Dim Sum
Turnip Cakes Crab Rangoon Taro Root Croquettes Bao
Meat Dumplings Wontons Rice Noodles Baked Curry Turnovers
"Dim Sum" means "little heart" or "touch the heart" — probably a good colloquial translation would be "hits the spot." These small "snack" dishes are mostly Cantonese in origin, and can be characterized as bite-size foods meant to be shared at midday over tea with friends.
The best dim sum restaurants in China are cavernous affairs packed with people drinking tea and chatting. They are now rivaled by the best dim sum restaurants in America. Some offer over 100 different items on a busy day. Young girls circulate throughout the floor with carts bearing steamers full of dim sum. There is often a sign on the cart indicating the particular selections available from that server. The diner selects favorite choices, to be served on small plates two or three pieces at a time. The server may mark the table's bill as each dish is delivered, or plates may be counted at meal's end to tally the bill.
Here are some favorites, most of them easy to prepare.
Turnip
Cake
This one is a fairly involved recipe. The result, however, is wonderful!
2 cups Daikon (Asian giant white radish),
diced
2¼ cups Chicken Broth
2 tablespoons Oil
1 cup Chinese Sausage (lop cheung), minced (optional)
¼ cup Scallion, minced
2 cups Cake Flour (all-purpose flour will do)
Boil daikon, oil & broth 15 minutes. Do not drain, but remove 1¼ cup broth
and mix with the flour until smooth, then add remaining liquid and turnip and
scallions. Pour into greased loaf pan. Steam 1 hour or until set. My favorite
way is to use my large restaurant-size steamer, but you can use a large pot and
suspend the loaf pan over the water with stacked plates or anything else that
will serve. Cool thoroughly, slice about ½" thick, and fry until golden
brown on both sides.
8 ounces Cream Cheese
8 ounces Crab Meat, shell picked out
1 Scallion, minced
1 tablespoon Red Onion, minced
1 package (12 ounces) Wonton Wrappers
Combine all filling ingredients thoroughly. Roll a heaping teaspoon of filling into each wonton wrapper exactly as described for meat wontons. Restaurants often make these by just gathering the edges of the wonton skin up vertically into a flower shape, but I find that this shape collects the frying oil to a shocking degree. Deep-fry at 350° until light golden brown. NOTE: you can just fill with plain cream cheese if desired, or cream cheese and onion. I guess you can't call them "Crab Rangoon" then, and it's just stupid to call it "Rangoon," so I will gladly accept suggestions as to a new name for the stripped-down version.
CRISPY TARO TURNOVERS (makes 24 to 26 turnovers)
Taro pastry
4 cups cooked and mashed taro (about 2 pounds raw)
2 tsps. salt
1 tsp. sugar
¼ tsp. white pepper
¼ tsp. 5-spice powder
7 to 8 Tbsps. Potato flour or 4-5 tablespoons Corn Starch
To make pastry: Peel, then slice taro into thin slices. Steam taro for 30-40 minutes until soft. Finely mash and add seasonings. Mix in potato flour last. The mixture should be just stiff enough to handle, but be careful not to overwork it or it will be too mushy.
Filling:
½ pound finely minced pork
Meat marinade:
1/2 tsp. 5-spice powder
1 tsp. sherry
1 tsp. dark soy sauce
1 tsp. cornstarch
½ tsp. sesame oil
½ cup bamboo shoots, finely minced
1 stalk green onion, chopped
2 tsp. oil
¾ tsp. salt
1 ¼ tsp. sugar
1/8 tsp. white pepper
Sauce mixture:
1 tsp. cornstarch
2 tsp. chicken broth or water
2 tsp. sherry
1 cup all-purpose flour
To make filling: Marinate pork in marinade for 15 minutes. Mix sauce. Stir/fry pork with shoots and onions in 2 tsp. oil. Add all other seasonings, then pour in the sauce mix and stir till thickened. Mix well and let chill in the refrigerator for 2 hours.
Wrapping: Take about 2 Tbsp. of the taro mix, roll it into a ball and flatten out to a 3-inch circle. Place 1 Tbsp. filling in center and bring up the opposite ides to seal. Continue till all the pastry and filling is used up. Place turnovers on platter with seam side up.
Deep Frying: Heat 4 cups of oil in a wok over medium high heat. Dredge turnovers in flour and deep/fry until golden on both sides. Serve hot.
Notes: Cooked turnovers can be frozen. To reheat, thaw out to room temperature, then deep/fry again till golden brown.
A lot of restaurants don't bother with cooking and mashing taro anymore. They just buy the taro powder/flour, it's like making mashed potatoes
I guess the only other comment that I would have to add has to do with technique: I usually add a pinch more water to the dough than most recipes indicate. This will make the dough almost nightmareish to work with, so you need a lot of patience, but the result is all that much more impressive. If you add a couple of extra tablespoons or so of water, mix the dough, then chill it for at least 1 hour to firm it up - this will make it easier to work. Once you make the cakes/dumplings, chill them again so you can later easily pick them up and put them in the oil without destroying them - the extra water makes them very delicate.
Why all this hardship??? When you put these in the oil, the extra water causes a more aggressive reaction with the oil. This extra cooking umph causes the dough to partially disintegrate into long intertwined shreds and threads, but the oil freezes them in place part of the way through. The result is a bird's nest-like appearance, almost like messy straw or hair. Makes them all that more impressive looking. One final thing to note though... the addition of extra water makes this dough extremely temprature sensitive. You must have the oil temperature set to at least 350F. If it is even 340F, the dough will not freeze in place as it disintegrates, and the whole thing will fall apart. If your oil is 360F or higher, the shreds and threads will burn.
