Unwrapping the Dumpling: Wontons
Wontons, potstickers, boiled dumplings. If you think that these are all different names for the same thing, then this is for you! Each of these styles of dumplings have different characteristics and cooking styles and throughout this series that we’re calling Unwrapping the Dumpling, we’re going to take a deeper look into the many types of dumplings out there and what makes them unique.
Next up: Wontons.
Cooking Style
When people think about dumplings, they’re often picturing wontons. In traditional Chinese culture, wontons are made in broth and served with wonton or egg noodles and some vegetables. In other cultures like Shanghai, wontons are made with a sauce that includes spicy chilli oil, soy sauce, and black vinegar. In other cultures, even, wontons are deep fried. We’ve even seen instances where only the wonton skin is deep fried without the filling and used in salads! Wontons are versatile and often a fan favourite.
Wrapper & Folding Technique
If you’ve ever had wontons (especially in soup with noodles), you may have noticed that the wontons themselves and wonton noodles have a tinge of yellow. The reason is because there is a special ingredient in these products: eggs.
Wonton wrappers are usually extremely thin and delicate and they’re square (compared to other dumplings where the wrappers are circular). With the fillings, usually made of pork, in the middle, the wonton wrapper is then folded in a way where the corners don’t meet and are bunched together to create a little sack with jagged edges. If you’ve ever had deep fried wontons, you might have noticed that once it’s been fried up, the edges can have hard corners!
Cooking Instruction
Cooking Time: 15min
The quickest and easiest way to prepare wontons is to serve it in soup. We recommend using a soup base like chicken broth, served with vegetables and noodles.
Bring the water or broth to a boil.
Put the desired amount of wontons into the boiling water or broth.
Let the wontons simmer in the boiling water for about 10 minutes. DO NOT put the lid on the pot, as the wrapper of the wontons is delicate and covering the pot will cause the skin to overcook and break.
With about 5 minutes left, you can put the vegetables into the broth to cook. Noodles can also be put in at this time, but we recommend cooking the noodles in a separate pot and rinsing it with water (as opposed to cooking it all in the same pot) so that it has a better consistency for the soup.
Pour contents into a bowl and serve. Enjoy!
The wontons at Typical Noodles are shrimp wontons and we make them fresh everyday. These wontons are available on limited basis everyday or can be purchased frozen. Our wontons and wonton noodles are made with real eggs freshly cracked into the dough mixture. You can view our wontons and other dumplings here.