Poor abandoned blog.

I’m still here, buried by work stress, but stitching and cooking away.  Here’s what my cross-stitch looked like last week:

And this week:

Last weekend I made mint chocolate brownies, using a divinely inspired recipe from Our Best Bites.  They were eaten before I got a picture, but I spilled flour in the process leaving this enjoyable footprint on the floor:

Spent this weekend making dumplings, which were delicious and it turns out my husband is a master dumpling maker!!

We made two fillings, one vegetarian (but not vegan), which I found on 101 Cookbooks, a great super healthy blog, if that is what you are into.  I improvised the other pork filling and wrote my own recipe, pulled from bits and pieces of other recipes.  Original recipes are not really my thing, so I am pretty impressed with myself when I manage to create a good one.  Here it is (heavily adapted from Gourmet 2004, as posted on Epicurious):

Ingredients:

1 (1-inch) piece peeled fresh ginger, finely chopped

1-2 cloves of garlic, minced

2 tablespoons of light/reduced sodium soy sauce

2/3 bunch green onions, thinly sliced

1 lb ground pork

1 can of water chestnuts (drained), finely chopped

1/2 teaspoon white pepper

1 tablespoon sriracha or other hot sauce

1/2 small white or yellow onion, finely chopped

1-2 packages of wonton wrappers

Preparation

Combine 1 tablespoon soy sauce with ginger and garlic in a small bowl.  Set aside while chopping and combining other ingredients.

Reserve 2 tablespoons green onions for garnish, then finely chop remainder and put in a bowl along with pork, water chestnuts, hot sauce, onion and remaining tablespoon soy sauce. Add garlic and ginger mixture.  Gently knead with your hands in bowl until just combined. Chill, covered, 10+ minutes.

Assemble wontons by laying wrappers on clean counter in a grid.  Put a scant teaspoon of filling in the centre of each wrapper.  Moisten edges with a damp finger.  Fold wrapper in half diagonally, enclosing filling, and pinch edges together to seal, ensuring no air is trapped inside.  Fold one corner into the centre and roll the dumpling into a little package.  Moisten opposite corner to seal if necessary.

Gently drop desired number of dumplings into a 6- to 8-quart pot of boiling water, gently stirring once to prevent sticking, and cook 6 minutes. (Dumplings will float to top while cooking.) Transfer dumplings with a slotted spoon to a serving dish and sprinkle with reserved green onions.

Alternatively, fry dumplings in olive oil, turning once.  (Watch carefully, they cook fast!)

To freeze, line a baking sheet with wax paper.  Lay the dumplings on the sheet, ensuring they do not touch.  Freeze on baking sheet for one hour, then move to a bag or container for longer term freezing.  (This method ensures they do not stick to one another in the freezing process).