水饺
Now I realise why people hold 水饺making parties; after making them all by myself for the first time today I can't bear to eat them because of the sheer tedium required to produce the prim little dumplings. However I must say that 水饺 brings back happy memories from childhood when my Shanghainese tutor used to make them for me on special occasions, and loads of them would be made :) My wrapping skills still suck >.< Today I decided to make the Chinese-style ones instead of the Japanese gyoza for a change, and for nostalgic reasons. Personally I'm not very familiar with the seasonings used in Chinese cooking so I had to feel my way around this time.
Preparing prawns for cooking can be a pretty disgusting process, especially if one has ever had emotional attachments to pet crustaceans. Each time I wrench off the head of a raw prawn to see its brains ooze out, an accompanying deep-seated sense of revulsion makes me want to lurch. I digress. It is still gross to consider how prawns are de-gutted, and their excrement-filled intestines removed. If you're not careful the shit might just smash up and soil your prawny hands further. De-veining the prawns also carries with it a distinct feeling of violation - reaching in and pulling out someone's main vein just doesn't sound very ethical. Still, I managed to survive, occasionally making crass jokes about the amount of shit that prawns have, with my maid.
Next I had to chop up a MOUNTAIN of cabbage and other vegetables, then mix them up with the prawns and chicken using hands to slap the mixture onto the sides of the bowl, supposedly to ensure springiness. Seasoning was essentially groping in the dark; using my 1337 skills of estimation I happily slopped on copious amounts of soy sauce, Hua Tiao wine and other condiments.
Making the skin was a pain in the a**. I -could- have used the instant gyoza wrappers that live in my freezer, but no I had to choose to be a Luddite and make dough from scratch. I hate making dough. Waiting for gluten to form just needles my impatient self into endless anxiety, and the sticky preliminary stages of dough-making are hardly what one would term quick and mess-free. I even made a batch of brownies while waiting for the gluten to form.
Lastly was the wrapping. Now, I do NOT claim to be an experienced wrapper in any way, so my dumplings are far from what would objectively be considered pretty. If I wasn't feeling so lazy today I would take a picture or two and post it here. Considering that the last time I saw 水饺 being made by a veteran was almost a decade ago, there is no way that I would have been able to master the fine art of wrapping then, much less remember how. So I had to call on the guidance of my mother, who isn't very adept either, partly due to her long blue acrylic nails. Luckily I managed to get the hang of doing it in a couple of attempts, and proceeded to wrap a Great Number (read: 1 plate) of dumplings before exhausting my supply of dough. Being afflicted with shape-memorising dough, I had to roll out dough for every SINGLE dumpling I made. So, the next time I decide to invite people over to eat 水饺 they'll know what they're in for XD I regret to say that not all the dumplings were of uniform size and form, but who cares when their raison d'etre is to be subjected to enthusiastic mastication?
I will never look at dumplings the same way again.
There is a pressing need for me to mention that, due to absent-mindedness I forgot to bring my ipod to school today, and as a result had to endure the inability to be anti-social.
LiveJournal Tags: food