- Servings: 72
- Prep Time: 12 hours 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 3 hours and 12 minutes
- Total Time: 15 hours and 45 inutes
Ingredients:
| Soup: | |
| 10 cups | Chicken Broth |
| 2½ oz | Smoked Ham, roughly cut into cubes |
| ¾ cup | Coarsely Chopped Green Onions, white parts only |
| 2 | Quarter Sized, ½" thick slices peeled fresh ginger |
| 1 | Whole Dried Shiitake Mushroom |
| 1 | Large Garlic Clove, unpeeled and flattened |
| 1 Tbsp | Soy Sauce |
| 2 tsp | Shaoxing Wine or Sherry |
| 1 Tbsp | Unflavored Gelatin |
| Filling: | |
| 1 lb | Ground Pork |
| ¼ lb | Peeled Deveined Uncooked Shrimp, finely chopped |
| ⅓ cup | Finely Chopped Green Onions, white parts only |
| 3 Tbsp | Sugar |
| 2 Tbsp | Soy Sauce |
| 1 | Large Garlic Clove, peeled and minced |
| ¾ tsp | Salt |
| ½ tsp | Ground Black Pepper |
| ½ tsp | Finely Grated Peeled Fresh Ginger |
| ½ tsp | Shaoxing Wine or Sherry |
| ¼ tsp | Asian Sesame Oil |
| Dumplings: | |
| 75 | 3" Square or Round Dumpling Wrappers |
| 1 | Large Head Napa Cabbage, leaves separated |
Directions:
Soup:
Combine all the soup ingredients, except the gelatin, in large pot over high heat. Bring to boil, spooning off any foam that rises to the surface. Reduce heat to a simmer and simmer, partially covered, for about 2 hours and 30 minutes. Remove the pot from the heat and strain the soup, discarding the solids, to end with a clear broth. Clean the pot of any residue. Return the strained broth to the pot. Raise the heat to high and boil to reduce the broth to about 2 cups. Taste and adjust seasoning with salt and black pepper. Pour 3 tablespoons of water into small bowl and sprinkle gelatin over. Let stand until gelatin softens. Add to hot broth, then stir until the gelatin is totally dissolved. Transfer the liquid to 13 X 9 glass dish. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
Filling:
Combine all filling ingredients in a large bowl and mix with a fork just until blended.
Dumplings:
Remove the set jelled broth from the refrigerator and cut it into 1/3 inch cubes. Line 2 rimmed cookie sheets with parchment paper. Place 1 dumpling wrapper on the work surface. Spoon 1 generous teaspoon of filling onto the center of wrapper, including at least 2 or 3 jellied broth cubes in the package. Lightly brush the edges of the dumpling wrapper with water. Bring 1 corner of the wrapper up around filling, then pleat remaining edges of the wrapper at regular intervals, all around filling until filling is enclosed and wrapper forms a bundle shape with a very small opening at the top. Gather the top edges of wrapper together and twist at top to enclose filling. Place on a baking sheet. Repeat with remaining wrappers and filling. Line each layer of a bamboo steamer basket with cabbage leaves. Place dumplings on cabbage. Add enough water to reach just below the bottom of the bamboo steamer, to the wok and place it over high heat. Or line a metal steamer rack with cabbage leaves and set over water in a large pot. Bring water to a boil. Cover and steam until cooked through, adding more water to wok if the water evaporates too quickly, about 12 minutes. Serve dumplings immediately with a dipping sauce if you like. Bite into the packets, but be careful they are now filled with hot broth.
Helpful Tips:
Twelve hours of the prep time is the time to create the jelled broth. Three hours of the cook time is the time required to make the soup broth, but the actual cook time is 12-15 minutes. The way we were taught in Taiwan to eat the soup buns, without getting a burnt mouth, was to bite a hole in the side of the buns and slowly suck the broth out, then dipping the buns and eating them. Several years ago my son married a gorgeous Taiwanese girl who has beautifully fused her culture into our Italian family. On a trip to Taiwan with her we were introduced to this unusual twist on chicken soup. With her help and lots of research, we discovered the trick to it and were able to come up with this recipe.
Trending Food
