Gyoza to share

These made about 40 gyoza, with left overs. The cost before extra flavours was about £3.70. Unrushed prep took just over an hour, cooking takes less than ten minutes.

For the dough:

300g of plain wheat flour, ASDA ( 45p / kg )
200g of hot water

This was measured out into a mixing on a set of digital scales, ( 200 g of water is roughly 200 ml ). Then water and flour were mixed, first with a spatula then rolled into a ball with clean hands.

Tip: Lightly covering your hands in flour first, helps to stop the dough sticking too badly to your skin.

This was left to rest on the side in cling film, but the fridge is fine.

For the filling:

Pork & Beef mince, ASDA Smartprice ( £ 1.81 / 500 g )
Soya Mince, Tesco Wholefoods (£ 1.90 / 375 g ) ( optional ) 
Three onions, ASDA ( 70 p / kg )
Water

Really this can be anything you like or have in the fridge or cupboard. I made rather alot of filling. Which is fine because my left over mix will not go to waste, but you could happily half the ingredients.

Into the mixing bowl went all the meat, roughly a third of the bag of Soya Mince, three onions chopped as small as I could manage and roughly two tablespoons of water. I squidged the whole lot together with my hands.

At this point any other flavours should be added.

For 'dough glue':

A heaped teaspoon of flour
Some water

Other options, if easily to hand, could be used to help the parcels stick together; egg white, milk, corn starch... But a mixture of flour and water is cheap and easy. The flour won't dissolve, so just re-stir this as you go.

To make the parcels:

The dough was rolled out (with a floured rolling pin on a flowered surface), to about a 3 mm thickness, and circles pressed out with a drinking glass. Extra dough can be re-rolled immediately to 

form more circles.

A small teaspoon of the filling was placed in the circles. With a pastry brush ( or clean finger ), draw gently around the edges of the dough. 

Each Gyoza was folded up like a Cornish Pastie and pinched around the edges to seal.

These parcels can then be refrigerated or frozen and cooked for snacks as wanted later in the week.

To cook:

Place in a hot frying pan with a tiny amount of oil for 2-3 minutes standing up, then 2 minutes on each side.

Extras

We decided to split our filling into quarters before adding spices - to appease the pickier eaters. These ingredients were added to each quarter of the filling mix:

1. Just as described above ( still delicious ) 
2. Garlic, Spring onion, Chives, Worcester Sauce
3. Garlic, Turmeric, Ginger and Fennel seeds
4. Three Green Chillies, Garlic, Chilli flakes, Chilli powder, a little oil

The filling can be adapted to almost anything.

In China these are a type of Jiaozi which might be boiled, steamed or fried then served with a dipping sauce.  As Japanese Gyoza they can be fried or steamed then served with soy sauce. In America they are called pot-stickers. In Poland with cabbage added to the filling, and sour cream on the side these are Pierogi. With similar dishes in most of eastern Europe. Pierogi can even be made with sweet filling. 

To make it even cheaper:

The dough was really simple and cheap to make, so various ingredients can be added to make the filling go further, depending on what is available or reduced in your shops. Would also be a handy way to parcel left overs into something appetising. 

The meat in the filling has been made to stretch further with Soya Mince. The mince I've bought is dry, so remember the more you add, the more liquid is needed. You can also add more onion, celery chopped really finely, chopped cabbage and leaks. I've used meat in these dumplings, but there is no reason why the recipe could not be completely vegan, vegetarian.

I really can't emphasize how adaptable this is.