I Should Have Known
I Should Have Known
Dumplings - Spotlight on Asia Month
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Dig in to this mouth-watering episode continuing our Spotlight on Asia theme! This week, Quizmaster Andi whipped up four delicious (?) servings of dumplings from around Asia. But one of them is completely fake! Do you think you can find the made-up dish? Join hosts Tanner and Sups in taste-testing and guessing!
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it's kind of like a reverse
SupsYeah. Creative. to the point that it could also be made up. Yes,
AndiI'll definitely try
Supsit. Yeah. But I just don't know if it exists. here.
TannerThe Alien
Andidumplings? aw,
Supsman. I don't want
Tannerwant this. Send it
Supsthis.
Andiit
Tannernothing
Supsjumps out as like,
Tannerno way. I don't believe
Andithat, except that
TannerI hate this This is,
SupsIt's the worst part of eating dumplings,
AndiHello, and welcome to this episode of I should have known the trivia game show that can't be trusted each week. One of our quiz masters will present you with four facts about a topic, but one of them is a lie We're putting a spotlight on the continent of Asia for this month. So we're celebrating many. Countries and cultures of Asia today. I'm your quiz master. I'm Andy and I'm going to be presenting you with a find the fake episode on Dumplings, so I hope you're hungry. So I'll present you with four dumplings from around Asia. Except, one of these dumplings I have invented. It does not exist. So join our other hosts, Supes and Tanner, in figuring out which one is my fake.
Tannerit's pretty impressive to make up a whole food.
SupsDid you eat any dumplings in the last few days, Tanner?
TannerNo, no,
Supscheck if she fed you something. and,I was like, that's the one Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Tannertest it out
AndiSo for our PQQ, we'll start with What is the name of the Cantonese serving style featuring many small dishes, particularly dumplings?
TannerThe Many small dishes thing. leads me to think that it's dimm sum,
Supsright?
AndiYes. So dim sum. Yes. Dim sum is not a dish. It is a serving style. Originally Cantonese, which is southern China, but it is popular throughout the region. And yeah, typically you order. Many different little dishes and almost always some kind of dumpling is involved. Mm-Hmm. and they come in like the little steam, bamboo, steam basket. So that's kind of like the iconic Yeah. Chinese dumplings, I love dumplings. Me too. I don't think I've ever met a dumpling. I didn't like I.
Tannervery curious to hear how you made one. up.
AndiI did. Let's find out. All right. So, let's get started.. Dumpling number one, a mandu, the fish dumplings of Korea. Mm.
TannerFish dumplings of Korea. It is. Mandu is the Korean word for dumpling.
Andiis Mandu is Korean for dumpling, and A is the general word for fish. Oh. So that's it.
SupsOkay. I mean, Mandu. Yes. I've had,
Andichicken man. Mm. Yeah.
TannerBut What's interesting to me is putting fish in,
SupsI mean, I know in Vietnam, they do fish dumplings. Okay.
TannerRight.
SupsSo,
Andifish dumplings.
Supsfish is pretty common.
TannerMm-Hmm. You can get
Supsget
AndiDough filled with fish. What makes almond dough special is that The wrapping
Supsis fish.
AndiSo it's not in dough. they take white fish and pound it very thin. And then fill it with beef, mushroom, cucumber filling. And then wrap the fish around that filling. Cut it into crescent shape using kitchen scissors, of course. Because this is very Korean to use kitchen scissors. And then they are steamed.
TannerWhoa.
Supsvery creative to
TannerYeah. it's kind of like a reverse
SupsYeah. Creative. to the point that it could also be made up.
AndiSo it's Korean? Mm I even wrote it in my notes Hangul. Of course you did.
SupsHave you had them, have you ever seen
TannerNo. I don't remember ever having them.
AndiWe lived in Korea for two years,
Tanneryes. for our two years in Korea, I ate a lot of food. and I don't remember all of it. It's like a structured dumpling. Because, for me, It's that. I just imagined a little bit that,
SupsBecause for me is that. when you talk about dumpling, I always imagined the dough is always with like flour yeah. yeah.
Tannerwheat flour, corn flour, or something
SupsYeah, yeah, But to have like the fish and then it's cut into a crescent
TannerWeird.
AndiWhy do they do that?
Tannerthey do that?
AndiBecause it's delicious? I don't know.
