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餃子Gyoza

The half-boiled, half-fried dumpling: a thin, round wrapper around a lean, juicy pork-and-cabbage filling, stood in a single row in a hot pan, steamed under a lid in the 120 ml of water, then un-lidded to the crisp flat on the bottom — and served with the dipping sauce on the side, and the crisp, even, deep gold bottom is what the dip is for.

Origin: Japan (a China-imported dumpling, adapted with the pork-and-cabbage filling, the half-fried half-steam cook, and the soy-vinegar dip it is now sold at stalls and homes with)
Difficulty: 3 / 5
Servings: 4
Prep: 40 min (the wrapper dough + 20 min rest)
Cook: ~8 min
Total: ~1 hr (with the dough resting) or ~20 min (with store-bought wrappers)

Technique notes

Gyoza is a dumpling in the thin wrapper family, and the cook is a two-halves thing: the steam half (the filling, inside, done by the water under the lid) and the crisp half (the wrapper, on the bottom, done by the hot pan without the water). The two halves disagree on timing — the steam is 4–5 min under the lid, and the crisp is another 1–2 min without — and on temperature — the pan has to be hot enough that the crisp half happens, but not so hot that the crisp half happens before the steam half does. The whole dish is that pan-heat decision, and the knife work that sets the shape of the fold in that half.

Equipment

A 24–28 cm non-stick pan or a heavy, well-seasoned teppan — enough room for 8–10 gyoza to stand in a single row, and a lid that is a little large so it sits over the edges of the gyoza and traps the steam
A rolling pin and a flat surface for the wrappers, or a set of store-bought gyoza wrappers
A small bowl for the dipping sauce

Ingredients

For the wrappers:
250 g plain flour (all-purpose)
2 g salt
100 ml boiling water — the hot half, for the two-water dough
100 ml cold water
A little more flour for rolling
For the filling:
300 g lean pork mince (minced) — the salt and the fat edges, in the marinate
200 g Napa cabbage, shredded fine and salted (a 2 g of salt, worked in, and then pressed until the water is out) — the water edge, and the thing that keeps the filling from wetting out the wrapper
2 scallions, cut fine
1 clove of garlic, grated
1 cm piece of ginger, grated
1 tsp soy sauce — the salt
1 tsp Shaoxing wine (or a dry sherry) — the depth
1 tsp sesame oil — the fat
1 tsp sugar — the sweet edge
a pinch of white pepper — the top note
For the cook and the dip:
15 ml vegetable oil, for the pan
120 ml water, for the steam — the water that turns to a cloud of steam under the lid and cooks the filling through
40 ml light soy sauce, the salt-and-sweet of the dip
20 ml rice vinegar, the acid of the dip
1 tsp chili crisp or chili oil, for those who want the heat

