We call it Gyoza they call it Potsticker

Today I want to share with you one of my family's favorite dish! Its called Gyoza.  Chinese restaurant calls it Potstickers and Korean version is called Mondu.  In Japan the filling is made of veggies and ground meat of your choice.

what you'll need:

1 package Gyoza Wrapper
1/2 pound ground meat (beef, pork, chicken, shrimp or any combination of your choice)
1/4 head cabbage
1tsp Salt (for cabbage)
1/3 tsp salt (for meat)
1 tsp grated garlic or garlic paste
1-1/2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp sake (optional)
pepper

Here is some of Gyoza wrapper available..







Note: the picture shows double or triple the recipe because my family LOVES them, I make tons and freeze them.  So don't be alarmed if your batch looks small!

1. Add 1/3 tsp salt, garlic, soy and sake if using and couple of dashes of pepper to the meat and knead well and set aside.

2. Cut cabbage into pieces and wash it well

 3. Drain well

 4. finely mince the cabbage, I use food processor because its much easier to do than by hand.

 5. they should be this fine.. transfer the cabbage to a bowl, then add salt and mix well.  Salt will cause water to come out of the cabbage keep mixing the cabbage to encourage the water to discharge. (maybe about 15mins)

6. Use a cheese cloth or fine mesh sieve, squeeze the water out of the cabbage as much as you can.  the cabbage should look like this..

 7. add the dry cabbage to the meat and knead well

 8. when they are incorporated well it should look like this

9. Now get the wrapper, a spoon and bowl of water ready to stuff the wrapper

 10. take a wrapper, use your finger and wet around the wrapper, take about round teaspoonful on the center of the wrapper.

11. Fold

 12, fold just the one side and press to the unfolded side and continue so you'll have several fold

 Like this

 it should be this moon shape but if you want to use a potsticker mold feel free to do so but I think once you get it its really easy and faster than a mold.

Here is a video, maybe it'll be easier to see how its folded

When its done we cook! or freeze them at this time.  I have a deep freezer in the garage, so I put a tray like this in a freezer for about and hour to quickly freeze them individually, then I wrap them up and freeze them until I'm ready to eat them. why do I freeze them individually? that way they don't stick to each other!

Cooking! its easier to use a non stick pan with cover, you'll also need veggie or canola oil AND sesame oil, oh and lets not forget some water.

Heat pan, when its hot add about 1 tbsp of canola or veggie oil, add gyoza like the picture

add 2/3 to 1 cup of water depending on the size of your pan, water should cover about 1/4 of the gyoza, cover and steam until all the water is gone.  about 4-5 mins

When the water is gone, take the cover off and add  about 1/2Tbsp oil to the pan, and swirl the pan to let the sesame oil spread around. maybe 3-5 min again depending on the size of your pan.  when its done you should hear the crackling sound of the gyoza. be very careful not to burn the gyoza, you want the bottom to be golden brown not chard.



When done, use a spatula to remove them. Yum

Now the sauce.  You can buy the sauce at your local Asian market (Sauce for gyoza) but you can make them simply by adding

4Tbsp Soy Sauce　　　
4 Tbsp Rice wine vinegar
1-4 tsp Sugar (depending on how sweet you want it)
sesame oil or Rayu (spicy chili oil) drizzle.. you don't need a whole lot. Rayu will make your sauce spicy.  I usually make the base with out the oil then let each person control the Rayu since my husband loves spicy, he puts lots, I like normal spicy so I put a little, my little one do not like spicy so I put couple of drips of sesame oil in his sauce so he don't feel left out.

enjoy!