Potstickers, Gyoza or Dumplings

I have made some Dumplings to make it as Potstickers....Whats the difference between Dumplings and Potstickers you may ask??? Arent they the same? Well lets see...

Well first with Chinese it is called Dumplings and with Japanese it is called Gyoza. Dumplings and Gyozas are boiled most of the time instead of panfried and steamed. Dont get me wrong Gyozas can be steamed, panfried and so on...So when it is panfried and steamed to have a somewhat crunchy crust at the bottom it is called Potstickers. And Potstickers, when you bite into it it is moist, soft and crunchy at the same time that makes it very appetizing.

And since we love having it every time we were in a Chinese or Japanese restaurant and sometimes cant get enough of it... decided to look for easy to make Dumplings recipe. Luckily found one that I could bravely say, easy to make.

Above picture are and were (gone in an instant) the Potstikers with vinegar,soysauce and pepper flakes for dippings that I have made and prepared on "ourmeza" for our snacks. And I still have some extras and I've stored them in our freezer. And whenever I am ready to cook them when ever we have some craving for it we could easily have it.

Ingredients:

chopped cabbage (boiled)

chopped green onion

ground pork or chicken or beef or shrimp

sesame oil


sugar

soysauce

minced garlic

minced fresh ginger

gyoza wrappers

extra virgin olive oil...

Procedure:

Mix all of the ingredients. Fill the gyoza wrapper with the mixture. Sealed edges of the wrapper by wetting or dumping it with water. Fold and sealed being that the mixture would be in the center. Add the olive oil in a frying pan. Put gyoza or dumplings in the pan and fry until the bottoms become golden brown. Add water just enough to steam the dumplings in the pan about 1/4 to 1/2 cup of water depends how much you have dumplings in your pan. Cover the pan and steam the gyoza on low heat until the water is gone.

Enjoy!

Chopsuey

"Eat your vegetables!"

I could still recall as if it was just yesterday that my mother was asking me to eat my vegetables. She will go on and on how good it was for me and that I would not get sick as often by eating lots of it. I would normally eat my vegetables but there are some that I would not eat like the "ginisang ampalaya" which now I love eating and the "talbos ng camote" which up to now I can not eat. But one dish that my mother wont have to ask me twice to eat my vegetables is when she prepared chopsuey for lunch or dinner. I love eating them then and I love eating them till now. I dont know why I love it, maybe because of the different colors of the vegetables, the sauce, taste of different vegetables blend well together or perhaps because it has shrimp,chicken,beef or pork. No matter what I would eat it with much "gusto" . It is our family's all the time order also when we eat out in any restaurant. So maybe that's why I love eating it. I love eating it with hot steaming rice and "toyo at calamansi" on the side. Yummm.

Anyway I have cooked it before when I got married but end up having lots of left over and I am the only one eating them. So I stop cooking them till last nite, I tried once again to cook them. As I've said in my earlier post spring came and we hardly eat any kind of red meat. It has been poultry,fish and plenty of green salad for the past few months. So I thought of cooking chopsuey to give it another try. Result? My son ate the carrots and a little bit of broccoli. My husband took it to work for his lunch. So I guess, I've got a better result this time. I'm not going to push it and cook it again sometime soon but I'll be definitely cooking it again in the future.



Ingredients: Mixed vegetables: any combination of broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, snow peas, red bell pepper, onion, garlic, the chicken, pork, beef and shrimp are all optional.

Procedure: In a pan heat oil, saute garlic and onion then chicken till brown. add shrimp till pink then stir fry all the mixed vegetables. add your sauce...combination of soy sauce,cornstarch and a little bit of sugar. Let it simmer till the sauce thickens and vegetables are half cooked.



So chopsuey was prepared on our "meza" for simple and healthy dinner.