Chinese Glutinous Rice Dumpling

In the pantry of my office right now, I am having Chinese glutinous rice dumplings (肉粽) as lunch. I have a sense of gratification as this is something I made from scratch. And seriously, it ain't easy! There are lots of preparation work prior to the wrapping, cleaning and washing numerous utensils after wrapping and waiting at least 2.5 hours of cooking thereafter. I always know it, that's why I didn't want to do it myself, alone. I grown up in typical Chinese family where every year praying of Dragon Boat Festival (or Dumpling Festival, 端午节) and eating dumplings are part of the family tradition. I have the vivid picture of my mum wrapping dumplings, siting on a stool with all the ingredients laying on the kitchen floor; I have fuzzy memory of my grandma doing the same. Long hour of hard work.

Then we grown up, my mum demanded helps from me and my sister. I didn't learn dumpling wrapping skill from my mum willingly. Well, I didn't resist it either. I found it challenging and wanted to overcome it and I sensed, she needed company. In retrospective, this was probably one skill that she passed to me with little confident, as she admitted that she didn't like the work and not good at the technique of wrapping the dumpling. Sometime, we would had wrapped dumplings leak/loosen up while cooking. She repeated the same confession more than once. Her little fear blocks her from improvement. Yet, it didn't stop her from doing. My dad loves dumpling apparently and we love it too. I reckon, family love gave her a push to do it. Over the years, she saw my sister's and my wrapping technique doing better, and better. I think, she was relieved.

One little dumpling revived One little family tradition of mine.

Thanks to Mrs Kam and Lynn, gladly joined me last Sunday (Fathers' Day!) to wrap dumplings from 2kg glutinous rice, 1kg of pork belly, and many other ingredients (I used Diana's recipe). If not, I would not able to complete the entire process of dumpling making! whew~!

Mrs Kam started such party last year. It was very fun, lots of laughter and talks. I was first time hands on wrapping the dumpling after almost 10 years away from home! It dawned at me that, I did not forget the way holding the bamboo leave and filling up the ingredients for wrapping and tying.

So I gamely took up the lead to host "dumpling wrapping party" this year at the very last minute... few days before the actual Dumpling Festival. Mrs Kam was having post-travel syndrome;p.

Anyway, it was a great session to have both talented bakers in my humble flat. Lynn was first time, but she was amazingly doing well with the wrapping. All our dumplings had no leak at all after cooked for 2-3 hours, you can tell that, it was absolutely a success!

The only thing was, the dumplings are a little bland, I guess I  didn't marinate long enough or add in enough seasoning during pre-cook stage. 

I have the feeling that my mum (my grandma too, i believe) would be proud of me knowing I did all the preparation single-handedly (along with some advices from Mrs Kam). I hope I would have strong will eventually to do this again, with more seasoning definitely, and deliver to my mum.