Mapo Tofu Flavoured Dumplings

Yes, I've got a mapo tofu fever probably...but I promise, this is going to be my last mapo tofu-related post... At least for some time... ;). To be true, I never really ate mapo tofu frequently nor loved it passionately, and yesterday was actually my first attempt at making mapo tofu - I just suddenly got this sudden urge of eating mapo tofu, which I couldn't really explain why. I had never touched a jar of spicy chilli bean sauce before and thus never knew that this sauce could have such a tantalising flavour. Yes, I have eaten mapo tofu before, but I didn't know that the spicy, slightly pungent taste comes from this sauce. Since I like the sauce, I thought, why not trying to make some dumplings with this sauce? There are not so many spicy dumplings, at the moment I can only remember kimchi dumplings from the short list. So, why not adding one more to the spicy dumpling list?

The ingredients are basically very similar to my other hot-water dough dumplings, I just added tofu, minced garlic, hot pepper and the spicy chilli bean sauce to make the dumplings characteristically 'mapo' in flavour. Just to be honest, I don't know what mapo means. Why is mapo tofu called mapo tofu? I tried to look for some information, but I couldn't find the meaning of mapo anywhere.

Ingredients

Dumpling skins

• 300 gr flour
• 1 cup boiling water

Filling

• 400 gr ground pork
• 200 gr minced tofu
• 2 tbs minced garlic
• 1 tbs minced ginger
• 1 tbs chilli powder
  
• 3 tbs chilli bean paste
• 2 tbs oyster sauce
• 1 tbs fish sauce
• 2 tbs chilli oil
• 1 tbs sesame oil
  
• 1 tsp sugar
  
• 1/2 tsp ground Szechuan pepper powder
  
• 3 tbs chopped green onions

You could also use ready-made wonton skins instead of making the dumpling skins yourself. Actually I used wonton skins, because I was too lazy making the skins myself. I pan fried the dumplings and then ate the dumplings with Chinkiang vinegar (black rice vinegar).