Cooking Classes for Visitors

Gyoza

Everybody loves Gyoza, Japanese dumping!
When I ask my friends from overseas, ‘what is your favorite Japanese food?’, they say ‘Gyoza!!’
Sushi and tempura are no more no.1 Japanese cuisine for foreigners!
I was kind of surprised and a little upset. As this yummy food originally derives from China.
Well, most of the Japanese people recognize gyoza as ‘Japanese’ though, or maybe ‘half Japanese and half Chinese’. We Japanese tend to accept foreign culture into ourselves and create our own new style. In China, boiled and steamed dumplings are very popular but you don’t see many pan-fried dumplings. Here in Japan, almost all gyoza are pan-fried.
You will find many gyoza restaurants in Japan but for me, it is a taste of home. My mom often made gyoza with fresh ingredients. I enjoyed putting the filling in the skins with my mom and sister.

In this class, we are making several kinds of Gyoza using two types of gyoza skins (wrappers). One from a shop and the other one you are making it yourself from scratch!
I think gyoza skin is widely available in local supermarkets around the world nowadays but if you know how to make it yourself, you won’t walk around the town looking for it. And they taste better and are so much more elastic and easier to work with a filling.

You will learn how to make gyoza skin and a filling, technique about putting the filling in the dough, and preparing several kinds of dipping sauce that works well together with gyoza.
You can use your new skills back home to show your family and friends!

*Basic gyoza consists of pork meat and some vegetables as filling but we can make vegetable gyoza upon request, and for those who do not eat pork, we will use chicken 🙂