it slightly off-centre toward the upper half of the wrapper, pressing and shaping it into a flat mound and keeping about 1/2 to 3/4 inch of wrapper clear on all sides. That's about 1.5 to 2 cms. Then fold, and press to enclose the filling and create half-moons.
 
Place the finished dumpling on the prepared baking sheet. Repeat with the other wrappers, assembling the dumplings and spacing them a good 1/2 inch apart on the baking sheet. Keeping the finished dumplings covered with a dry kitchen towel, form and fill the wrappers from the remaining dough.
 
Once all the dumplings are assembled, they can be covered with plastic wrap and refrigerated for several hours and cooked straight from the fridge. You can freeze on the baking sheet until hard, about an hour, and transfer them to a freezer bag and kept frozen for up to a month. Partially thaw before cooking.

To cook the dumplings, half-fill a large pot with water and bring to a boil over high heat. In the meantime, prepare a serving plate for the dumplings by smearing it with a tablespoon or so of vegetable oil. This will stop dumplings from sticking to the serving plate. Add half the dumplings, gently dropping each one into the water. Nudge the dumplings apart with a wooden spoon to keep them from sticking together and/or to the bottom of the pot. Return the water to a simmer and then lower the heat to maintain the simmer and gently cook: a hard boil can make a dumpling burst. Cook the dumplings for about 8 minutes, or until they float to the surface. Add about 1/2 cup of cold tap water to the pot and wait until dumplings resurface. Add another 1/2 cup of cold water and wait for dumplings again. Do this one more time and dumplings will be ready.
 
Use a slotted spoon to scoop up dumplings allowing excess water to drip back down to the pot before putting on a serving plate. cover the plate with a large inverted bowl to keep dumplings warm.
 
Return water to a boil and cook remaining dumplings. When done, return first batch to hot water for a minute or two to reheat. There is no need to wait for the water to boil.
 
Serve the hot dumplings immediately, placing the plate in the middle of the table, serve with the dipping sauce to which people can help themselves. Beware, there might be hot juice waiting to burst from inside the dumplings. We usually place a dumpling on a chinese porcelain spoon, bite a bit of skin off, let steam off the dumpling, slurp up the juice and then eat the entire dumpling at once...not elegant, I know, but clean and you won't scald your tongue this way.