Soup dumplings are among the most delicious of culinary conundrums. Pillowy dough pouches filled with steamy liquid inevitably beg the question: How do you get soup into a dumpling? ChefSteps turned to author and culinary instructor Andrea Nguyen for the answer — and for a lesson in creating the warming dish at home — in this segment of the ChefSteps series "Other People's Ideas."
The secret to nailing Shanghai soup dumplings is altering the physical state of the soup. Adding gelatin to cooled broth means it will set into a semi-solid in the refrigerator — like gingery, scallion-y, pork-y Jell-O. The resulting wiggly soup sheet is then easily minced and added to the filling (Nguyen uses ground pork with various seasonings and spices). Steaming re-liquifies the small gelatin cubes, creating a perfectly meaty and hot soup inside the neat pleats of the dumpling dough.
Watch the video above for a visual guide to how Nguyen crafts her perfect soup dumplings. Then, recreate the dish at home using this recipe from ChefSteps.
