Friday, September 3, 2010

Leaf-Wrapped Rice Bundles with Pork and Peanuts

The title says it all, really.  To prepare these dumplings, I soaked some sticky white rice overnight, drained and salted it, divvied it between four banana leaf squares and wrapped them up with some unseasoned ground pork and peanuts.  I didn't even chop the peanuts.  Then I submerged the leaf bundles in boiling water for two hours.  That was it.
Since I did not use bamboo leaves as the recipe suggested, a considerable amount of rice tried to escape, only to encounter boiling water and congeal at the exit.  The rice came out very soft, chewy, and slightly green.  The predominating flavor in these dumplings was salt, even though I had cut down the amount of salt in the recipe.  If I were to make these again (and I don't think I would, since if I were to have pork and rice with peanuts I can think of simpler ways to cook them), I'd cut the salt down even more.
One bonus I discovered (re-discovered?) about dumplings made this way is that they produce very few dirty dishes!

2 comments:

Ruth Lee said...

This really reminds me of the rice bundles they have at Dimsum places. I can't wait for us to go! btw, aren't a lot of dumplings like full of bad carbs? how are you still so skinny? I don't like girls like you>;) JK, I love you:D

Deborah said...

I remember having a lotus leaf bundle at dim sum. It was a meal by itself, but I ate a lot of other dumplings with it anyway. So much food...
I think the idea of dumplings is that they are all pretty small portions, and I cut a lot of the recipes in half, and I'm starting to sub whole grains when I can. But I do like carbs :P