Flat-dough items created thus far: egg rolls, 2 kilos of veggie dumplings (yes, i weighed them), two versions of chorizo potstickers, broccoli and cheese agnolotti, red pepper tagliattle, whole wheat tagliatelle, egg noodles for a teriyaki stir-fry, and sweet potato ravioli.
Here's some of the veggie dumplings.
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| contents: radish, celery, parsnip, carrot, leek |
Basically, you want to make a dough that is around 50% hydration and let that set for 20 mins to an hour. I do this by weighing out the dry ingredients, stirring them and making a well in the centre, resetting my scale, then adding the wet ingredients to the well, cutting them in with a bench scraper. when they're pretty well incorporated, i turn the mass out onto the counter, kneading it as little as possible, until they're in a ball. I then roll this out into a log shape, return it to the mixing bowl and let it sit.
For the red pepper pasta, i used a 50/50 mix of pureed red pepper and water. Even though the pepper was pureed, there were still bits in it that limited how thin i could roll the dough. With that in mind, i cut the noodles into tagliatelle instead of spaghetti, as i was worried about tiny bits of pepper clogging the cutter.
Best results would probably be obtained by using a juice instead of a puree. I'm looking forward to trying a squid-ink version.
- 240 g flour
- dash of salt (mix dry ingredients, reset scale)
- two eggs
- add water to the eggs until scale reads 120 g.
- stir together with pastry cutter, fork, or similar.
- let rest for at least 20 mins.
The fastest method is to roll out one long sheet, cut it in the middle, and put spoonfuls of filling at equally-spaced intervals across one segment. Then place the second segment over the first, sealing one side at the top, and work your way across and down, pressing around each spoonful of filling. Make sure to get all the bubbles out as you go; as you work around the filling, leave room for the air to escape.
This is much quicker. However, it works better when the filling is of a consistency that sticks together well, like with the sweet potato ravioli, than one that has more bits (like the dumplings), or has a lot of fluid, juice or oil (the chorizo potstickers). For those two, I find pre-cutting the squares or rounds works better.
Veggie Dumpling:
- carrots, leeks, onions, celery, radish, or whatever veggies you like
- rice wine vinegar
- soy sauce
- sesame oil
- red pepper
- dash sugar (optional)
heat a saucepan, add sesame oil and a dash of red pepper. Add vegetables. Cook very briefly, stirring well. You don't want these cooked much at all, just enough to soften them slightly. They'll finish cooking when you boil/steam/fry the dumplings. Add equal parts soy sauce and vinegar; you don't need a whole lot, and remember that you don't want this mix too wet.
Transfer this to a plate, spreading it out to cool. Pop it in the freezer if necessary; you don't want to be scorching yourself and juggling dumplings if the filling is too hot.
Fill a few rounds at a time, pinching the sides together with your fingers. Carefully transfer them to gently boiling water. If you're going to pan-fry them, I suggest putting a splash of sesame oil and water in a saucepan, adding dumplings, then covering the pan before turning on the heat. as the pan heats, the water evaporates, and then the dumplings fry a little. Credit to Jen for coming up with this method.
If you're not eating these right away, transfer dumplings to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and put them in the freezer - 15-20 minutes, so that they're firm and no longer sticky, before moving them to a ziploc bag or plastic container.
