Dim Sum We

We recently visited a restaurant in Nottingham called Man's which serves traditional Chinese Food. It mixed the bizarre, battered crunch of chicken feet with heaps of real noodles, fried turnip squares and the famous Dim Sum. It was a trip that inspired me during a weekend of downtime in October to make some Dim Sum of my own. Here's how it's done.

The night before I had experienced cultural delights with my fellow cricket team mates at the local curry house for our end of season night out. I realised it was time to step out of my traditional weekend cooking dishes of the last couple of weeks to make the Dim Sum.

The ingredients used were:

For the pastry:

• 200 grams of Gluten Free Rice Flour.
• 8 tablespoons of cold water. 

For the filling:

• 200 grams of cooked prawns. 
• 200 grams of Bamboo pieces.
• One home grown Cayenne Pepper sliced thinly. 

For the dip:

• Three tablespoons of Soy Sauce.
• Three tablespoons of Sesame Oil.
• Three tablespoons of Rice Vinegar. 

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So to the method, it goes like this:

1. Slice the Cayenee Pepper, Prawns and Bamboo thinly and fry them lightly in Sunflower Oil for ten minutes.

2. Make the dough by gradually stirring the Rice Flour and water together until the mixture is soft enough to knead together without it breaking up. 

3. When the dough is soft, pliable but not too sticky, roll it out onto the worktop until it forms a wide and flat circle. 

4. Cut the dough into pieces and wrap it round clumps of the Prawn Mixture to create dumplings the size of golf balls.

5. Mix the Soy Sauce, Sesame Oil and Rice Vinegar together in a small serving bowl.

6. Steam the dumplings for five minutes prior to serving.

For the authentic dining experience this Dim Sum dish is best sampled by using chopsticks to dip the dumplings into the bitterly savoury dip while the pastry makes the meal surprisingly filling.