A New Blogging Event for Me: Recipes to Rival

I know, I know – what was I thinking, joining another food blogging event?  This month marks my first foray into Recipes to Rival, which I decided to join because I have to do something besides bake.  No, really, I do:  my freezer won’t hold any more baked goods, and I’m going through flour at an alarming rate.  I already participate in Tuesdays with Dorie, and the Daring Bakers.

Interestingly enough, my first Recipes to Rival challenge involves . . . dough.  Yep, you read that correctly.  Ah, the irony of life.  Dough, as in homemade potstickers, or dumplings.  So, what can I say about homemade potstickers?  That they are definitely superior to the commercial varieties! I’ve made homemade ones before, but this challenge may render me unable to eat commercial wrappers in the future.  Oh, the work that lies ahead!

Heather, of Randimosity and the Girl, and Temperance of High on the Hog, chose this month’s recipe, and wonderful hostesses that they are, the only requirement was that we use a certain dough, but we could use any filling that we liked.  I chose Alton Brown’s vegetable filling, which is outstanding.  So much so, in fact, that my pork-loving husband prefers this filling to regular pork potstickers.  That, in itself, is an Earth Shattering Event.  I cooked them in a non-stick pan, because I prefer them with a brown bottom than just steamed.

The bottom line is that rolling out all those little buggers is a time consuming, tedious task.  The results are so delicious, however, that I believe you should try it at least once, just so that you know what you’re missing!  In a Chinese cooking class that I took, our teacher explained that one of the secrets was to make sure that the edges of the wrapper are rolled thinly, because it gives the potsticker a more pleasing mouth feel, giving you a better ratio of dough to filling.

A few thoughts about the recipe:  Flavor – delicious.  Dough – sticky and a bit hard to work with, making it virtually impossible properly to “pleat” the dumplings (you’ll find all sorts of wonderful things on Jaden’s blog!).  After reading other posts on this, however, it may be that I hand kneaded the dough, and others had better luck using their stand mixer, which I will use next time.  Amounts –  the dough recipe, based on my experience, makes over 50 dumplings, depending on size, maybe as many as 100.  This is not a recipe that you should tackle when you’re pressed for time, or short on patience.  But, oh, they are so tasty, these little potstickers!  You can find the recipe here, and check out the Recipes to Rival blogroll.

UPDATE 10-2-08:  Some Lessons learned from my experience and that of others:  (1) try using a pasta roller to roll the dough out thinly; (2) plan on filling the wrappers right after you make them; and (3) the dough is very sticky (thus, advice given in #2) so if you stack the wrappers, they may turn into an inseperable blob of dough.  Use parchment and be generous with the flour!  For even more tips on how to make/roll/fill dumplings, in addition to the R2R blog, check out World Foodie Guide, and Eating Out Loud (great tips on using a pasta roller).