Baked Egg Rolls and Potsticker Salad

This post is dedicated to my brother Nick, who thought last week's avocado and pea puree looked gross. Whatever, dude - it tasted good! So tonight I made food that you would have to be CRAZY to think doesn't look delicious.

Two nights from now, I'll be rocking out to Bon Jovi at the Xcel Energy Center. I'll be sure to pull him aside and ask him if he remembers that one time I saw him walking down the street in Soho while I was sitting in a cab. I'm sure it's burned into his memory! Before we head to the show, Alicia is hosting a pack of crazy women at her place in St. Paul for cocktails and appetizers.

I want to bring an appetizer that is a little more substantial than a dip since we'll probably be consuming a good amount of booze. I found this little gem in my recipe box, cut from a magazine and it's so simple! You could cut all your veggies yourself, but I found a bag of broccoli slaw on sale for about $1 at my grocery store. The chicken was also on sale, labeled "for stir-fry" and it was already cut into small pieces so most of my work was already done for me.

The best part is that these rolls are baked, not deep fried. And the test roll I baked tonight was really tasty. I wrapped up the rest of my egg rolls and put them in the freezer and I'll bake them directly from frozen on Wednesday. If you are really ambitious, you can make your own sweet and sour sauce to go with the egg rolls.

Baked Egg Rolls (adapted from "Cooking for 2" magazine)

1 bag broccoli slaw mix

1 package chicken cutlets, diced into tiny pieces

4.5 tsp soy sauce

2 tsp sesame oil

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 inch fresh grated ginger

egg roll wrappers

Put the broccoli slaw in a large bowl. Season the chicken with salt and pepper and cook in a skillet with some olive oil until no longer pink. Add chicken to bowl with broccoli slaw. Whisk the soy sauce, sesame oil, minced garlic, and grated ginger in a small bowl and pour over broccoli slaw and chicken. Mix well. The mixture will smell really good at this point and you will just want to eat it as is - resist the temptation and you will be rewarded later.

Place 1/4 cup chicken/broccoli mixture in center of 1 egg roll wrapper. Follow directions on back of egg roll wrapper package to roll up egg rolls and seal with water-moistened edges.

Spray cooking sheet with nonstick cooking spray and place egg rolls seam side down. Spray tops of egg rolls with more cooking spray (I used olive oil spray). Bake at 425 degrees for 10-15 minutes or until browned, turning once halfway through cooking time.

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And, since I was in the asian food mood tonight, I pulled out some homemade frozen potstickers and threw them in with some stir fried carrots, snap peas, red pepper, and edamame beans. I was inspired to make this today after reading this post, but I used the sauce from Cafe Cyan's Potsticker Succotash.

To make potstickers, add to hot oiled pan and cook until bottoms are browned. Add 1/4 cup water and cover quickly. This will steam the potstickers, finish cooking them, and unstick them from the pan. Easy peasy. You can buy frozen potstickers or make your own like I did.

The sauce was complex: spicy, tangy, acidic, and sweet. I could have eaten the whole batch but now have 3 containers for lunches this week. It's nice to move away from cold weather roasted veggies and into springtime stir fries as I look outside and see more and more green on the ground!

ONE YEAR AGO: Springtime Tofu Stir-Fry