Nabjak-mandu (Daegu Flat Dumplings)

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Wide nonstick or well-seasoned skillet, 10 to 12 inches
• •Small pot for boiling noodles
• •Clean kitchen towel for covering wrappers
• •Flat spatula

Instructions

1. 1

   Salt the cabbage

   Toss the chopped napa cabbage with 1/4 teaspoon salt and let it sit 15 minutes. Squeeze it firmly in your fist until no more liquid drips. This little filling has nowhere to hide water; wet cabbage tears the wrapper and makes the mandu soft instead of crisp.

2. 2

   Cook the noodles

   Boil the dangmyeon in unsalted water for 6 to 7 minutes, until clear and tender but still springy. Drain, rinse briefly under cold water, and drain again very well. Chop the noodles into 1/4-inch pieces. Long noodles pull the filling out when you bite, and that is a small mistake you only need to make once.

3. 3

   Mix the filling

   In a bowl, mix the chopped noodles, squeezed cabbage, garlic chives, soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, black pepper, crushed sesame seeds, and the remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt. The filling will look too small. Good. Use about 2 teaspoons per wrapper. Nabjak-mandu is a wrapper-led dumpling, and if you fill it like ordinary mandu it becomes something else.

   Taste a pinch of the filling after mixing. It should be lightly seasoned and a little nutty, not salty enough to stand alone. The dipping sauce will finish the dish.
4. 4

   Seal them thin

   Lay a wrapper on the board and place 2 teaspoons filling just below the center. Wet the edge with water, fold into a half-moon, and press out the air as you seal. Do not pleat. Press the filled mandu gently with your palm so it lies flat, about 1/4 inch thick. A flat dumpling cooks evenly; a puffed one stays pale in the middle.

5. 5

   Mix the sauce

   Stir together the soy sauce, rice vinegar, water, sugar, gochugaru, sliced scallion, sesame oil, and sesame seeds. Let it sit while you fry the mandu so the scallion softens into the soy. This sauce should be sharp and salty, because the dumpling itself is deliberately quiet.

6. 6

   Griddle until crisp

   Heat a wide nonstick or well-seasoned skillet over medium heat and add 1 tablespoon oil. Lay in the mandu in one layer, without crowding. Cook 2 to 3 minutes per side, pressing each one lightly with a spatula, until the wrappers blister in spots and the edges turn crisp and pale gold. Add the remaining oil between batches as needed.

   Medium heat is the right heat. Too low and the wrappers drink oil; too high and they brown before the thin filling warms through.
7. 7

   Dress and serve

   Serve the nabjak-mandu right away, either with the sauce on the side or spooned lightly over the top. Eat them with chopsticks while the edges still crackle. If you want the Daegu snack-shop table, set them beside tteokbokki or a bowl of jjolmyeon, but do not drown them. Let the wrapper stay the main thing.

Chef Tips

• •Fresh mandu wrappers make this much easier. If yours are dry at the edges, cover them with a barely damp towel while you work and seal each dumpling carefully. A dry wrapper opens in the pan.
• •Garlic chives give the clean green bite Daegu flat mandu wants. If you cannot find them, use ordinary chives plus one finely sliced scallion, but keep the total green vegetable at about 80g so the filling stays sparse.
• •The safe shortcut is store-bought wrappers. The unsafe shortcut is wet filling. Squeeze the cabbage, drain the noodles, and keep the filling lean. 시대가 바뀌면 음식도 바뀌어야 해요. When times change, food must change too, but the texture still has to be right.
• •Leftovers lose their edge in the refrigerator, but they are not wasted. Reheat them in a dry skillet over medium-low heat for 2 minutes per side, then add a few drops of oil at the end to bring back the crispness.

Advance Preparation

• •The filling can be mixed up to 1 day ahead and kept refrigerated in a covered container. Drain off any liquid before filling the wrappers.
• •The dipping sauce can be made 4 hours ahead. Add the scallion no more than 1 hour before serving if you want it to keep a fresh bite.
• •The dumplings can be filled and frozen raw in a single layer, then stored in a freezer bag for up to 1 month. Cook from frozen over medium-low heat, adding 1 to 2 minutes per side.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 185g)