You can cook dumplings deliciously in a saucepan, oven, or slow cooker, but it’s best to fry them in a frying pan. The dish has a lot of advantages. It's fast, which busy housewives like. You can use leftover dumplings cooked the day before but not eaten. Store-bought frozen ones and freshly made homemade raw ones will be used. To properly fry dumplings, there is no need to graduate from a culinary college or surf the Internet. Everything is prepared quickly and easily, in one, two, three times. Interestingly, the Japanese were the first to cook dumplings in a frying pan; they call the dish “gyoza”.
Both adults and children like the dish, and those who haven’t tried it are missing out on a lot. You can simply fry semi-finished products, but if you try a little and learn the recipes, you will surprise your household with delicious dishes. Because dumplings can be fried with onions, garlic, sour cream, mayonnaise, soy sauce, and cheese.
The classic way to fry dumplings in a frying pan
The classics of the genre are boiled and fried dumplings, and also real fried ones, that is, frozen semi-finished products fried in oil with a crust.
The first method is tasty and more delicate. To fry ready-made dumplings, it is not at all necessary to boil a fresh portion. Leftover dumplings from yesterday are good, the only condition is that if you cooked them and left them the next day, do not forget to immediately remove them from the broth and let the water drain.
However, freshly cooked dumplings fried in butter produce a distinct dumpling flavor. Do not spare the bay leaf and roots when cooking, strain the water well and place the finished product in a frying pan with very hot oil. Sprinkle with your favorite herbs and seasonings, let the remaining liquid evaporate. At the end you will get the most delicate, appetizing fried crust, high in calories, but so tasty!
Frying in oil and water
The second frying method is for raw dumplings. It is very important to do everything correctly here, because a mistake in frying dumplings can be irreparable - they will either burn instantly, remaining raw inside, or stick together and turn into an incomprehensible mass.
The correct way to fry dumplings is this:
- Prepare a pack of frozen dumplings. Important: If you take a large number of semi-finished products, then use a frying pan with a larger diameter. It is important that the oil quickly coats the dumplings before they stick together and melt!
- Pour a little vegetable oil into a hot frying pan. Don't pour so much that you end up with fried dumplings. With strong heating and fast frying, they will not have time to fry, but they can burn quickly.
- Place the dumplings in the oil heated to high heat and immediately stir them, dousing them with oil.
- Cover with a lid and let one side brown over fairly high heat.
- Remove the lid, turn the dumplings over to the other side and brown them too.
- At the same time, you can salt the dish and sprinkle it with some spices, seasonings, pepper, and finally - whoever likes what.
- When all the barrels of dumplings are appetizingly fried, take a glass of water and quickly pour it into the frying pan - the dumplings should be half covered with water. To avoid splashing of oil, at this moment it is better to cover the frying pan with a lid, which should be removed when the vigorous boiling stops.
- Next, turn up the heat as high as possible and fry the dumplings without a lid until the water boils away.
- As soon as they begin to stick a little to the pan and the liquid has evaporated, the dish is ready! The dumplings are fried, covered with a wonderful buttery crust, juicy inside. Can be served with sour cream and sauces.
Mistake No. 1. Only from the freezer
Frozen dumplings can be fried; you don’t need to wait for them to defrost. But still, before cooking, it is better to take them out of the freezer and lay them out on a board. Leave for 10-15 minutes until they become slightly soft. Then the dumplings will be fried evenly and will not stick to the pan.
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Breaded fried dumplings
Pan-fried dumplings can also be cooked in a crispy breadcrumb crust. This recipe is similar to the previous one. The only difference is that it is better to keep the dumplings a little warm to thaw.
In the meantime, we do this:
- Beat 3 eggs with half a glass of milk (this is lezon);
- prepare fresh breadcrumbs;
- soak the defrosted dumplings in the lezone, dip them in breadcrumbs and place them in a medium-heated frying pan with oil;
- turn on low heat and fry without a lid for 10 minutes;
- Turn the dumplings over and fry again until golden brown. The dumplings are ready!
Important: Spices are usually added to this recipe to improve the taste of the products. This can be done immediately when preparing lezon by adding Adyghe salt with spices, pepper, curry or other seasonings to the milk and eggs. You can sprinkle the dumplings with spices when turning them over.
How to fry dumplings with cheese?
Do you know how to make fried dumplings with cheese? You can simply sprinkle the fried dumplings with grated cheese and simmer a little in an open frying pan. It turns out very tasty if you add a little finely grated Parmesan or other hard cheese to the breadcrumbs (see previous recipe). After this, roll the dumplings dipped in the egg-milk mixture in cheese breading and fry in the usual way.
There is another method that produces very tasty, filling dumplings with a golden-brown cheese crust.
For this you will need:
- dumplings - half a kilo;
- onion - 1 pc.;
- cheese - 150 g;
- sour cream and mayonnaise - a glass each;
- pepper and salt to taste;
- vegetable oil for frying dumplings;
- greenery.
Dumplings fried in a frying pan should be poured with sauce prepared as follows:
- Finely chop the onion, fry lightly in vegetable oil;
- Pour sour cream and mayonnaise into the sauté and boil;
- grease a baking sheet with vegetable oil, place fried dumplings, pour sour cream and mayonnaise sauce over them, grate cheese on top;
- put in the oven for about ten minutes to bake a nice crust. Sprinkle the finished dish with herbs.
