Teczcape-An Escape to Food

Store-bought frozen wontons is one of my freezer stash. It might not be the healthiest (homemade ones are always better than store-bought) to stock up in the freezer but it is a convenient choice especially when you want a quick and reasonably balanced meal on a busy day.

This Wontons (Chicken Dumplings) Salad is best enjoyed warm, most suitable during spring weather when the temperature swings from 70Fs to 60Fs within the same day, and varies similar range in the same week. I still love wonton dumpling soup and dumplings in egg-drop soup but not so much when the temperature inches up.


There are different variations of Wonton Salad made in the past e.g. Wontons with Pea Sprouts and Snow Peas, Wontons with Broccoli and Cabbage, colorful variations  Wonton with Beets and Kale. Each time, it gets bigger and better, worthy of a bowl meal e.g. Wontons with Butternut Squash, Asparagus, Cauliflower, Wontons with Egg, Broccoli, Zucchini.

Wonton salad is a viable option if you are shunning /staying away from piping hot wonton soups especially in summer. It may sound strange to you but I am perfectly fine, enjoying cooked wontons with pea sprouts and snow peas. A meal with all components (carbs, protein, fiber) considered, isn't it?


If solely greens isn't your cup of tea, add some colors and enjoy this bowl of wontons with steamed beets, and cabbage.

Wontons/ dumplings, dough-based skin wrapper (carbs) filled with meat-veggies (protein and fiber) is a combination of meal components all in one morsel. In fact, a plate of 12-20 wonton dumplings (depending on dumpling size) can be stand-alone meal for some of us. Homemade or store-bought, freezer-friendly wontons also make great versatile recipes in soups, salads or side-dishes.

Personally, I prefer to enjoy wontons/dumplings with veggies - wonton salad or call it wonton dumplings veggie-bowl e.g. Broccoli Cabbage with Wontons or Asparagus, Cauliflower with Wontons or this Oven-Roast Zucchini and Steamed Broccoli with Wonton Dumplings.

In the past few months of preparing veggie-salad meals and grain bowls, I have realized that nothing is impossible. In the standard culinary world of wonton soups, have you ever thought that wonton salads might also work?


With the arrival of autumn, this veggie bowl meal can be customized using what's in season. Pumpkin! And here today, we have butternut squash.

Convenience absolutely makes a difference when putting together a meal on busy days. Store-bought wontons (Bibigo Fully Cooked Mini Wontons Chicken and Cilantro) that take 15 minutes to cook means a quick and easy meal on the table.

This Steamed Broccoli and Wontons Salad completes a meal from store-bought wontons and home-cooked vegetables.

Wontons served with steamed vegetables such as broccoli, cabbage, red cabbage and kale

You can always make your own wontons at home (make a batch and freeze portions). If you have leftover boiled (or cooked) wontons, you can also pan-fry those cooked wontons (gyozas goodness!).

For extended shelf-life, many brands of store-bought dumpling (be it wonton, gyoza) wrappers sold in the Bay Area grocery stores/supermarkets contain preservatives e.g. sodium benzoate. When I chanced upon these "free of sodium benzoate preservative" dumpling wrappers in Mitsuwa, San Jose store, I was excited.

However, in that excitement, I actually forgot to check the shape of the wrappers and bought round wrappers for wontons instead of what should be typically square wrappers for wontons.

Wontons are traditionally boiled version of the same dumplings which manifest themselves as pot-stickers or gyozas when pan-fried; wontons skins are also typically thinner than gyoza skins. Most store-bought dumpling wrappers go by this: square and thin (for wontons), round and thick (for pot-stickers)

The Chinese characters on the package "饺子" meant dumplings, and not 云吞 - wontons. The graphic on the package also showed pan-fried-style dumplings. But, the package label also wrote "Tokyo Wantan" (keyword: wontons) with "Gyoza Kawa" in brackets (photo below), so I thought these wrappers can be used for wonton as well.

This is another one-dish meal which saves me the trouble of cooking the noodle ("carbs") accompaniment. With homemade wontons (shared and given by my "wonton expert" friend), all I had to do was to cook a big pot of chicken soup with potatoes, carrots, tomatoes.
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A big pot of chicken soup is "double-duty" (1) make stock/broth that can be used for cooking other dishes; and (2) prepare the actual meal.
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Each region of China has its own wonton - dumpling variation - referred to as 馄饨 (hun tun, Mandarin) in Northern China e.g. Beijing; 云吞 (yun tun, Mandarin) in Guandong; 抄手 (chao shou) in Sichuan.


And fried wontons/dumplings are sometimes known as 猫耳朵 - Cat's Ears!!! Because they simply look like IT.

I usually enjoy boiled wontons (wonton-wrapping video here) since I prefer not to fry them (and do not do much frying at home). However, these were courtesy from my friend (more on "Cat's Ears"at end of post), and I do not reject fried goodness.

Do you think they are gyozas (pan-fried dumplings) or simply resemble gyozas? But gyozas tend to be regularly-shaped vs these...which are not so.

Why Cat's Ears? 为何称它猫耳朵？

Give me Wonton(云吞) - the kinda roundish thin-skinned dumpling, Sui Kow (水饺 - below) - the longish thin-skinned dumpling, Jiao Zi （饺子）- elongated thicker-skinned dumpling, Gyoza (锅贴) - pan-fried version of Jiao Zi （饺子); boiled, in soups, fried or pan-fried and I will take them ALL!

Which is your favorite?