Supsdon't know. I mean, all I can say that it sounds very fishy to me. I would try it. You would try it? I I would try it. Yes, Yes,
AndiI'll definitely try
Supsit. Yeah. But I just don't know if it exists. here. That's the part that I'm not
Andiconvinced.
TannerHonestly, I wonder if
Supsyou can even do that. Yeah. Okay. Can you make a... because The texture of white fish. you pound it, you pound it, you pound it. But for it to be the outer layer to hold And you said there's mushroom, there is beef, there is cucumber, carrots, vegetables, whatever. So your filling is very heavy. and this pounded fish, the weight of it, Physics wise, me.
Andiyou steam it or boil it
SupsYeah, whatever. Yeah, exactly. So even if you put a little bit of flour to give it, like, that additional weight. Very skeptical. Okay. Maybe this will be the most people will Nyonya
Tanner1 plus
SupsBakchang.
Andiskeptical. Let's see the next one. Alright. Dumpling number two. The Nyonya Bakchang, which are the blue dumplings of Malaysia.
TannerBlue
SupsWhere's the gyoza
TannerYeah,
Supsthe mod ones
AndiWe weren't gonna do easy ones. Come on. So Bong is. A kind of Chinese dumpling in China, it's typically called Tsum Tsui. So it's this kind of
SupsSo it's a kind of this,
Andibut it's common throughout Asia. typically tetrahedral rice dumplings wrapped in bamboo leaves. So
Supsyou take
Andimushy rice, so rice that has been like oversaturated, like, gelatinous almost and you fill that. And then you wrap it really tight in bamboo leaves and steam them in the leaves. So when you open it up, it's kind of like gimbap. It's kind of like sushi where it's like, you know, the rice is all stuck together and then there's a filling
Supsinside.
TannerYou said it's tetrahedral. so
Andiit's...
TannerIt's like a
Andipyramid. Yeah. Okay, cool. Yeah. Usually. These are common all throughout Southern Asia, Southeast Asia, so different cultures They'll use different leaves, they'll use different shapes, different fillings, but this is
Tannera style. So that's
AndiYes.
TannerAnd these are blue
AndiThese are blue bakchang. Yes. So, Nyonar cuisine refers to
Supsthe
AndiPeranakan people of Southeast Asia. So I said Malaysia, but actually it covers the entire Malay peninsula. So includes Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia. So it's, Not only Malaysia. And so this is a specific ethnic group
Supsin this
Tannerregion.
AndiAnd they fill this dumpling with pork, winter melon,
Tannerand
Supsand
Andipeanuts.
Tannerpeanuts. The So
SupsNone of which
AndiThe blue comes from blue butterfly pea
Supsflowers.
AndiSo these are like a bright blue. So like, these dumplings are Like truly blue. And this blue butterfly pea flower. a natural edible flour that is used throughout cooking. And when you boil them in water, they make an edible dye that is bright blue, like ocean blue, And so then, they take the rice and they soak it in this blue liquid, and then that's how the rice is blue.
TannerOh wow, that's very specific and creative.
Supsknow. which one's more fake. The second one.
TannerI
Supsone of the good things is that
Andibakchang, yes,
Supsknow what is bakchang, and she used the right keywords for that region. Bamboo, this weird shape, this natural food dyes, they do that to a lot of Dishes there. But the contents of the food It's just the pork that is creating a little bit problem for
TannerOh really? There is a very large Muslim population in that part of the world, And
Andithey wouldn't eat
Tannerpork. But there's a lot of populations in
Supsthat part of the world, you know? There's a ton of people, but, But the major religion is, Islam.
TannerUm,
SupsThat's interesting. Unless there is like a variant. Yeah. Which makes sense.
Tannerit sounds like the claim to fame here is that it's blue, and it's rice, and it's a weird shape,
AndiI thought the blue is the interesting part. Because it's one of those colors where if you saw it in food, you'd be like, that has to be food dye. Yeah,
Tannerabsolutely.
SupsThey do a lot of natural dye stuff.
TannerAs, the Asian
Andirepresentative would
Supsfancy as it sounds to other, you know,
TannerWould you eat them?
Sups100%. 100%. But back to this
AndiNyonya Bakchang. So, Nyonya refers to the cuisine of these people.
