Asian Pot Stickers for the 4th of July

Asian pot stickers are delicious Asian dumplings filled with spinach, green onions, ginger, and pork. They're a tasty appetizer, or serve them with a side salad for a light meal.

Somehow this holiday weekend has turned into a 3 ring circus of sorts for me. Ever since the BF and I got together the one thing I have been looking forward to is fireworks on the 4 th of July. I should have known better....

Somehow I'm working Saturday til 3, meeting my parents somewhere to ride horses (>.> yeah, not sure bout that one either), rushing home to get to the BF's parents to watch fireworks. Oh, did I mention now my parents are coming to the BFs house with me? Sure why not? This would be when its important to know my rents haven't met the BF's mom yet - yeah, I'm not stressing out at all.

The fun continues into Sunday when I have to be at work for an event we're having and leave quickly from there to get to my fathers for his 4th BBQ.... Aren't we supposed to relax on holiday weekends?

To celebrate our nation's independence, I made Asian pot stickers.

(for those of you who don't know me - that was sarcasm, you'll see a lot of that in these parts).

$Asian pot stickers are delicious Asian dumplings filled with spinach, green onions, ginger, and pork. They're a tasty appetizer, or serve them with a side salad for a light meal. \\ Get the recipe on PassTheSushi.com$

Asian Pot Stickers

made by me with inspirations from myrecipes.com and Ming Tsai.

Ingredients

1 cup chopped spinach
½ cup minced green onions
1 tablespoon low-sodium soy sauce
2 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 ½ teaspoon dark sesame oil
Salt and pepper
1 pound lean ground pork
1 egg
1 pack round wonton wrappers or gyoza skins
1 to 2 tablespoon canola oil, divided
2 cups fat-free, less-sodium chicken broth, divided

Preparation

*I made a tester first then added more of what I wanted - like green onions and ginger. Heck, their pot stickers I didn't over think it.

Give the spinach and green onions a rough chop then pulse them in a food processor until finely chopped. Add the garlic and ginger and pulse until minced. Put the ground pork in the food processor with the soy sauce, sesame oil, egg and salt and pepper. Pulse until everything in mixed together well (you may have to scrape down the sides once or twice).

Place a small amount of filling in a wrapper, line the edges with water and pinch closed. I actually got a small ice cream scoop with level for this part of the gig. It makes portioning the filling so much easier and mess free. Make sure the edges are closed very tightly. Test one before filling all of your wrappers to see if you need to adjust anything to your tastes.

Heat canola oil in a large skillet. Sit pot stickers seam side up in for about 30 seconds, until browned on the bottom. Add 1 cup chicken broth (be careful - the liquid will splatter when added to the pan), cover and cook 5 minutes. Uncover and cook until the liquid evaporates. As the liquid evaporates the bottoms with get nice and crispy again.

If there are too many Asian pot stickers for one meal, freeze the rest before cooking them and prepare as directed at another time. It's a lot of work, so we make them in batches and freeze the rest.

Lucky for me, there is an Asian market right behind my store. They have great wonton wrappers, some produce, a lot of things that I can't spell or pronounce, and every sauce you would ever need - not to mention it's cheaper then normal grocery stores! Win!

3 garlic cloves, minced