Hot Plate: Dim Sum Give Me Some

Chinese New Year is this month and every year my family celebrates by going out for Dim Sum. I'm not Chinese, but all of my step-in-laws are. I love Dim Sum and what I love about Chinese New Year is that all of the married people have to give the non-married people -- like me -- money. Props to the Chinese for rewarding us singles on this very month we celebrate love. Unfortunately this year, my family will be going out for a regular Chinese dinner instead of Dim Sum, so I decided to host my own Dim Sum get together with some friends-- on a Thursday. What was I thinking?!?

I guess I was thinking Asian food doesn't typically take long to make, unlike those braised French dishes. The preparation however, is time consuming even if you're just making dinner for four.

On the menu (everything is practically wrapped in a won-ton):

Pork and Shrimp Sui Mai (pronounced Shoo-My) - The filling called for shrimp, ground pork, sesame oil, garlic, green onions, Sherry (but I used Brandy because I didn't have Sherry), egg whites, corn starch and soy sauce. Mince the ingredients together in a food processor and plop a tablespoon of it onto a round wonton wrap, then steam. Here's how it turned out:

SIKE!! That's the picture from Tyler Florence's book where I got the recipe. Here's mine -- in all defense, Safeway only had square wonton wraps which made it very difficult to wrap.

Put the steamer over an inch or two of boiling water in a Wok for 10-12 minutes. It tasted ok. Much better than I expected. I concocted a dipping sauce made of soy sauce, rice wine vinegar and chili sesame oil.

Budah's Vegetable Delight in Ginger Infused Chicken Broth - This dish is a hybrid of two dishes. Budah's Delight is the vegetable version of Sui Mai, except that the wrapping is closed. The filling consists of leeks, carrots, baby bok choy, shitake mushrooms (which I substituted for oyster mushrooms due to Safeway's limited selection). The veggies are roughly chopped and stir fried first in sesame oil, then let cool to room temperature, then put in a food processor. 

Mine turned out really watery. Egg whites and corn starch is suppose to bind the filling, but it was still to runny. Wrapping the darn things was a very messy process. I steamed the delights and served it in the ginger infused chicken broth.

Barbecued Chinese Chicken Lettuce Wraps - This recipe I got from Rachel Ray which I highly recommend. The dish is easy and delicious! Rachel Ray the person kind of annoys me with her bad wardrobe and her acronyms, but I really do like this recipe. Lettuce wraps aren't typically served in Dim Sum, but I have made this before and I had to have something I knew would taste good. 

Hoisin (Chinese barbecue sauce) is what makes this dish very flavorful. You could probably put hoisin on anything to give it that distinct taste associated with China... even put it on bacon maybe?

Because I had a lot of leftover shrimp, I stir fried it with some fancy green and yellow string beans I got at the Grocery Outlet (thanks to Molly).

Lots of prep work required the night before and as usual I was up until 1:00 a.m. -- but the guests were happy, or at least they were nice enough to pretend to like my food.

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

(Happy New Year)