I recently attended a cooking class at Shanghai’s Chinese Cooking Workshop, which has been teaching expats to cook since 2003. The nondescript entrance, on Dongping Lu, would be easy to miss without knowing what to look for. Our class was held in a glass-enclosed room in the courtyard, hidden behind the thick stone walls.
The day’s lesson was on making dumplings, and we learned how to create two different kinds. We began with a pumpkin variety filled with red bean paste. The ingredients had been pre-measured for us and the chef’s assistant was preparing the red bean stuffing as we arrived.
Once our stations were set up, the chef explained how to make the dough by kneading stewed pumpkin into the flour mixture. We then rolled and cut the dough into pieces which we shaped around the nuggets of red bean paste. After arranging our dumplings in bamboo baskets, the chef steamed them until our little pumpkins were ready. They were almost too cute to eat!
For our second batch, we made fried pork dumplings known locally as 生煎 (shengjian). The two main ingredients were ground pork and something called “pork jelly.” This time we prepared the stuffing ourselves, adding soy sauce, sesame oil, green onions and ginger. We then prepared our dough and watched as the chef demonstrated how to craft the dumplings.
We had to make sure that our dumplings were pinched tightly closed as the “pork jelly” would melt into soup broth during cooking. The chef explained the frying process, then let us cook our own. It was intimidating at first, but turned out to be rather simple. The real test will be recreating them at home!
Chinese Cooking Workshop Address: 2 Dongping Lu, Shanghai, China Pricing: most dim sum classes are 150 RMB per person (24 USD)
Get practicing! I’d love to try some homemade dumplings!
Hubby said the same thing!
I like the round dumplings for looks the best, but imagine the flat ones are easiest to make. Do they teach anything else at the school? Mom
The school offers many different classes. We can check their schedule and see if we can find something fun to make while you’re here.
I enjoyed watching them make the dumplings in the restaurant in your complex. They were so good to eat too. Mom
Oh wow! This looks like a lot of fun. Can you go for a class without any Chinese knowledge? Will they be okay with an English speaker?
Absolutely! I took 3 or 4 classes and they were all taught 100% in English. They also give you print-outs of the recipes in English to take home.
Which cooking class is that? How is the school called?
Here’s the info for the school:
Chinese Cooking Workshop
Address: 2 Dongping Lu, Shanghai, China
Pricing: most dim sum classes are 150 RMB per person (24 USD)
Phone:+86 139 1732 6055
Oooh I love food articles 🙂 I’m glad you got to make the second filling yourself, as that’s a pretty big part of the process and the instructors premaking it kind of takes something away from the experience. Good luck at recreating it at home!