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My77th Recipe, “Veg Spring Roll”, a Chinese New Year special. A super delicious evening snack recipe / appetizer recipe, which I get every time I order takeout from my favorite Asian restaurant. A super crunchy outside wrapper with yummy veggie fillings.
Wishing everyone who are celebrating, a Happy and prosperous New Year. When I came to know that today is Chinese New Year, as usual I wanted to post a dish which goes with the theme. When I did some research on internet, I came to know some interesting facts which I never knew earlier.
The first day of Chinese New Year usually falls between January 21 and February 20. And looks like it is a tradition to eat certain dishes during the New Year. Especially on the New Year’s eve, Lucky Food is served, which is believed to bring good luck for the coming year. Though there are many Lucky Foods, the one which I am very familiar with and have eaten many times are these Veg Spring Rolls
But until today, I never knew that such a simple dish would have a huge significance. Since the Spring Rolls looks like bar of gold, the lucky saying for eating spring roll on New Year’s Eve is 黄金万两 (hwung-jin wan-lyang/) – ‘A ton of gold’ – a wish for prosperity. Even interesting to know was that the New Year is also known as Spring Festival and since the spring rolls are usually eaten during the Spring Festival in China, hence their name.
Veg Spring Roll
Taking just the inspiration from the Chinese cuisine, I adapted the taste of the spicy vegetable filling to suite my taste buds. These veggie spring rolls turned out super crispy on the outside and juicy n delicious in the inside. These homemade spring rolls are definitely much better than any takeout. Perfect with a cup of Hot chai or as an appetizer with Asian dipping sauce 🙂 Refer to my video here on“How to make the Spring Rolls”.
If springs rolls are your favorite just like mine, do check out my other spring rolls recipe as well
- Avocado Spring Rolls
- Vietnamese Spring Rolls
- Icecream Spring Rolls
Veg Spring Roll
Revathi Palani
Chinese New Year is also known as Spring Festival and since the spring roll are usually eaten during the Spring Festival in China, hence their name.
5 from 1 vote
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Prep Time 45 minutes mins
Cook Time 15 minutes mins
Total Time 1 minute min
Course Appetizer
Cuisine Chinese, Indian
Ingredients
- 12 Spring roll sheets | | Egg Roll Wrappers
- 2 tsp Sesame oil
- 1 Tbsp Garlic (finely Chopped)
- 1 Tbsp Ginger (finely Chopped)
- 4 Spring onions (finely Chopped with White, Green parts separated)
- 1 large Carrot (julienned)
- 5 Green beans (cut diagonally)
- ½ Red bell pepper | Green bell pepper (julienned)
- 2 Cups Cabbage (julienned)
- 1 tsp Sugar
- 2 tsp Soy sauce
- 2 tsp Ground black pepper powder (adjust as per your taste preference)
- ¾ tsp Salt
- Oil - for frying
- 1 Tbsp All purpose flour
Instructions
First follow the instruction given in the packet of the spring roll sheets for thawing the frozen sheets. According to my store bought frozen sheets, I made them to rest in room temperature for about 30 minutes and later covered with a clean damp cloth / damp paper towel and left for another 15 mins.
Chop the veggies and keep them aside. Heat a large pan or wok with sesame oil. Add the ginger, garlic and saute for 30 secs. Then add the white part of the spring onion and saute for 30 secs.
Now add all the chopped veggies (carrot, cabbage, bell pepper, green beans), sugar and stir fry for a minute. Follow it by soya sauce, fresh ground black pepper powder and salt and saute for 2 minutes in medium-high heat or until the mixture becomes dry. Once done, add the green part of the spring onion, give a quick mix and turn off the flame.
Transfer the filling to a baking sheet or large tray. Leave the sheet/tray stand in slanting position and let the filling cool down completely. This will helps in draining out excess liquid from the filling.
For sealing the spring rolls, prepare a paste by mixing the all purpose flour with 1 ½ Tbsp water and keep aside.
Now place the sheet on a clean flat work surface. Place a spoon full of filling about 2 cms away from the corner of the wrapper. Now pick up that corner and roll into a tight wrap around the filling. Once you roll till the center of the sheet, fold both right and left corners towards the center. Continue to roll. Once the roll comes to the opposite corner, brush the corner with the flour paste and stick the corner nicely to the roll. Make sure that there are no gaps in the roll. Refer to my videohereto "Learn How to make the Spring Rolls".
Heat a pan with oil for deep frying. And once the oil is hot, drop the spring rolls one by one into the hot oil and fry until golden brown. As our stuffing is already cooked we need not cook the spring rolls in low/medium flame. You can fry them in high flame. Drain them on a paper napkin.
Enjoy hot with hot and sweet asian dip or tomato ketchup or chilli sauce
Notes | FAQ
- Follow the instructions given in the packet of frozen spring roll for thawing. You can leave them outside to thaw before starting to prepare the filling.
- Adding sugar to the veggies will help to retain their color.
- You can add any veggies you like for the filling. Traditionally bean sprouts, shiitake mushrooms are used along with other veggies.
- The whole process of cooking is done in high flame. Take care not to burn the veggies.
- The filling should be at room temperature and dry before rolling.
- You can check if the oil is hot enough for frying by inserting a wooden skewer or chopstick in the oil. If bubble raises from the oil, then its hot enough to fry.
- Be careful while frying the spring rolls. If the oil is too hot the rolls can get burnt out easily. If the oil is not hot enough the texture of the spring rolls will not be good.
- While rolling the spring roll it should be a tight pack with no opening. Else the spring roll will get unwrapped or absorb excess oil while frying.
- Instead of green cabbage you can also use Napa cabbage and also feel free to add other veggies such as mushrooms or bamboo shoots, etc
- Chinese restaurants also add rice noodles / glass noodles as part of the delicious stuffing. But I dont personally prefer adding them.
Just for reference. The below is the spring roll wrappers I used. It is not same as rice wrappers. This one is made from all purpose flour. It is similar to the Egg roll wrappers in US, which can be used as an alternative.
Image Source: Amazon.com
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