You can also bake frozen dumplings this way. In this case, they are simply placed on a baking sheet, poured with sour cream and mayonnaise sauce and the cooking time is increased to 40 minutes.
Mistake #4: Closing the lid
Condensation collects under the closed lid. Moreover, if the dumplings are frozen, then there will be a lot of it. If water gets into the heated oil, there is a risk that the pan will “spit” with splashes.
In addition, if you close the dumplings with a lid, you will not get a beautiful crust; it will be soft.
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Dumplings in a slow cooker
This option is good because the oil will not splatter, and much less oil itself will be required than with regular frying in a frying pan.
It's very simple: place dumplings in a greased bowl. Set the “Baking” mode. Cooking time: 40 minutes. Fry one side for the first 20 minutes, then turn the dumplings over and fry until the end.
Fried dumplings in a slow cooker will be low-fat, so they can be seasoned with rich sour cream sauce.
Mistake #2: Hot frying pan
A common mistake when frying frozen foods. If you heat a frying pan and oil on it very high, and then throw frozen food onto it, there will be a small explosion and even a possible fire. The same thing will happen if you drop water on hot oil: the oil will begin to splash in different directions and may ignite. Therefore, for safety reasons, it is better to heat the frying pan over medium heat and not overheat; the oil should not smoke.
If you fry non-frozen dumplings, it is still better not to heat the oil and frying pan. The dumplings run the risk of turning into charcoal on the outside and remaining raw on the inside.
Recipe with onions and garlic
The taste of fried dumplings can be enriched by adding a little garlic and onion to them. This can be done in two ways: fry a large onion cut into half rings in butter or vegetable oil, then put frozen dumplings in the onion, quickly mix them and leave to fry as described above. At the end add the chopped garlic clove. In this case, the onion turns out softer and boiled.
You can first fry the dumplings, and then separately chop a little lard with layers of meat or bacon and, after melting the fat, fry the onions cut into half rings on it. Place the onion and bacon, well fried, on the prepared dumplings, crush a clove of garlic in a garlic press and add to the onion. Simmer everything together a little so that the dumplings absorb the aroma of bacon, onion and garlic. The result is a very rich taste, the dish becomes extremely appetizing and high in calories.
How to deliciously fry store-bought dumplings in spicy sauce with garlic
The recipe will help you out a lot if store-bought dumplings are disappointing and turn out to be terribly tasteless.
You will need:
- Frozen dumplings – 0.5 kg.
- Sunflower oil – 3 large spoons.
- Soy sauce – 4 large spoons.
- Hot chili sauce - spoon.
- Garlic – 3 cloves.
- Water - a glass.
Step by step recipe:
Pour fat into the pan. Don’t be sorry, it should completely cover the bottom. Reheat. Crush the garlic with a press and place in a frying pan.
After a minute, send the pieces to fry. Stir well immediately so that the semi-finished products are saturated with garlic aroma.
Pour in soy sauce, hot chili, mix again.
Pour in water.
Wait for the sauce to boil, then cover the pan with a lid. Fry until the dumplings are cooked through and most of the sauce has evaporated.
Dumplings with vegetables
Absolutely any vegetables are suitable for this delicious dish. You can even use a ready-made frozen mixture. An excellent option is a combination of carrots, onions, bell peppers, Brussels sprouts and cauliflower. In the absence of a complex composition of vegetables, it is quite possible to get by with the usual combination of carrots, onions and tomato paste.
Whatever the set is, everything is done the same way:
- chop vegetables, grate carrots;
- fry them in butter or vegetable oil;
- fry the dumplings separately as described above;
- put the vegetables on top of the dumplings and pour in the tomato paste diluted in water, simmer a little;
- sprinkle the finished dish with chopped parsley.
Proportions: for half a kilo of frozen dumplings, take 1 carrot, 1 onion, a couple of peppers, two tbsp. spoons of tomato paste.
Which sauces are best?
Since dumplings are an international dish, every culture has its own characteristics of their use, its own seasonings and sauces. Thus, the Chinese cannot imagine their dish without sweet and sour sauce, and Siberians will prepare dumplings with a sauce based on finely chopped salted mushrooms. We will tell you about the most common sauces for dumplings.
Spicy with horseradish: this sauce for classic Russian dumplings consists of sour cream, mayonnaise, grated horseradish, with the addition of black pepper, table vinegar and melted butter.
Sour cream sauce: add squeezed two cloves of garlic, a little chopped parsley or dill to half a glass of sour cream.
Spicy: it is also called “light” because in addition to the tomatoes chopped in a blender, the sauce contains grated horseradish and hot chili pepper, as well as salt and pepper to taste.
Matsoni: a common Caucasian sauce, similar to the sour cream version. In the Caucasus, it is prepared with sour matsoni milk; if you don’t have it, you can take regular yogurt, add a couple of cloves of crushed garlic, a spoon or two of chopped herbs (cilantro, parsley, basil or any other) and salt to taste. Dilute the sauce with mineral water and gas - the gas will give the sauce the necessary spiciness.
Tartar type sauce: finely chop half an onion and one pickled cucumber, add half a glass of mayonnaise, salt and pepper, add a little more chopped herbs. The sauce should not be too thick, so dilute it to the desired consistency with brine.