SupsOh, okay. which is interesting. Then I take my words back for the Pork Element, because this is a specific group of people,
AndiYeah.
Tannerof people. It's not the
Supscountry. Okay.
Tannerwhole group. it's more believable.
AndiI think it sounds pretty
Supsbelievable, like,
TannerThere's Nothing that jumps out at me as like, no way. they can't do that. Like, you can't
Supsmake it
TannerLike, maybe this flower really exists and it's that color and then you can cook with it. Sure, I don't have
Andiexperience eating this cuisine. This one I feel like if you saw a picture of it and had to be like, is this naturally made or not? That would be hard. That would be hard,
TannerSo I'm inclined to believe it.
SupsOr the picture doesn't exist. There's a possibility.
Tannermaybe she
Andimade it up.
Tannermaybe she saw so many different colors of dumplings, She's like, oh, there's a sepia one, so it's black or like made with whatever,
Supsand it's bright red.
Tannerand then
Andishe's like, why is there no blue one?
TannerBut to have it, the whole thing is
Supsthis color and it's crazy blue. Mm hmm. Okay. Well we
Andiare.
Tannerthere.
SupsAlright, so.
Andithere's pretty much a dumpling I've never met that I didn't like. This one, maybe might change that.
TannerOkay.
Andidumpling
Supsnumber three,
Andithe Ariake dumplings, the alien dumplings of Japan.
TannerThe Alien
Andidumplings? Yes. So, Ariake is a sea in
Tannerin
Supsthe south.
AndiJapan, in southwest Japan.
TannerOkay.
AndiAnd in this sea, there are these little eel like fish that are called
Supswarasubo.
AndiAnd they are little eels. They don't really have eyes. They are mostly just mouth. And they have sharp pointed teeth. And they look exactly like in the movie Alien, with the thing that pops out of that guy's chest. They look...
TannerExactly like that.
AndiWhere they're like just teeth and a mouth. So they're considered like a delicacy in this region. They're usually grilled or dried or even put into sake to flavor.
Tannerthey're usually
Supslike a tequila worm?
AndiYeah. the Saga government made us special occasion with a restaurant called Dumpling Kingdom. In Japan. And they created a steamed dumpling. It's a typical dough steamed dumpling. Where they put the warasubo heads sticking out.
SupsOh
TannerOh no.
AndiSo they're sticking out, up, out of the
Tannerdumpling. Mm-Hmm.
Andithey were a limited time But people say that if you go to the Saga region, you could probably find them again. Local restaurants making them.
TannerSo that's why they call it the Alien
Andione can movie Alien. Yeah. They look exactly like the thing that pops outta that guy's chest in the movie Alien.
TannerGotcha.
AndiYeah.
SupsI mean, let's put first thing on the
AndiNot
SupsI'm not going to eat this
TannerHa ha ha I would
Anditry it. You would try?
Supsit? Okay. I would've
Tannerone. Oh, I would
Supsdelicious.
AndiI would try and they would taste bad, but they look
Supshorrifying. Yeah.
TannerI know eel is
Andia common food in Japan. But Well it's not technically an eel, It's a fish. It just looks like an eel. It
Tannerdoesn't have fis. Yeah.
SupsSo
Andiit's eel like. It's eel like.
TannerGross.
Supsno eyes.
TannerOh God. It gets worse and worse. this is not our
SupsHalloween episode. You don't have to freak us out. I have a general philosophy in life. If I hear something that's weird for me Yeah. But then you go like two levels above. Mm-Hmm. right? And like so bizarre that it's possible. And then you drop the word Japan. I'm always inclined to believe it because
AndiNine
Tannerout of 10
Supswill be true. You know,
Tannertimes, it will be true.
SupsAnd especially, like, I think only in Japan, a place like, Dumpling Kingdom, would
Andiyou know what I'm saying?
SupsI would not eat it, but
Andiit, but I can see why they would.
Supsdo
TannerWell, I think two things, is like, people who wouldn't eat it, it's interesting
Supsbecause a
Tannerof people say, I don't need anything with a face,
Andiis a face, it's
Supsthis have a face?
Tannerit's just a mouth. And teeth.
SupsIt's just
Andiare not my teeth.
TannerYeah.
SupsI mean,
TannerThe other thing is like
AndiIs it just
Tannereel?
