Prawn Wonton – Swallowing Cloud!

You might have seen this one in a Chinese restaurant. Wonton – literally translated to ‘swallow cloud’ in Cantonese. I have no idea why it’s called that, but I always thought when they are boiled they have this lovely frilly shape that is like a cute little cloud. And hey, it’s a very versatile dumpling to make – you can alter the filling, you can boil them and serve with soy and vinegar dip, or you can deep fry them and serve with sweet chilli dip. The choice is yours. I can guarantee you it tastes authentic with minimal effort.

Annie

Traditional Prawn Wontons

A simple, traditional recipe for prawn wontons using fresh prawns, and simple ingredients no matter where you are in the world.

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Servings: 4 people

Course: Main Course, Soup, Starter

Cuisine: Chinese

Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients

  

• 1 pack Wonton Wrappers Available in Chinese grocery stores
• 250 g raw tiger prawns deveined and finely chopped
• 250 g pork mince
• 1 tbsp grated ginger
• 2 sprint onions finely chopped
• 1 tbsp shaoxing rice wine or rice wine, or dry sherry
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• 1 pinch salt & sugar

Soy dipping sauce

• 2 tbsp light soy sauce
• 2 tbsp dark rice vinegar (or white wine vinegar)
• 1 red chilli chopped (optional)
• 1 spring onion chopped (optional)

Method

 

Making the Wontons

1. Mix all ingredients (apart from the wrapper) in a bowl and mix well
2. Take a wonton wrapper and place it in your hand, now put a reasonable amount of filling (small tsp) in the centre. Do not be greedy and overfill as you might not be able to wrap it up, but also don’t underfill as you do want to eat those yummy prawns!
3. Brush the edges with water and fold one corner to the opposite corner, forming a triangle. Now you can leave it like that if you’re deep frying them, or if you want to boil them, you can swaddle the wonton like I did in the pic. Either way, it doesn’t really matter. It’s just how I like to do mine. You can still boil the trianglar ones and deep fry the swaddled ones, but I think it cooks better this way.
4. Now your wontons are made! If you want to freeze them, now is the time. You can’t freeze them once cooked.

   Lay them out flat, not touching each other when you freeze. After 30mins or so, when they are frozen, you can store them in a bag.

Cooking the wontons!

1. If you want to boil them, you need to have a pan of boiling water ready. They are cooked when they float to the top. It shouldn't take long but a few minutes.

   Serve with a bit of soy and vinegar.
2. If you want yours deep fried, preapre a hot wok of oil at around 180'C, make sure there is enough oil to cover the wontons. Fry until they turn golden brown, roughly 4 minutes or so. Then drain on kitchen paper.

   You can serve this with sweet chilli sauce.

Notes

I prefer my wontons just boiled, either with a soy dip on the side, or with a bowl of noodles. 

Here’s how we eat it!

The best thing is that you can make loads, use a few and freeze the rest! They don’t even need defrosting when you need them, just throw them straight into a pan of boiling water until they float! But if you froze them it’s best not to deep fry… I haven’t tried throwing frozen stuff in a hot pan of oil so I wouldn’t ask you to do it!