Our Potsticker recipe is sort of a mixed bag of Asian ingredients, but the dipping sauce is very Korean. Choganjang is a Korean condiment generally made of 3 parts soy sauce and 1 part vinegar. It’s typically used as a savory seafood pancake dipping sauce, but also great to use for dipping potstickers.
What is a potsticker?
Potstickers are dumplings that are typically steamed before being finished with a bit of pan frying. They are so many things to stuff them with, such as beef, chicken or pork and vegetables like sautéed cabbage and mushrooms. They are commonly made in the shape of half circles, similar to European perogies. All potstickers are dumpling, but not all dumpling are pot stickers. The cooking method of frying, then steaming makes them potstickers.
Why are they called potstickers?
When you are pan frying potstickers, if you cook them for too long they will stick to the ‘pot’! We generally like to use a nonstick pan when we cook our potstickers which ensures they’ll lift from the pan easily.
Can you freeze potstickers?
Yes, they freeze very well. We love freezing our potsticker recipe for an easy dinner later. We recommend that you line a baking sheet with a piece of parchment then place uncooked potstickers onto the baking sheet about 1/2 inch apart (they shouldn’t touch one another). Next, pop them into the freezer for a couple of hours. Once they are completely frozen you can transfer them into an airtight bag like a ziplock. They will keep frozen for up to three months.
How do you cook potstickers?
Potstickers are usually pan-fried by adding oil to a hot pan and searing the pot stickers. Some water is added to the pan and quickly covered to allow the pot stickers to steam and cook through. Pot stickers can also just be steamed, but as mentioned above those are generally called dumplings.
Gluten free wonton wrappers
You can find a really great recipe for gluten-free wonton wrappers here.
Potsticker sauce
Traditionally potstickers are served with a sauce that is contains soy sauce, rice wine vinegar and brown sugar. We are serving ours with a more traditional Korean sauce called Choganjang, which is three parts soy sauce and one part vinegar. We like to add Korean chile powder, garlic green onions, and sesame seeds to our sauce as well for added flavor.
Potsticker tips and tricks
- It’s important that all the air is pressed out of the filled wrapper before tightly sealing the sides together to prevent the potstickers from bursting when they’re cooked. This is best achieved by starting at one end of the wonton wrapper and carefully pressing the seal to the other end, while removing any air out.
- Be careful not to overstuff the wrappers with filling which can also make the potstickers burst while cooking them.
- Make sure to remove the skillet from the heat before adding the water to steam the potstickers. This will help to prevent any of the oil in the pan from spattering up and possibly catching on fire from the stovetop flames.
If you like these potstickers you might also like our Pork and Shrimp Dumplings recipe, or our Shanghai Soup Dumplings.
Pot Stickers
Ingredients
pork filling
- 12 ounces ground pork
- 1 baby bok choy, diced
- 6 water chestnuts, diced
- 2 green onions, thinly sliced
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
- 2 teaspoons soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon cracked black pepper
- 1 egg, lightly beaten
assembly
- 1 egg, lightly beaten
- 30 round wonton wrappers
- 4 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided
choganjang
- ⅓ cup soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
- 2 teaspoons sesame oil
- 1 ½ teaspoons gochujaru (Korean chili powder)
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 green onion, thinly sliced
- 1 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds
Instructions
- Place all filling ingredients into a bowl and mix together until well combined. Set aside.
- Brush perimeter of a wonton wrapper with the remaining egg and fill center with 1 heaping tablespoon of pork filling. Seal and crimp together.
- Set dumplings aside and repeat until all wrappers have been used.
- Heat a large, heavy bottom skillet over medium heat and add 2 tablespoons oil.
- Add 5 to 6 pot stickers to pan and pan fry for 3 to 4 minutes. Flip pot stickers and continue to fry for 2 minutes.
- Add 2 to 3 tablespoons water to the pan and cover for 2 to 4 minute or until the wonton wrappers have softened and steamed and the filling has finished cooking through.
- Remove from heat and repeat until all pot stickers have been cooked. Serve immediately with choganjang.
- Choganjang:Place all ingredients into a small bowl and whisk together. Serve with pot stickers.
Notes
- *Makes 30 Pot Stickers
Did you make this recipe? We want to see!
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Wow. Looks really good. I’m getting hungry.
Me too
I love making pot stickers they are so much fun to make and the fiddliness is totally worth it as they taste great!
Will have to give you filling recipe a go next time :)
I absolutely am crazy about pot stickers as well! Can’t wait to try!
