Dumpling Soup

I hope everyone had a wonderful time for Chinese New Year - at least, I know that no matter how bored you were/are, it's still better than mine :P

Anyway, on this cold winter's day, I felt like something simple and soothing. I wasn't feeling too great the night before with an upset tummy so I wanted something soupy. I thought I'd make some dumpling soup. I had mince meat in my fridge that is threatening to go bad if I don't use it soon enough so today's the day! I also made a vegetarian version too, because my partner is a vegetarian. And it tastes really good too, acccording to him.

The soup base is made out of carrots, daikon radish, chinese cabbage, onions, 1 tablespoon of wolfberries or keichi in chinese, 5 dried red dates, 1 aniseed, 1 teaspoon of szechuan peppercorns (or black/white peppercorns), 1 inch knob of ginger, salt & pepper. No meat or bones but with the veges, esp the chinese cabbage, it is enough to "sweeten" the soup into a clear, tasty and healthy broth. I top the soup off with a bit of fried garlic bits and oil so that it rounds up the flavor into a very fragrant soup for later.

And to make an otherwise simple recipe, well, simple, i had to make my own dumpling skin. I didn't have any dumpling skin at hand. And since i had flour and eggs, I thought i might as well make some skins myself. Anyway, feel free to use pre-made dumpling skin if you'd like. You can get wanton skin too if you'd like your dumpling to have a wanton-y, silky feel to it. Read this to know the difference between wanton and dumplings.

Recipe for filling

Meat version:
250g mince pork

pepper

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon soysauce

1 teaspoon sugar

sesame oil

1 tablespoon cornflour

Method:

Mix all the ingredients together and let it sit in the fridge for an hour or until you're ready to useit.

Vegetarian version:

250grams mock mince meat + tofu

1 tablespoon cornflour

1tablespoon soy sauce

1 teaspoon salt

sesame oil

1 teaspoon sugar

pepper

Method:

Mix everything together and store until ready to use.

To make the dumpling, just fill them in and pinch to close all ends. I just use wonton style cos they're easier - as you can see in the picture above.

And here's how they turn out to be when cooked:

And here's how it looks after i take my first tantalizing bite!

This is an very clean sort of comfort food that's easy on your digestive system when you're under the weather. You can add a bit of veggies to it too - i added baby Bok Choy to it.

I think i feel a whole lot better already :)