餃子/Gyoza/Jiao-zi/Chinese Dumpling

Jiaozi (Chinese Dumpling) is a traditional Chinese Food, and it becomes one of the most widely loved foods in China and the world. Jiao zi is a wonderful food. You can make a variety of Jiao zi just using different and various ingredients mixed together by you. (I still think there is Original way to make Jiao ji) Jiao zi is also fun to make. Making Jiao-zi is a team work. Good to make Jiao zi is the occasion such as family gathering, party with you friend, and make it with you children is so much fun too.

I made 66 Gyoza last night. I think, some of you will find funny about the way I make Jiao-zi… but this is how we make it!! I wish I could learn ‘the real’ jiao-zi sometime! One time, we had international flea market in my city. We are the organizer, and there are many resident foreigners. One Chinese couple was thanking us for organizing the market, and they offer us to make jiao-zi for our lunch. (Jiao-zi which you immerse it in boiling water and eat with soy sauce and 黒酢:kind of vinegar)It was really good.

Ingredients:
A
For the filling♪
2 cups of ground pork
1 Tbsp. sesame oil
Pinch of sugar
1/2 of salt
1/2 tsp. ground white pepper
4 cloves of ground garlic (if you like. Depends of when you make it)
1 tsp. freshly grated ginger

B
1/4 of Chinese cabbage (about 4 cups) (finely chopped)
1 white stem of green onion (about 3/4 cup) (finely chopped)
1 batch of green chive (about 1 cup) (finely chopped)

1. mixed all the ingredients A in a one ball. Stir quick and well until the meat surface become smooth. 2. Add ingredients B in to A, and stir quick and well.

For the dough
(I used prepared dough from store, but its taste really good if you make dough. It’s really easy to make, so please try)
3 cups of hard [strong] wheat flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 ~ 1 1/2 cups of worm water
1 tsp of oil

①Mix the flour and salt. ②Add the water and stir with chopsticks, or fork. ③Add oil and stir well until the dough become a one smooth peace of ball. Then, let it rest on a bowl for about 15 to 20 minutes.
To make dumpling skins:
Break off a piece of the dough the size of your hand fist, and break off a piece of the size of 1 teaspoon. (Also, you can easily roll up dough to shape of a stick. And cut it for about 1 inch long. ) Roll the dough into a ball and then roll out into a 3-inch circle. (This is the difficult part, but you will enjoy it) You may need extra flour to do this work!!
(I will update some picture of this.)

Construction:
Place 3-ince circled dumpling skin in the palm of your hand. Scoop Jiao zi filling with spoon (heaped spoonful) and put it into a middle of a dumpling skin. Seal all edges of dumpling like a picture! (Sorry, it’s hard to explain in English ^^;) This is the where you really enjoy making Jiao zi, because you will see all kinds of shapes and people just need to laugh and smile about it.

You can immerse Jiao-zi in boiling water for 5 to 8 minutes, or you can cook with your frying pan. If you like to cook with your frying pan, there is a construction::: put a frying pan on a fire, and make sure it’s well heated. Put about 2~3 table spoons of oil and when the oil gets hot enough, line up the Jiao-zi into a pan. Leave it for about 3 minutes, put a cup of water into a pan, and put a lid and cook with steam. When the steam water has dry off (water evaporates) it ready to eat. It will take you about 10 minutes. This is how you place it. Put baked side up like the picture.

Eat with soy sauce＋vinegar, if you have black vinegar, its taste really good with Jiao-zi. If you like spicy taste, you can put hot sesame oil. ^^

This is just an aside: The Gyoza (jiao-zi: Chinese Dumpling) Festival is taking place in Utsunomiya City, Tochigi Prefecture in Japan. In 1999, the Gyoza Festival was established as part of the city's publicity campaign. Utsunomiya City boasts the largest gyoza consumption in the country. About 800,000 tourists now visit the city annually to enjoy the specialty. Amazing, huh?? We have interesting places… ^^ Anyway…