It's been awhile since I've posted a recipe, so I'm excited to share one with you that I created myself. I even kept track of measurements. 😮Well... most.
Before bed one night this week, I watched one of my favorite YouTubers attempt to make egg rolls, and I was instantly inspired to make homemade potstickers. I made them this past NYE but didn't attempt any of the traditional folding techniques, and they came out looking like pierogi. Delicious pierogi, I might add. I did an inventory in my head of the basic ingredients I would need and happily fell asleep, imagining the taste of salty soy and sesame filling.
I don't know what changed my trail of thinking that morning, but I sat down at the kitchen island and Googled "Chicken Pot Pie Potsticker"--Nothing. "Chicken Pot Pie Filled Dumplings"--Still nothing but dumpling soup recipes. The closest recipe I could find to what I was imagining was a fried pot pie ball. Mind you, I've only eaten pot pie maybe twice in my life and have never made it, so I really just wanted to try my hand at making something new for myself.
I thought I invented something amazing today! So wonderful! Something so totally new! I took a bite and realized... I had practically made a bite-sized chicken (turkey) pot pie Hot Pocket. So if you want to spend 3 hours making hand-crafted dumplings of love for your family, or just yourself--they're really good, follow this recipe. If not, please kindly continue to read through and enjoy the pictures, and then go pop a Hot Pocket in the microwave for 2 minutes and save yourself the effort. 😝
Pot Pie Potstickers
This recipe yields 12 potstickers. Feel free to double it for a standard 24.
Takes about 3 hours start to finish. I recommend recruiting a buddy to help!
Ingredients: DOUGH
4.5 oz All Purpose Flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup water
FILLING
2 tsp butter or margarine
1/4 lb ground turkey (I used what I had. Feel free to use whatever protein you'd like. I actually really liked the texture of the ground meat in the potsticker.)
1/4 cup finely diced carrot
1/4 cup finely diced celery
1/4 cup finely diced yellow onion
Splash of white wine
2 tsp All Purpose Flour
1 cup milk (I used 2% because that's what we had, but I'd prefer whole)
1/3 chicken bouillon cube (I prefer Knorr brand)
Salt and pepper for seasoning
COOKING
Olive oil or vegetable oil for pan frying
Small cup or glass of water
1. Add the dough ingredients together and stir. It will look flaky and "shreddy" like the photo above. Continue to gather and combine all of the flour from the bottom of the bowl together with the existing dough. Use your hands to form the dough into a ball.
2. Knead the dough for 10 minutes until more tender and smooth.
3. Roll the dough into a smooth, round ball and place back in the bowl. Cover with plastic wrap or a dish towel and let sit for one hour.
4. Get started on the sauce! If you are using pre-cooked chicken or turkey, you can skip this step. I am browning 1/4 lb of ground turkey. When brown, deglaze the pot with one or two splashes of white wine. Let the wine cook out for a minute or two. Remove from the pot.
5. Heat the butter or margarine for a minute and add your veggies. Once sweated, add the bouillon and combine.
6. Add the meat back into the pot. Salt and pepper to taste.
7. Add first half cup of milk and stir. Wait a few seconds and add the second half of the milk and stir. Bring the heat up and let it come to a slow boil. Keep an eye on your heat level. You don't want the milk to start bubbling and make a mess! Turn the temp down as it starts to boil and thicken.
8. I moved my pot to a smaller burner and let it go on low until the thickness was to my liking. Transfer filling to a heat-proof bowl, and let it come to room temperature. Then, put it in the fridge to cool. We want to work with a more solid, chunky filling while we make the pot stickers. Once they are warm, the filling's "sauce" will expand and be runny again when you take a glorious bite!
9. Back to the dough. After an hour, stick your finger in the dough and make what looks like a doughnut! Stretch carefully into a dough ring. You'll want your ring to be about an inch in thickness. Obviously if you've doubled the recipe, your ring will be bigger.
10. Cut the ring in half, in half again, and then cut each fourth into thirds. Got it? 🤪 You'll want equally sliced dough pieces. Mine makes 12.
11. Use a rolling pin (or a bottle of vinegar like I did... hey, we don't have a lot of kitchen gadgets in this apartment yet) and roll each piece of dough into a 3x3in. circle. You'll want the edges a bit thinner than the middle.
12. Take a small serving of filling and plop it into the middle of the dough circle. If filling is coming out of the edges when you fold/seal it, you know you've added too much. I didn't really measure here and just scooped in what felt right. Use your judgement.
13. Take your finger and trace a circle of water around the dough. Seal it however you'd like. Google dumpling folding technique videos. My first few were not good, but I did better once I got the hang of it. They look so cute!
NOTE: There will be leftover filling that you must selfishly reheat and shovel into your mouth... I mean eat... while the stickers are steaming. Call it a chef's treat.
14. When all of the pot stickers are filled and sealed, add enough olive oil (or vegetable oil) to just coat the pan. Heat the oil for a minute or two on medium-high.
15. Add the stickers and pan-fry for 2 minutes.
16. Watch that they don't get too brown on the bottom. I flipped one over quickly (and dumbly) with my fingers to get a picture of the brownness before steaming.
17. Lower the heat, have a lid prepared, and CAREFULLY pour a little bit of water into the hot pan. The water and oil with sizzle up and try to kill you😵, so immediately put the lid on and let the stickers steam for 3 minutes.
18. After 3 minutes, take off the lid and let them sit in there another minute until all of the water is evaporated. I used tongs to place them on a paper towel to catch and blot the oil.
Voila! Turkey Pot Pie Potstickers. Careful when taking a bite, they are oozy when hot! The fun part about this recipe is that the filling possibilities are endless! What favorite dish can you reimagine and put into a potsticker?