Gotta Be a Better Way

Shortly after I started my study of Chinese cooking, I discovered that one of Charlie's favorite dishes in the world is Jiaozi, a Chinese dumpling that is filled with pork, napa cabbage, chives, and various spices. I also discovered that Jiaozi is very time-intensive to make. Making the dough and rolling out those thin dumpling skins takes forever! Jiaozi ended up being a half-day project, and by the time we were done, I had pretty much decided that this was going to be a special occasion treat, not an everyday dish. I was afraid to try to make the stuffing ahead and freeze it, because the cabbage would get all slimy, but I was wondering if I could make a mountain of those dumpling skins and freeze them so I didn't have to go through all that very often.

Fast forward a week or two, and Charlie and I are shopping for fruit and veggies in the local SuperFresh store. I'm looking at the napa cabbages, and Charlie starts "talking." He doesn't use his voice in public much unless he is really, really excited about something, so I hurried over to where he was looking, and he is pointing at a package of round, thin, slices of dough. Dumpling skins. Ready-made.

It says you can freeze them. I bought 5 packages of them--there's 100 in each package. I figure that's going to keep us going for a while.

We had dumplings again tonight, and it took less than an hour. Goes so much faster when you don't have to start from flour and water.

Is that cheating? Don't know, don't care.