Yesterday, I had my family over to celebrate my mom’s birthday.  Normally when they come over, I cook western food, because that is what I normally cook.  My mom was totally expecting to eat steak or some other grilled meat.  I wanted to surprise her with Chinese food because one, I very rarely cook Chinese food, and two, she loves Chinese food over all other foods.

When I was little, wontons and dumplings played a huge role in my food memories.  My mom would make pot stickers, and shove all sorts of vegetables in them, and in turn, shove all sorts of vegetables into my sister and I.  We often visited my aunt, who liked to make us pork and shrimp wontons.  (I liked my aunt’s wontons a lot better, shhh).  I decided as an ode to my aunt and mom, I would make pork and shrimp wontons, and vegetable and shrimp wontons in a homemade broth.

There are numerous types of dumplings.  But my simple breakdown is that dumplings are made out of thicker skin, and they can be boiled, steamed, and when pan fried, they become guo tie, or pot stickers.  Wontons are made out of thinner skins, and generally served in a soup or deep fried.

I first made a much anticipated trip to the Asian grocery store.  I normally go to a Korean store, but this time, I decided to go to a Chinese store.  I now know not to go there on Friday mornings.  It usually gets pretty crowded in that area, so I went in the morning to avoid the crowds and traffic.  When I arrived, I was surprised to see a long line of huge vans in front of the shopping center.  Apparently, the Chinese senior centers in the area take their participants to that store for grocery shopping.  Don’t get me wrong, I was actually very pleased to see that.  I used to work at an adult day center, and for many of the folks, the few hours they spend at their day centers are the only times they get to socialize and get out of their homes.  But my dreams of leisurely spending my morning browsing and discovering were pretty much destroyed the moment I saw those vans.

Man, those old folks were rough!  Mind you, this is a large grocery store, and it was just packed with old folks.  Just getting a shopping cart and entering the store was an obstacle.  Once I managed to get into the store, it was this ridiculously funny yet frustrating scene of bumper carts.  Those folks were causing serious traffic jams by driving too slow, driving on both sides of the aisles, parking in the middle of aisles to chat, cutting each other off, and crashing into things.  I got my shit as fast as I could, and got the hell out of there.

Back to the subject, the dinner was on Sunday.  I made my broth on Friday, wonton fillings on Saturday, and made the wontons on Sunday.

Important note.  I sort of forgot that dinner was only for 6 people.  I prepared enough food for…maybe 16 people.  What I am about to share with you is perfect for a wonton making party.  Or if you are going into hibernation mode, you can stock up on frozen wontons for the cold hard days when all you need is a bowl of steaming wonton soup.

I will break this down into 2 parts.  First, I will show you how I make my tonkotsu style broth.  Then, I will show you how to make the two kinds of wontons.