That's it. Note that this is definitely an optional step. I wouldn't recommend it for a first attempt, but once you are comfortable making taro dumplings/cakes, it is worth a try.
1 Tablespoon Dry Yeast
1/2 Cup Sugar
1 1/4 C Milk -- Warmed
1/3 C Warm Water
2 1/2 C Flour
2 1/2 C Cake Flour
1/2 Teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoons Shortening
16 Pieces White Paper 2 Inches
Knead mixture 5 minutes to form a dough. Cover with a damp cloth and
set dough in a warm place. Allow the dough to rise for 3 hours.
Fill with sweet bean paste, or roast pork filling (below). Steam 15 minutes or
bake until lightly browned.
Cha Shu (Roast Pork) Filling for Bao
6 Oz Chinese Bbq Pork, Diced
1 Tb Oil
2 Ts Water
1/2 Ts Salt
1/2 Ts Sugar
1/2 Ts Thin soy sauce
1 T Oyster sauce
1 T Hoisin sauce
2 Ts Cornstarch mixed with 4 Ts Cold water (For thickening)
Heat wok, add oil and stir-fry pork for 2 minutes.
Add 2 tablespoons water, salt, sugar, soy sauce, oyster sauce and
hoisin sauce. Bring it to a boil.
Prepare thickening by mixing the cornstarch and 4 tablespoons cold
water. Stir into the mixture and cook for 1 minute. Let cool before
using.
After 3 hours, when the dough has risen, shape into rolls about 2
inches in diameter. Cut each roll into 1-1/2 inch pieces.
Shape each piece into a shallow bowl shape.
Put 1 tablespoon filling in the center, close ans twist dough to form
a bun. Put the bun on a 2 inch square of white paper. (This prevents
the bun from becoming soggy while steaming.) Place 8 buns in a pie
pan and allow them to set and rist for 15 minutes in a warm place.
Steam for 25 minutes.
Dumplings
Some dumplings are made with noodle wrappers very much like egg roll wrappers,
but smaller and round. These dumplings are steamed. Others are made with a
wrapper of rice flour dough, and these can be simply steamed or cooked at
"pot stickers," fried on the bottom and steamed to get cooked through.
Steamed Dumplings
1 pk Round dumpling skins *
1/2 lb Prawns
12 Chinese mushrooms, small or
- use canned but squeeze dry
1/2 lb Ground pork
2 Green onion, finely chopped
1 sm Egg
MMMMM-------------------------SEASONING--- -- €
---------------------------
1/2 ts Salt
1 t Sugar
1 tb Sesame oi
2 ts Thin soy sauce
1 t Oyster sauce
1 tb Cornstarch
Shell, devein, wash, and drain prawns. Dice into bits.
Boil mushrooms in water for 10 minutes, rinse, squeeze dry, cut off
and discard stems; then chop into very small pieces.
Combine the pork, mushrooms, prawns, and onion. Put mixture on
chopping board and chop 10 to 15 strokes with cleaver. (Use a sharp
knife if you don't have a cleaver.) Texture, when you're finished,
should be slightly finer than hamburger.
Add "seasoning" and the egg to the pork mixture. Mix well.
To make dumpling, place 1 Tb filling in the center of a dumpling
skin. Then bring all sides of the skin up to cover the meat as much
as possible, without closing. The top of the dumpling is left open.
Cook dumplings by steaming for 30 minutes. Use as many as you need,
with the rest, cool, wrap, freeze. Reheat after thawing by steaming
10 minutes.
Serve with soy sauce, hot sauce, or mustard.
* Dumpling skins are similar to won ton skins, except that they are
round and slightly thinner. You may substitute won ton skins by
merely cutting off the corners to round off the skin.
You'll have to buy these fresh, thick white noodles from a market. About 4" square, they are fragile and require gentle handling. Slip a couple of shrimp or some cooked, minced pork (leftover dumpling filling is perfect) into the center, fold over the right and left sides and you're done! Brush with a little oil to prevent sticking and steam 10-15 minutes, serve lightly drizzled with "noodle sauce" described in the chapter on condiments. At the restaurant, the waitress will pour on a few drops of the sauce when delivering a plate of rice noodles from her cart.
Dim Sum Baked Turnover
Pastry - Wk
Recipe By : Wayne Keyser
Serving Size : 1 Preparation Time :0:00
Categories : Chinese Dim Sum
Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method
-------- ------------ --------------------------------
2 Cups flour
1/2 Teaspoon salt
2/3 Cup lard
1/3 Cup ice water
Combine flour, salt and lard in a bowl. Cut together until it resembles coarse
meal.
Add enough water to make a dough. Shape into a flat cake and chill between wax
paper 15 minutes.
Roll out and shape turnovers as with short pastry.
Fill and bake 20 minutes at 400'.
Dim Sum Baked Turnovers - Curry Filling - Wk
Recipe By : Wayne Keyser
Serving Size : 1 Preparation Time :0:00
Categories : Chinese Dim Sum
Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method
-------- ------------ --------------------------------
1 Teaspoon vegetable oil
1 Pound ground pork
1 Teaspoon dry sherry
1 Teaspoon curry powder
1 1/2 Tablespoons soy sauce
1 1/2 Teaspoons salt
1 1/2 Teaspoons sugar
1 Cup minced onion
1 Cup mashed potatoes
Cook pork in oil, breaking up lumps.
Drain, return to skillet, adding sherry, salt, sugar, soy and curry powder. Set
aside.
Cook onions in a bit of oil, return pork and add potatoes, mixing well.
Cool and use to fill 24 turnovers.
Bake about 15 minutes until golden.
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