Category: Recipes

Szechuan Wontons in Chili Oil红油抄手

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The classic Szechuan snack is my favorite wontons. It is perfect for a breakfast, lunch or dinner. These slippery suckers are lip smacking. Wear a bib or take your white shirt off for these while you are shoveling these into your mouth.

There are perhaps a dozen of ways to wrap the fillings – but I care for the “Lucky Yuan Bao” 元宝 fold (like Tortellini.). The Italians perhaps got the fold from the Chinese. Now we are borrowing back their stuffed-noodle fold.

Yields 45 wontons,

Wrappers

I think you can buy the wonton wrappers from any Asia markets in the US. In Singapore, they are available at NYUC or Cold Storage. One package comes with either 50 or 100 wrappers.

Make fillings

  • 250g           ground pork
  • 125g           minced shrimp (shrimp needs to be peeled)
  • 1/2 teaspoon    salt
  • 1 teaspoon      corn flour 生粉
  • 1 tablespoon    light soy sauce 生抽

Make the sauce

Method

  1. Peel and minced the shrimp.
  2. In a large bowl, combine ground pork, minced shrimp, salt, corn flour and light soy sauce and mix well.
  3. Now let’s wrap – the Italians may get the tortellini fold from the Chinese. Now we’re borrowing back their stuffed-noodle fold. So just take out one wrapper, add a half tablespoon of fillings. Fold it into half size from the middle, press the two sides of the wrapper together to seal.
  4. Dab a little water on the two corners, then fold one side toward the center. Fold the other side to the center.
  5. Press the two ends together to seal. The filled center will plump up like a belly with the edges framing it like a golden ingot (lucky Yuan Bao,元宝).
  6. Bring a pot of water to boil, add in 6-8 wontons and cook for 5 minutes till they float on the water.
  7. In the meantime, prepare a serving bowl, combine a tablespoon of chili oil, 1/2 teaspoons of minced spring onion, garlic and roasted peanuts with a tablespoon of boiled water from the pot. Mix well.
  8. Drain the wonton and add them in the bowl. Gently toss till the wontons are well-coated.

Tips:

  1. If you are serving these to guests with different levels of heat tolerance, pass the chili oil at the table instead. That way, everyone can get the dose they want.

Sichuan Chili Oil 红油

~ letsplaydough ~ 1 Comment

I happily found that all my friends, regardless of eastern or western  background, all enjoy this garlicky and numbingly spicy chili oil.

This homemade chili oil is amazing on top of noodles, rice or anything else that you want to kick up a notch. It is essential for making Poached Chicken in Sichuan Chili Oil口水鸡

Yields one and half cups,

  • 12g   dried red chili,  roughly chopped干辣椒
  • 2-3 teaspoon   Sichuan peppercorn powder现磨花椒粉, quantities variable depending on the level of your tolerance for the numbingly chili oil (I would go 3 tsp for sure)
  • 1 tablespoon     white sesame seeds白芝麻
  • 1/2 teaspoon   salt
  • 2  garlic cloves, peeled and roughly chopped蒜末
  • 2       spring onions, sliced into small pieces青葱
  • a bit thumb, thinly sliced 姜丝
  • 1 cup     vegetable oil
  • 1 tablespoon    fermented Sichuan soy bean paste 豆瓣酱

Method

  1. Mix dried chili, Sichuan peppercorn powder, white sesame seeds and salt in a bowl.

2. Heat the vegetable oil in a pan in medium heat. Add ginger, garlic and spring onion into the oil and fry the ingredients for about 5 minutes in low heat.

3. Add fermented Sichuan soy bean paste into the oil and fry for 2 to 3 minutes.

4. Turn off the heat and let the oil cool down for 2 minutes

5. Drain the cooked oil by leaving the garlic in the oil. Pour the cooked oil in the bowl (indicated in the step 1)

6. Mix the ingredients well. Done.

Tips

  1. The amount of dried chili is variable. Spiciness of the oil depends on the quantity of Sichuan peppercorn powder you add in.
  2. The chili oil can be stored and leave in the room temperature.