Method

The wrapper dough, mixed. Whisk the flour and salt. Put the 100 ml of the boiling water in all at once and mix with chopsticks into a shaggy paste — the hot water sets a slurry of some of the starch so the gluten network is weaker, and the sheet stretches thin without fighting back. Add the 100 ml of cold water and work until a shaggy, slightly sticky mass forms. Turn onto a clean surface, knead a few seconds until it's just smooth (you are not trying to develop the gluten hard), and wrap in plastic. Rest 20 min. This is the two-water dough, and it's the same family as the scallion pancake and the boiled dumpling.
The filling, mixed and rested. Squeeze all the water from the shredded cabbage and set it aside. In a bowl, the pork mince, the scallion, the garlic, and the ginger. Add the soy, the Shaoxing, the sesame oil, the sugar, and the white pepper and mix until the paste starts to hold. In a few additions, fold in the squeezed cabbage, and mix until the filling holds a single, even, slightly wet paste — this is the marinate-and- salt together. Wrap and rest 15 min — the marinate and salt together, and the balance of the filling is the salt of the soy, the depth of the Shaoxing, the sweet of the sugar, and the raw edge of the scallion and garlic.
The wrapper, rolled out. Roll the rested dough out into an even cylinder about the thickness of a finger, and cut it into 30 even pieces of about 15–18 g. Roll each one into a round of about 8–9 cm across, with the edges a little thinner than the middle. Keep the unwrapped ones under a damp cloth so they don't dry on the surface. This is the thin-and-flat family of the wrapper logic — the one that stretches thin enough to hold the filling and the balance of the filling and the knife work that sets the shape of the fold all at the same time.
The wrap. Hold a wrapper flat, and a 1 tsp of the filling in the middle (you want the filling to sit in the middle of the wrapper, not the upper half). Fold it over and pinch the middle of the open edge to seal it, and then fold the two ends over into the middle so the gyoza is a loose, half-moon with a pleated top. The pleat is the knife work, and the one that sets the shape of the half-moon and the seal of the thin-and-flat family. (If you use store-bought wrappers, skip steps 1–3 and start here.)
The cook: stand, steam, crisp. Into an unheated pan, the 15 ml of oil, and the gyoza set in a single row (don't let them touch). Bring to a medium heat, and 2–3 min, until the flat is a clean, even, deep gold. (This is the browning half of the pan-heat decision.) In with the 120 ml of the water, immediately (it will hiss and turn to a cloud of steam), on with the lid, and 4–5 min, until the water has fully gone and the steam has cooked the filling through. This is the steam half of the cook, and the steam logic, and the one that sets the balance of the filling against the wrapper without burning it.
The crisp and the dip. Take the lid off, and a 1–2 min more, until the flat is a crisp, slightly darker, even gold and the pan is dry. Tip the gyoza out onto a plate, and the dipping sauce (the 40 ml of light soy, the 20 ml of rice vinegar, and the chili crisp if you want the heat) to the side. The salt-and-sweet of the dip is the salt of the soy against the acid of the vinegar, and it's the balance of the plate against the crisp, even, deep gold flat on the bottom of the gyoza.

Common failures

The filling is wet and the wrapper is a soft, limp mass. The cabbage was not squeezed (step 2), so the water edge of the filling is too high. Squeeze the cabbage until the water is gone, and the filling will hold the wrapper and the wrapper will hold the balance of the filling inside it.
The flat is a soft, pale grey, not a crisp, deep gold. The pan was under-medium (step 5), and the browning half of the pan-heat decision was not there. The flat has to set to a clean, even, deep gold, and that only happens with a pan that is hot enough to set it before the steam takes over.
The filling is under-cooked in the middle. The lid was not on for the full 4–5 min, or the 120 ml of the water went in before the flat had a chance to set. Let the flat get its color first, then the water, then the lid, and the steam does the cook of the filling.
The wrapper tears when you fold it. The wrapper was too thin or too dry, or the filling was too much for the 8–9 cm circle. Use 1 tsp of the filling, not 1.5 tsp, and make sure the wrapper is just thin enough to stretch over the filling, not too thin to hold it.

Variations & substitutions

A plain-veggie version. The same wrapper and the same seal, but the filling is the squeezed cabbage, the scallion, the garlic, the ginger, the soy, and a 1 tsp of the sesame oil and a 1 tsp of the sugar — a clean salt-and-sweet balance without the marinate of the pork.
A "boiled gyoza" cook. Instead of the steam-and-crisp cook (step 5), tip the gyoza directly into a pot of lightly salted, rolling-boil water, and the 3–4 min of the boil that sets the wrapper and the filling at once, without the crisp. A lighter version, and the liquid-bath logic instead of the pan-heat logic.
A "deep-fried gyoza" cook. Instead of the steam-and-crisp cook, the gyoza are deep-fried in the oil at 170 °C for 2–3 min, until the wrapper is an even, deep gold all the way around. A different battering and fry logic, and the one that sets the balance of the filling against the fry.

What to serve with it

This is the dumpling of the section — the thin-and-flat wrapper, the lean, juicy filling, the half-boiled, half-fried cook, and the salt-and-vinegar dip on the side. It pairs with the boiled dumpling (the full, thick-skinned, liquid-bath version of the same family) and the xiao long bao (the thin-and-pinched family doing the hardest job on the list: holding the salt-and-sweet of the filling inside the thin-and-flat wrapper). A clean, simple plate of onigiri or a bowl of miso soup is the "cut" against the crisp, even, deep gold flat on the bottom of the dumpling.

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