I’m a HUGE dumpling fan as well. Went to the NYC Dumpling Festival this weekend. Thanks for posting this – I’m definitely going to give them a try!
omg…. I. LOVE. DUMPLINGS….. like REALLY, REALLY love ’em. If you make that shirt, I am so buying one. My friends and family always tease me when we go to certain restaurants, because I always say “I’ll have the dumplings” and they’re like, “okay we could share those for an appetizer” and I’m like “do whatever YOU want for an appetizer, I’m having them for Dinner! and oh yeah, I am NOT sharing….” I have a basic filling that I use (it’s delicious…) and I usually keep a bag of frozen dumplings in my freezer, but alas, my freezer is currently bare of dumplings, so I can’t wait to try your recipe, because frankly there’s (almost) no such thing as a bad dumpling (I had one once at a Thai restaurant.. I don’t want to talk about it). What I can’t believe I haven’t tried is a Korean dipping sauce. I can’t wait to do this! Yum and thanks!!
I do have a tee that says “I <3 Pot Stickers" from the mid 2000s.
I have fond memories making potstickers as a kid. Each member in the family had their role in the potsticker assembly line! It was so much fun, but lots of work!
I only started making my own pot stickers at home recently and realized how easy they are. I need to try it with Choganjang next time.
Rowena @ rolala loves
Just this weekend, my boyfriend and I decided that we have to learn to make potstickers. And lo and behold.
It’s a sign.
OH MAH GAH! I love dumplings also, a little too much maybe — NAHHH, no such thing as too much dumpling love :) I live on the West coast and there are some good dumplings around here, but the last time I visited New York I ate sooooo many dumplings! Japanese dumpling, Korean, Tibetan, everything was so so so good. These sound absolutely delicious and your choganjang looks INSANE! Bravo, ladies! Can’t wait to make a wholllllle bunch of these beauties.
Looks delicious! If you want to freeze them do you cook them first or freeze them raw?
You would freeze them raw!
These look delicious! I am really into Asian food these days, so this looks like the perfect recipe for me to try!
I. Love. Pot Stickers. Thank you.
I don’t eat pork so I was wondering if I could swap it out for shrimp. Would I need to adjust anything else in the recipe if I did this?
Yes you can, I would just make sure to chop the shrimp up pretty fine. I would also skip the whole egg and only add the egg white, as the yolk would make the shrimp filling a little on the heavy/gummy side. Good luck!
These dumplings look awesome! Such neatness and deliciousness!
Love pot stickers or any type of dumpling. Looking at these makes me hungry!
I have been obsessed with dumplings this summer. I went a little crazy at our Asian market and purchased six different bags of frozen dumplings. My favorite is one with kimchi in it. I need to replicate it.
Your dumplings are beautiful. Mine never come out that gorgeous.
I love pot stickers and actually made my own around christmas last year. SO freaking amazing! I can’t wait to try these!
These look and sound awesome!!! Is the filling mixture the traditional kind that is served in small town Chinese restaurants? The recipe sounds so easy, we really have no excuse for not making them anymore!!!! Thanx everso for the prodding!
I love this kind of thing – really great. Would I be able to get the wanton from any asian supermarket? x
Yes! And most local grocery stores (albertsons, piggly-wiggly, Ralph’s, Jewel-Osco, etc) should have them too!
I was lucky enough to be able to live in Japan for 3 months when I was 18 and these were by far my most favorite food to eat. I spent some time with one family where the mom made her own wrappers even. SO GOOD! I will definitely be making this recipe. Thanks for posting it!
There is something so wonderful, comforting, and delicious about dumplings…mmm
OH haaaaaail yes. We both posted dumplings on the same day. Twinsies! (sorry)
Wow these look so good! I love to eat pot stickers and your recipe is super easy to follow too :)
I love dumplings too! And these potstickers make my moth water even if it is breakfast time and I am not really hungry!
Do you think you could use rice paper to make pot stickers? I’m not able to eat gluten so therefore the wonton wrappers would not work for me. Just wondering?
These are so yummy! Such an interesting food
Just tried this on my blog… OUTSTANDING.
Aw yay…yours look great!!
Your dumplings look and sound delicious. The hubs and I love pot stickers and will give them a try.
I made these tonight and they were very, very good. I will be making again. The only thing I would do different is cut the salt down. Even though I used low sodium soy sauce it was still a bit too salty – next time I will use maybe 1/2 or 3/4 tsp instead of 1 tsp. Thanks for the recipe!
I’m having trouble finding the wonton wrappers…any suggestions on where to buy them?
Thanks!
They’re in most grocery stores, but sometimes they can be tricky to locate within the store. If you’re in a Vons/Safeway, Albertsons/Jewel-Osco type grocery store you can usually find them in the refrigerated section (close to the packaged raviolis, ricotta cheese, etc) OR you can find them at Asian markets!
We LOVE this recipe and have come back to it time after time. we even have a long standing tradition to make these with my sister and brother in law every time they are visiting from across the country. The sauce is the real hero and we won’t make them without it!