Dumpling is usually made and hang from a leave string.
During Dumpling festival or known as Dragon Boat Festival, The Chinese traditionally prepare a sticky rice packet or rice dumplings. It is a traditional Chinese food made of glutinous rice stuffed with different fillings that may contain meat, eggs, and vegetables and wrapped in bamboo,reed, or other large flat leaves such as pandan or bamboo leaves.
It is a tradition by the Chinese to commemorate the death of once a great poet and minister Qu Yuan, and also to commemorate fealty and filial piety. The Rice Dumpling or Zong Zi (粽子) had a origin dated back to the death of Qu Yuan, where the villagers throw sticky rice into the river where Qu Yuan died to prevent fishes from eating Qu Yuan body.
My mom made these simple rice dumplings 肉粽 (bak chang) every year around the Dumpling Festival just as all traditional Chinese do. Below is the tutorial video on how to make and wrap a rice dumpling.
Minced pork is best mixed for making classical dumpling.
To make a meat rice dumplings, you need:
- Gelatinous rice
- Minced Pork
- Pork Lard
- Mixed salted vegetables
- Pandan/Bamboo Leaves
- Strings
Once the rice and meat filling is ready, you need to pack the ingredient to form into dumplings.
Placing minced pork and pork lard into a folded pandan leave with rice.
First wash clean the pandan/bamboo leaves.
Fold the leaves at the center with two equal opposing edge, make the center into a cone shaped pocket and fill in the rice and the meat filling. Cover the the leaves like a pocket and tight it with a string. The dumpling is hang by the string and ready for steaming.