36. Won ton soup (folding, boiling and serving)

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Continued from yesterday's post on Chinese wontons . Hope you are not tired of reading about wonton soup Northeast style… we are only half way through. :) Fun ? :)

Folding the wontons

I really should call it folding, it is different to wrapping the dumplings . :)) --- Place the filling in the middle, and fold up the three ‘corners’. The filling of each wonton is not supposed to be too full, otherwise it is going to be difficult to ‘close’. So, it is not only the wonton that will fill up your stomach, but also the soup -- nice soup base is very important.

1) Take one wonton pastry sheet, and place it on the palm with one corner facing you.

2) Place an adaptable portion of the filling in the middle of the triangle pastry sheet. (I prefer to use a table knife or a long coffee spoon. This helps me getting the amount right, and place the fillings correctly.)

3) Fold up the corner which was facing you, ‘ceil’ well the filling.

4) Use both hands to hold the other two corners, overlap them underneath the ‘filling’.

---- Done. (Sorry, I could not take the picture well during the process. The one on the left is the finished wonton facing up, the one on the right is the wonton facing down.)

Again, before you place the prepared wonton on the plate or, like me, on the bamboo board, dust enough plain flour to prevent the stickiness.

Making the soup and boiling the wonton

In Northern Chinese cuisine, the wonton soup is normally clear soup, often with some dried seaweed in (zi cai).

It is different to those dark green ‘thicker’ sea leaves (normally we use in the salad dish), this seaweed is lighter, very thin. Long time ago, with my good friend Zhenya, we saw somewhere it was called ‘black mess’ --- we really laughed hard.

But this seaweed is different to the ones used in Japanese or Korean cuisine. In Northeast cuisine, they are in original formal (not toasted), sold dried in ‘block’, and normally in dark purple colour (sometimes dark green colour), so it is also called ‘Zicai’ as ‘purple food’. In the North of China, it is cooked in the soup, to which it gives a fresh ‘sea’ touch. :) But in this recipe, it is optional.

1) In a heated wok, pour in 3-4 tablespoons of oil, (I made for 2 people, with some leftovers).

2) When the oil is heated, add the chopped spring onion in, and 1/2 teaspoon of ground sichuan peppercorn.

3) When the spring onion is well cooked (the smell fully comes out), pour in 3-4 big bowls of water.

4) When the water is boiling, put prepared wonton in the wok, and bring the water to boil again.

5) Meanwhile, add 1 tablespoon of salt, 2 tablespoon of light soy sauce.

6) When the body of the wonton is popping and floating to the surface, tear some dried seaweed into the soup. (Don’t leave the seaweed too long in the boiling soup, otherwise it will ‘disappear’ in the soup -- it can be cooked very quickly).

Turn off the fire, add in drops sesame oil (optional), and take the wonton with plenty soup into a soup bowl.

---- Almost there!! :))

Serving

I like to put some chopped coriander leaves on the top of the soup to give it a fresh fragrance. I also like to have some old vinegar in the soup and spread some ground white pepper. (Try it, probably you are just like me --- the taste is good.) If you like it spicy, pour in some chilli oil. :))

Normally wonton soup is served with a spoon, … no chopsticks, it is difficult to ‘pick up’ the soup liquid. :))

36.Won ton and wonton soup!! I (The pastry sheet and fillings)

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For your weekend recipe --- Northeast Chinese wonton!

About Wontons and Wonton Soup

To be honest, before I came to England, I never thought Wonton soup was so well known, and then, I realized that I never knew wonton could be so different in different regions of China.:))) Compare Northeast wonton to Cantonese ones, the pastry, the filling, the soup base and the way of making them are all different.

Actually, where should I start? Probably, the name? --- in North East China, wontons are called l hun tun , without need to stress ‘soup’, ‘hun tun’ already refers ‘wonton’ with soup. If you order ‘wonton’ in a restaurant in Northern China, you might not be understood at all.

‘Hun tun’ is extremely popular in Northern China, especially during the cold winter. In the past 20 years, in some small restaurants, it is served as part of the breakfast. In fact, I had it many times for breakfast during my university years. But as a homemade food, my mom or my auntie used to cook Hun tun for dinner during the week days. (Because everyone has their own bowl of huntun, it is not good for ‘sharing’ in a weekend family gathering.)

The pastry sheet and the fillings are very similar to Northeast dumplings, even if you want to change the ideas of making one or the other during the process of making, you can just do a simple switch.:) The shape of the Northeast ‘wonton’ looks like ‘Yuan bao’ -- an old Chinese money form, and these ‘wontons’ can only be boiled with soup, while Cantonese wonton with ‘prawns fillings’ can be fried.

In North East China, Wonton soup is served in a big bowl, with approximately 15 wontons (or more) along with the soup, as a main meal. Normally you don’t need any other dishes on the table, or just some pickles or small salad (liang cai) plate. While in Cantonese cuisine, it is served in a much smaller portion, probably around 4 -6 in one portion in a bowl --- as a side dish, never as a main plate.

Have I mentioned that Northeast food is also famous for the size of the portions? :)) In most of the restaurants in the region, (or our dining table), the plates or bowls are normally much bigger, thus the portions. :)) So when we went to South China, I was always worried to fill up my big stomach.

Ok, let me introduce this ‘huntun’ of Northeast version -- a different ‘wonton’, hope you also like it :))

By the way, the most popular fillings of wonton in Northeast are beef mince (with different vegetables) or prawns with eggs and garlic chives. For example, the fillings in my previous postings for Hezi , dumplings all can be used for wonton. Same as dumplings’ fillings, there are also many vegetarian options. In this posting, I did another filling “beef with black fungus’ (Niu rou mu re). Apart from the fillings, the way making the pastry sheet, wrapping, and boiling is all the same.

The recipe: Chinese wonton soup

Ingredients

Plain flour (for pastry sheet)

Beef mince, Mu re (black fungus), spring onion, five spice powder, (or spiced water), salt, oil, sesame oil, light soy sauce, ground sichuan peppercorn, ground white pepper (optional), vinegar (optional), vegetable/mushroom/chicken essence or msg (optional).

Preparing the pastry sheet

1) Making the dough is exactly same as making the dumpling dough .


2) Divide the dough into a few smaller portions, and shape the small dough into a round shape, press down.

3) Use rolling pin roll the round dough into a big flat thin sheet.

4) Divide the ‘sheet’ into every around 8-10cm width strip.

5) You can dust some dry flour, overlapping them for cutting, or just cutting it like that --- into triangle shape, it is ideal if three edges of the ‘triangle’ are at the same length, but it is not necessary.

- Keep on doing the rest of the doughs, but make sure that you have dusted enough dried flour in between the sheet to prevent them ‘sticking’ together.

Preparing the filling: (Beef mince with black fungus)

1) Soak a handful dried black fungus in hot water for over 30 minutes. Then rinse and fine chop it into smallest pieces possible.

2) Fine chop 2 whole spring onions.


3) Put the beef mince, chopped spring onions and black fungus together in a mix bowl.
Add in 1 teaspoon of salt (flat spoon), 2 tablespoons of light soy sauce, 3 tablespoons of oil (if you are using extra lean mince, add a bit more oil), 1 tablespoon of sesame oil, 2/3 teaspoon of five spice powder (or 2 tablespoons of spiced water ), 2/3 teaspoon of vegetable/mushroom/chicken essence or msg (optional).

Mix everything together.

---- Here the filling is ready.

(To be continued for the folding, making the soup and serving tomorrow. Sorry, otherwise, it will be too long).