How To Make A Money Bag

These golden Steamed Money Bag Dumplings are a Chinese New Year specialty. Make them for the holiday, and they will help you ring in the lunar new year with abundance and good fortune galore!

(At the very least, you can impress everyone with how fancy they are.)

An Auspicious Menu for An Auspicious New Year

When it comes to a Chinese New Year celebration, making all things auspicious is the ultimate objective across every aspect of the holiday.

A new haircut and outfit, a thoroughly cleaned home, and some loud firecrackers before midnight are just some of the old traditions that have been carried forth to today to ring in a favorable year ahead.

These traditions are all geared toward dusting off the old, scaring away the bad, and removing the unlucky to welcome a new beginning.

The same philosophy applies to Chinese New Year's Eve menu selections. Traditional New Year dishes are special—richer than standard fare. This is the time for whole fish and chicken, fried and crispy indulgences, and extra impressive, ornate appetizers.

Dishes often have fanciful names to bring positive energies like growth, good health, and good fortune. People more gifted than I can cleverly name dishes befitting the occasion, like Ru Yi Cai, a dish to "make all your wishes come true."

As a plate of stir-fried greens and bean sprouts, it's not super obvious how that particular dish got that particular name, but when it comes to these golden purses shaped like money bags, their intention on the dinner table is much more direct.

They yell into the future, "I want money!"

In short, by serving this dish, the hope is to have abundant opportunities and lots of good fortune in the coming year.

A Simple Recipe to "Make It Rain"

I have seen many very resourceful ideas when it comes to creating these golden money bags. The most important thing is that they actually look like little money bags, and are yellow—golden—in color. Everything else is flexible!

The money bag can be made with tofu skin, soaked tofu sheets, yellow napa cabbage leaves, or the thin yellow dumpling wrappers I used.

Hong Kong Style Yellow Dumpling Wrappers

As for the filling, there's no need to get too fancy (when it comes to food shaped like money, people will eat anything you put in it!).

Plus, you will be cooking plenty over the course of the day. You could even use filling from other dishes you're already preparing (like spring rolls, jiaozi/dumplings, egg dumplings, fried stuffed lotus root, etc.).

If not though, use the filling recipe described below. It happens to be vegetarian. I was blogging my vegetarian duck recipe on the same day as I did this recipe, so I decided to cut a few more ingredients to make the filling for these money bags, which just goes to show how flexible it is.

Chopped carrots, ginger, scallions, bamboo shoots, and shiitake mushrooms

Trust me, even if these are imperfect, everyone will fight to eat one or two to ensure their fortunes are in good standing for the coming year—superstitious or not!

Money Bag Dumplings: Recipe Instructions

Take your rehydrated shiitake mushrooms, squeeze out excess water, and trim away any tough stems. Finely dice them, and set aside. Also prepare the minced ginger, carrots, and bamboo shoots

Heat your wok over medium low heat, and add the oil. Cook the ginger and carrots for about 1 minute.

Add the mushrooms and bamboo shoots, increase the heat to medium, and stir-fry for 2-3 minutes.

Adding mushrooms and bamboo shoots to carrots and ginger

Add the Shaoxing wine, light soy sauce, and vegetarian oyster sauce. Stir to combine, and cook the mixture until the mushrooms are tender and there is no standing liquid.

Stir-frying vegetable filling for money bag dumplings

Stir in the scallions.

Stirring scallions into vegetable filling

Remove from the wok, and cool completely.

Vegetarian filling for money bag dumplings

Meanwhile, make the ties for your money bags. Bring a medium pot of water to a boil, and prepare a medium bowl of cold/ice water. Blanch the cilantro stems for 5-10 seconds…

Blanching cilantro stems in boiling water

And immediately shock them in cold water to stop the cooking process.

Shocking blanched cilantro in bowl of cold water

Drain, and gently squeeze them dry, being careful to keep the stems intact.

Open the package of dumpling wrappers, and cover with a damp towel to make sure they don't dry out.

Roll each wrapper out so it is about 4 inches (10 cm) in diameter.

Rolling dumpling wrapper into 4 inch circle

Add a tablespoon of filling to the middle, ensuring there is enough slack to tie the money bags.

Vegetable filling in middle of dumpling wrapper

Gently close the wrapper over the filling pinching the bundle together but leaving the top of the bag fanned out.

