Pandagrub Lunar New Year Edition

 This week on pandagrub we are going to be celebrating the Lunar New Year! We are making homemade dumplings. In Korea, dumplings are called mandoo. In Japan, dumplings are called gyoza, and in China, dumplings are called jiaozi.  In our house, we call them mandoo because our main dumpling maker (my mom) is Korean.

 The panda in the picture above is named Pei Pei. Pei Pei is sitting with the ingredients for the dumplings. This recipe is my mom's recipe that she keeps in her head so she doesn't have precise measurements.  She just eyeballs it.  The ingredients for the dumplings are:
1 lb. ground beef or chicken or pork
1 18 oz. container of firm tofu
1/2 head of cabbage (blanched first and then finely chopped)
1 bunch of scallions
2 eggs
2 TBS chopped garlic
salt
pepper

Here is the most important ingredient for the dumplings: 3 10 oz. packages of Nanka Seimen Golden Dragon Gyoza Skin. Make sure you get the round ones. Make sure to defrost.You must use these. These dumpling skins are not too thick but not too thin.

This recipe makes about 150 dumplings. 

My mom likes to put the dumplings on a saran wrap lined baking sheet.  (Make sure that they don't touch each other.)  She then puts the baking sheet in the freezer.  Once the dumplings are frozen solid, you can put them in a plastic ziploc bag and store them in the freezer.  If you don't freeze them individually on the baking sheet first and you just put them straight into the ziploc bag, you will just get a giant ball of frozen dumpling -- and Pei Pei will be very disappointed.  

 Mix  everything but the dumpling skins together. Fill a bowl up with water and then gather your defrosted dumpling skins.

First add about one or two tsp of the dumpling filling into the middle of the dumpling wrapper.

 Put your finger in the water and then spread the water from you fingertip onto the edges of the dumpling skin. Fold the dumpling skin in half and make pleats across the top. These are the kind my mom makes. These are too hard for me.  

 An easier way to fold dumplings is to fold them half way across, and the wet your finger again and put the two edges of the dumpling skin together. (I fold these much better.)

 The dumplings are ready to be frozen!  Make sure they aren't touching each other.

In the picture above is some of the dumplings that have been fried. Pei Pei is ready to eat them.

 Yum! These look good and taste even better!

 Here's Pei Pei jumping in front of a painting that is an abstract version of the Chinese character for the word dragon (龍). My Grandpa painted this picture.

Happy Lunar New Year everyone!

Pies in a Jar

This week on pandagrub, we are going to be making pies in a jar.

 The panda in the picture above is named Tiny. Tiny is sitting with the ingredients to make the pie filling. The ingredients are brown sugar, flour, blueberries, and lemon juice. ( You can use any fruit that you desire.) You will also need canning jars which you can find at Cookin' Stuff. Cookin' Stuff is a cooking supply store in Torrance.

After making and rolling out your pie crust, cut out circles with the canning jar lids. The dough circles will be on the top of the filling. Use mini cookie cutters and cut out shapes in the middle of the dough circles.

Use the left over dough to create dough balls in the bottom of the jar.

Spread the dough ball along the sides of the canning jar.

 Add the fruit filling of the pie into the pie dough. 

Add the top of the pie and place the mini decoration. Make sure to leave a hole in the middle of the top layer of the pie or it will explode.

 After being baked at 375 degrees for 45-60 minutes the pies are ready to be eaten! Tiny just can't wait to eat the pies.

 Yum! Look at the blueberry filling.

For the full pie in a jar recipe click here.

Lots and Lots of Pandas

Lots of people ask me, "how many pandas do you have?" I'm not sure, but here are some pictures of some my pandas.

January 17, 2012 UPDATE:  One of our readers spotted Blossom missing in the photos above!  Blossom was hiding from us at the time of the original post but we found her today!  Here's a photo of her with her pink scarf with some of her bobble head friends and other panda accessories.

Wow, Blossom sure is popular in the panda community.

Deviled Eggs

This week on pandagrub we are going to make deviled eggs. Deviled eggs are my favorite food.

 The panda in the picture above is named Chocolate. In the picture above Chocolate is sitting next to the ingredients for the deviled eggs. The ingredients are: hard boiled eggs, ranch dressing, and a topping of your choice.

 After cutting hard boiled eggs in half, take out the eggs yolks with a fork. Put the yolks in a bowl.

Then add the ranch dressing to the egg yolks, and mash with a fork until smooth.

 After mashing up the egg yolks, put a ziploc bag in a coffee cup and then add the egg yolk mixture. Putting the ziploc bag in the coffee cup helps the egg mixture go to the corner of the ziploc bag.

 Cut a hole in the corner of the bag and pipe the egg yolk into the egg white shells.

After piping the egg yolk into the empty egg white shells, top with your favorite topping and serve. Chocolate is ready to devour the deviled eggs. 

Yum!

Pandagrub made the LA Times!

Anybody read the food section? I know I do. My mom sent in a picture of the peppermint pinwheel cookies to the LA Times. The LA Times picked our photo to be shown in the print edition, it was in today's food section on page E3. The picture was also shown on the online edition. For the online edition picture click here. To get to our photo click #7.  You can also see a color version of this photo on this blog post.

The panda in the picture above is named: Special Panda. That is his  name because he was  my first panda that I got. My grandfather (Yeh Yeh) gave me this panda when I was a baby.

In case you can't get the print edition or read the article from the picture above, here's part of what it says:

"Holiday pinwheels"

This image comes to us from Helen Fong of Manhattan Beach, who made our holiday cookie recipe for peppermint pinwheels with her 9-year-old daughter, Mia. ( Mia has a food blog called PandaGrub.) 

A special thank you to Rene Lynch for putting pandagrub in the LA Times.

Pandagrub Birthday Edition

This week on pandagrub we are going to be celebrating my 10th birthday!

 In the picture above are chocolate brownies that I made for my class at school. ( Notice the special pandagrub stickers.)

The panda in the picture above is named BamBoo. He is sitting next to some homemade lemon sugar cookies which we used to make ice cream sandwiches. The ice cream flavor is chocolate chip. The ice cream sandwiches are for my gymnastics team.

After being packaged, the delicious lemon sugar cookie chocolate chip ice cream sandwiches are ready to head to gymnastics.

Some of the things I got for my birthday were a pandagrub t-shirt, a panda hat, panda bobbleheads, and a panda necklace. It was a good day because I got to spend time with my family.