Cook: Fried Pork Wontons
Fried Pork Wontons make the perfect appetizer for any delicious Asian home cooked meal. This recipe is especially dear to my heart because it’s the exact recipe that I grew up eating - made by my mom. She always makes these for family holidays and get togethers and they are gone before she can pull them all out of the frying pan.
You can make wontons a 100 different ways, so I’m really excited to share this recipe with you. I use ground pork but there are options to make them vegetarian friendly or vegan. You can substitute the ground pork with a plant-based protein (like Impossible Foods or Beyond Burger) and Nasoya makes vegan wonton wrappers. They are my preferred brand of pre-made wrappers.
I like to eat these hot out of the frying pan with sweet and sour sauce or some spicy mustard mixed with soy sauce. The amazing thing about these wontons is that you can freeze a batch if you don’t want to cook them all at once. They’re great to keep stocked in the freezer for quick meals. I’ll also provide options to use a deep frying method or you can pop them into your air fryer!
Fried Pork Wontons
Serving Size: This recipe will yield 50-60 wontons
Prep Time: 1 hour, Total Time: 2 hours (dependent on how many you plan to cook)
Ingredients:
1 lb ground pork (or plant based protein)
5 cloves of garlic (washed, peeled, smashed, and diced)
1 tsp ginger (freshly grated or the kind in the jar works)
1/2 cup of water chestnuts (drained, dried, and diced into small pieces)
2 celery sticks (washed and diced in small pieces)
3 green onions (washed and diced)
Asian seasoning to taste (this is my brand of choice at the moment)
Kosher salt & pepper to taste (this works if you don’t have any Asian seasoning as mentioned above)
1 package of wonton wrappers (they usually come in packages of 60) - make sure for these that they are in a square shape
Sweet and sour sauce
1 small bowl of water (to seal the wrappers)
Directions:
Prepare your filling ingredients. The filling can be prepared up to a day before you plan to cook your wontons. Wash, dry, and chop all the vegetables, ginger, and garlic listed above. Set aside in a medium sized bowl.
Heat oil in a medium-large sized pan and cook the ground pork or plant-based protein completely. Season with Asian seasoning salt or some Kosher salt and pepper.
Once the ground pork is done, add in the vegetables, ginger, and garlic to the same pan and mix well. Cook for just a few minutes with the pork, so that the veggies are still a bit crunchy. It adds great texture. Make sure that you taste test to get the flavor you want.
Remove your filling into a large bowl and set aside to cool. Do not begin filling your wrappers until the filling has come to room temperature. If you try to fill while it’s hot, the wrappers become flimsy and may break apart or tear.
Once the filling is cool, prepare a large tray with parchment paper.
Place a wonton wrapper in your hand, with the top and bottom corner pointing up and down. It should look like a diamond in your hand.
Scoop a small spoonful of filling and place it in the center of the wrapper. Dip your finger in a small bowl of water and line the top two edges.
Pull up the bottom corner to meet the top and this should create a triangle. Pinch the edges together so that there are no gaps in the wrapper. The water will act as the “glue”. If there are gaps, the filling might spill out once you cook them.
Continue wrapping until all your filling is gone. At this point, if you want to freeze some of them, line them up in a plastic bag and put then in the freezer. I like to flash freeze them on a tray before to ensure they don’t stick together in the plastic bag. To do this, place a tray of them in the freezer for 15-20 minutes. Then once they are cold and hard, put them into your plastic bag.
Next, heat up 2-3 inches of oil in a large pan. It should reach 375° F. Place as many into your pan that can fit without overlapping or touching each other too much.
If you are going to use an air fryer, simply put them in the tray and cook for 6-8 minutes on 380° F.
Cook for around 5 minutes in the oil, and flip halfway through. They should be golden brown when you pull them out. Place them on a paper towel lined plate or tray and serve with sweet and sour sauce, or mustard mixed with some soy sauce!
This should give you an idea of the size you want your veggies to be.
Fill with just the right amount, it takes a bit of practice to get it right!
Try some different folds. I prefer the triangle, super easy and no folding required!
These work perfect in a small deep fryer. We were lucky to use a friend’s!