Use one of the cilantro "strings" to tie it closed.

Repeat until all of the filling is used.

Now you're ready to steam.

Important!

Steam dumplings right after assembling. Only the filling can be made in advance, as the dumpling wrappers are extremely delicate and may rip open if the assembled dumplings are allowed to sit too long. The tops of the money bags may also dry and crack if left out too long.

A bamboo steamer works best here. It will allow steam to escape and won't cause excess condensation to make your money bag dumplings soggy (which can happen with glass or metal steamer lids.

Line the bamboo steamer with parchment, cabbage leaves, or cheesecloth to prevent them from sticking. Arrange the dumplings in the steamer, about 1 inch apart.

Money bag dumplings in bamboo steamer before cooking

Set the steamer in a clean wok or shallow pan of boiling water. (Read our post on how to use a bamboo steamer.)

Steam for 3 minutes. You can also pan-fry these, following the same process we use for our Japanese gyoza.

If using tofu sheets, tofu skins or napa cabbage as wrappers, increase the steaming time to about 15 minutes.

This recipe only makes 16 small money bag dumplings, so feel free to double the recipe if you want a lot of money in the New Year! In this case, you're the boss! :)

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Prep: 2 hours

Cook: 15 minutes

Total: 4 hours 15 minutes

▢ 2 ounces dried shiitake mushrooms (soaked overnight or in hot water for at least 2 hours until rehydrated; save the soaking water)
▢ 2 teaspoons ginger (minced)
▢ 1/2 cup carrot (finely diced)
▢ 1 cup bamboo shoots (finely diced)
▢ 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
▢ 2 teaspoons Shaoxing wine
▢ 4 teaspoons light soy sauce
▢ 2 teaspoons vegetarian oyster sauce (or regular oyster sauce, if the dish doesn't have to be vegetarian)
▢ 2 tablespoons scallions (mostly green parts, finely chopped)
▢ 16 cilantro stems (each about 5 inches/13 cm long; substitutions include young scallions, chives, and garlic chives)
▢ 16 Hong-Kong-Style yellow dumpling wrappers (substitutions: tofu skin, soaked tofu sheets, blanched yellow napa cabbage leaves)

Take your rehydrated shiitake mushrooms, squeeze out excess water, and trim away any tough stems. Finely dice them, and set aside. Also prepare the minced ginger, carrots, and bamboo shoots
Heat your wok over medium low heat, and add the oil. Cook the ginger and carrots for about 1 minute. Add the mushrooms and bamboo shoots, increase the heat to medium, and stir-fry for 2-3 minutes.
Add the Shaoxing wine, light soy sauce, and vegetarian oyster sauce. Stir to combine, and cook the mixture until the mushrooms are tender and there is no standing liquid. Stir in the scallions, remove from the wok, and cool completely.
Meanwhile, make the ties for your money bags. Bring a medium pot of water to a boil, and prepare a medium bowl of cold/ice water. Blanch the cilantro stems for 5-10 seconds, and immediately shock them in cold water to stop the cooking process. Drain, and gently squeeze them dry, being careful to keep the stems intact.
Open the package of dumpling wrappers, and cover with a damp towel to make sure they don't dry out. Roll each wrapper out so it is about 4 inches (10 cm) in diameter. Add a tablespoon of filling to the middle, ensuring there is enough slack to tie the money bags.
Gently close the wrapper over the filling pinching the bundle together but leaving the top of the bag fanned out. Use one of the cilantro "strings" to tie it closed.
Repeat until all of the filling is used. Now you're ready to steam. A bamboo steamer works best here, as it allows steam to escape and won't cause excess condensation to make your money bag dumplings soggy (which can happen with glass or metal steamer lids.
Line the bamboo steamer with parchment, cabbage leaves, or cheesecloth to prevent them from sticking. Arrange the dumplings in the steamer, about 1 inch apart.
Set the steamer in a clean wok of boiling water (read our post on how to use a bamboo steamer), and steam for 3 minutes. You can also pan-fry these, following the same process we use for our Japanese gyoza.
If using tofu sheets, tofu skins or napa cabbage as wrappers, increase the steaming time to about 15 minutes.

Makes 16 dumplings, 4 dumplings per serving.

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