If you’ve ever made the mistake of calculating how much you spend on take-out, then this column if for you. We look at some our favorite and most frequent delivery dishes and figure out how to make them at home. This week, we unpack steamed dumplings.

Dim sum is one of my favorite and most frequent delivery orders, and steamed dumpling are always on that list. While they might seem laborious, making steamed dumplings is not that daunting as long as you have some basic ingredients. You can make a big batch and freeze them for future enjoyment, make them specifically to your tastes, and save yourself some serious dough.

The Breakdown

You won’t use all of these ingredients entirely in the making of these dumplings. Since these ingredients can be used in tons of other dishes, you’re actually spending less per dumpling if you do the math. All of these ingredients are available at 99 Ranch Market, Marukai, and other Asian food markets in and around Los Angeles.

Dumpling skins ($3.29)
Water chestnuts ($1.49 for a can)
Soy sauce (I prefer Japanese Kikkoman to other brands, $5.39)
Sesame oil ($5.79)
Black vinegar (made from black sticky rice, should come from Chinkiang, $3.39)
Ginger ($4.00)
Cornstarch ($1.39)

By my rough calculations, each dumpling costs about $0.79 to make, not including your labor of course.

The Filling

Every country has their own style and variety of dumplings. I guess this is sort of a traditional Japanese gyoza meets Singaporean street dumpling? Honestly, I don’t know. It’s just good. Make your filling to your tastes. My kids hate anything green, so I resisted the urge to add any scallions or ramps or leeks or any other alliums. Usually the filling is ground pork. You could substitute that for ground chicken, ground turkey, or even eggplant, shiitake, and shirataki noodles (something I made for my daughter’s vegetarian pre-school potluck). Just be mindful of the fat content and adjust the level of corn starch accordingly. If you don’t like corn starch, you can substitute that with rice or potato starch.

Mix the meat, finely diced ginger, garlic, and water chestnuts. For seasoning, add sesame oil, and a touch of soy sauce, and salt. You can add a touch of white pepper if you like a bit of fragrant zing and funk. Then I usually add a teeny bit of broth or water and the corn starch to stir the whole meat mixture into smooth paste. The starch helps it all bind together. The water chestnuts give the filling texture and crunch.

The Art of Moderation in Stuffing

You could make the dough yourself too, I learned how to in a recent virtual cooking class with my sister. But honestly, it’s faster and easier to just grab the ready-made ones at the store. They always come frozen. Let them defrost naturally. Grab the round ones for these dumplings and have a small bowl of water ready on the side. When you’re ready to make the dumplings, just put about a heaping teaspoon in the middle of the wrapper. Resist the urge to overstuff the dumplings. You don’t want them to pop or rip. You want to see about an inch of space around the filling.

The Folding

To close the dumplings, you’re essentially making a perfectly pleated purse. Trace the edge of the wrapper with a bit of water which acts like glue. Fold the wrapper closed in half, pinch the pocket closed only in the middle. You should have a half circle pocket at this point. Then working your way to the right, you create the pleats by making tiny folds of the FRONT side of the wrapper only, and pinching it shut. The BACK side fo the wrapper remains flat or un-pleated. Then you work your way the other direction doing the same thing.

Once you get the hang of it, it’s almost like a form of meditation. Sometimes I get my kids to help. But more often than not I just put on some music, pour some wine, and pleat like a beast. Often times, you’ll run out of wrappers and have left over filling. You can freeze it, but at my house the freezer is where things go to die, so I like to make little meatballs and I just steam the filling without wrappers. Serve those up with rice or as savory midnight snacks.

You could select to freeze some of the dumplings instead of steaming them immediately. If so, when you’re ready to eat them a few weeks from now, just be sure to steam them directly from frozen. If you let them thaw first, you’ll end up with a goopy icky mess. I learned this lesson the hard way.

The Sauce

While the dumplings are steaming, you can make a simple dipping sauce. I’m a huge fan of Din Tai Fung and their simple dipping sauce which is basically just soy sauce, black vinegar, and ginger. Add a few drops of sesame chili oil if you want that nuttiness and a bit of heat. You could make a thicker Singapore style dipping sauce by adding hoisin and sweet chili and some additional ingredients but I’m a fan of keeping it simple.

The Recipe

Dumpling Filling

1 package of ground meat (pork or chicken)
1 inch of ginger (diced finely)
2 cloves of garlic (diced finely)
1 can of water chestnuts (diced finely)
1 tablespoon of sesame oil
1 teaspoon of soy sauce
1 tablespoon broth or water
1 teaspoon corn starch
1 package of round dumpling wrappers

Dipping Sauce

1/4 c. soy sauce
2 tablespoons black vinegar
1 tablespoon of thinly sliced ginger
A tiny bit of sesame chili oil

Mix the meat, ginger, garlic and water chestnuts in a large bowl. Add the seasoning; soy sauce, sesame oil, and salt. Add the slurry; broth and cornstarch. You can make the slurry separately and mix it in or you can be lazy like me and just put the broth and cornstarch into the meat and mix it all together. Either way, work it slightly till everything is mixed well, but don’t over work. If you overwork it, the filling will be too dense and solid.

Make sure you have a flat dry workspace and get a small bowl of water which you’ll be dipping your fingers into and using as glue to seal the dumpling wrappers. Take a teaspoon and place it in the middle of the circular wrapper. Dip your fingers in the water and trace the edge of the wrapper. Either all the way around, or just on one half of the circle. Fold the wrapper into a semi-circle, and pinch the very top only. Pinch shut to seal. Then work your way to the right, making small pleats by folding the front of the wrapper only. Then make your way left, doing the same thing. You should end up with a perfectly pleated pocket of goodness.

Place the dumplings in a steamer on cabbage leaves or wax paper. Steam for 15 minutes or so until the wrappers become translucent and you can feel that the filling is cooked.

While the dumplings are steaming, mix the soy sauce and black vinegar in a small bowl. Add the sliced ginger and chili sesame oil. Stir and let it sit.

When the dumplings are done, simply serve from the steamer or put them on a plate with the dipping sauce. Sprinkle with cilantro or scallions, or just dig in.

Disclaimer: Unpacking Take-Out is an amateur’s attempt at reverse engineering things that we love to order in. These are approximations of actual recipes. Be advised that Haily is not a pro so don’t be mad if these recipes don’t work out exactly. She documents her food adventures semi-regularly on @theweeknighter.

Steamed Dumplings with a Simple Dipping Sauce