A Trio of Dumplings 饺子! 水饺!



Chinese Phrase: 你吃饭了吗？
Have you eaten?

"Anything that walks, swims, crawls, or flies with its back to heaven, is edible."
(Cantonese saying. Source: The Chinese Kitchen by Eileen Yin-Fei Lo)

This past week I learned how to make homemade dumplings (饺子或水饺) three days in a row!  The first night all the international students were invited to one of our teacher’s homes to make dumplings and have dinner. The second night after I taught English to my student her, her mother, grandmother and I all made dumplings together.  The third night I went to my Chinese friend’s house and we ate dumplings her mother had made. These three days I really had 口福 (kou fu)! 口福 is one’s luck to always get nice food.
 Dumplings are a big part of Chinese culture. Every Spring Festival春节, the Chinese New Year, it is tradition to make dumplings. A coin will be placed inside one of the dumplings. The person who eats the dumpling with the coin inside is said to be lucky in the upcoming year.

Making Dumplings at my Teacher's House

Flowers for Wang Zheng for welcoming us into her home.
Step 1: Make the dough for the skin of the dumplings and prepare the filling of the dumpling.

Step 2: Roll out the dough into long slendor pieces then cut them. Take the small pieces make them flat like pizza crust.

 

Step 3: Take the filling and put it into the flattened pieces of dough and seal  the dumpling. Make sure they are all sealed tightly or else the dumpling will come apart while cooking.

The Finished Product!