AndiOh, it? gets served with sauce. Okay. Good. Coated in sauce and
SupsI'll eat. it. Yeah. But like, they're sticking out like,
TannerYou can't avoid
SupsI can't imagine
AndiI think you get
Supsyes, But this was like, too, bizarre.
AndiYeah, even for Japan,
Tannerhave one
AndiWe have one more now.
Tannerthough.
SupsAll three of them so far are ridiculous.
AndiAlright, last dumpling. dumpling number four, Pista Solo, the
Tannerghost dumplings of Kazakhstan. and Central Asia.
SupsAnd
Tannerthese dumplings
AndiSo these dumplings come from Central Asia and the Turkic cultures there. The ghost thing is kind of... Maybe taking some liberties a little bit. The unusual thing about these dumplings is that they're made with super saturated dough and filled with heavily spiced beef or lamb and then steamed They get served along with a plain broth, like a soup. And what you're supposed to do is take the dumplings and drop them into the soup where they dissolve. And then, like, there's the dough floating in it and then the meat and the spices. And then you
Supseat the soup. You're supposed to deconstruct it.
Tannerit. okay.
SupsYeah,
Andithey, like, they're also called sometimes twice cooked dumplings because they get
TannerHmm. So they're ghosts because you killed
AndiBecause they disappear.
Tannerokay.
SupsYeah, sure. Yeah,
AndiI mean, that's basically it. Like,
TannerHmm. they're dissolving dumplings.
Andithey're disappearing dumplings. It's typically beef or lamb,
TannerThe Traditionally
Andieven,
TannerYeah,
SupsI was gonna
Andium, and it's like, it's heavily spiced.
TannerMm-Hmm...So it's supposed to make this Mm-Hmm.
Andito Kazakhstan Uzbekistan. We had a
TannerKazakhstan and Did not have these. We had horse
AndiNope.
TannerI don't
SupsAnd
Tannershe's eating these dishes.
AndiI will say because I knew this would come up because we were in Kazakhstan
Supsrecently. It's from the north.
TannerWe were in the south, We were in the south, of course. yeah. Uh huh,
AndiHow convenient. Where were you? Well, this is like a big thing. Okay, this is like culturally a big thing it's a huge country. yeah. in the plains, in the steppes, not the
TannerOkay, So we went to,
Supsnear the
AndiKyrgyz border. In Almaty, yeah, so it's
Tannerin the south. Yeah. So this is from like, the plains. and The steppes, in the
AndiAnd it includes other countries of Central Asia too, so like Mongolia,
SupsNorthwest China, Yeah. I mean, the part where I believe, of having a broth with dumpling, that's very common, Right. So, that part is Totally believable.
TannerThe
SupsThis disappearing
Tannerpart I understand
Supsbecause it's like, if it's like, soggy, like you put it down and then it just sort of,
Andijust sort of,
SupsActually, this is the
Tannerone that I believe the most. Yeah. it's kind of the boringest. I think What's interesting to me is that it's like Exactly what I don't want. I hate it when I'm eating, dumpling soup, and then my dumplings fall apart. And then it's just floating in there, and I don't actually get to bite into it and get the good juice come in. Yeah. So if it's like, oh, it's designed to be like that, like,
Andiaw,
Supsman. I don't want
Tannerwant this. Send it
Supsthis. But I would believe this. I mean, everything checks out. There's horse, there's beef, there's lamb, there's a broth.
Tannernothing
Supsjumps out as like,
Tannerno way. I don't believe
Andithat, except that
TannerI hate this this is,
Supsit's the worst part of eating dumplings when they break. Yeah, can you think of anything that you had in Kazakhstan?
Andithat
Supslike give her inspiration to come
Andiup
Tannerwith Mm. I could totally see why she would make this. Because she would,
Supstake
Tannerthe dishes that we did have, you know, like soup and Meat, beef, lamb, whatever.
SupsAnd just wrap it in a dumpling and be like
AndiIt
Tannerfalls apart. Yeah. And then call it the ghost. Yeah. Mm. kind of lacking
Supsin creativity, I would say. I would expect more.
Tannerfrom her. Yes,
AndiYes, I think the bar is set quite low at this one.
Tannerone that she made up... Yeah. Yeah. Come on. you can't have something like... Georgian dumplings. King Kali, where like there's a part of the dumpling you're not supposed to eat. you know, like Do something like that. Like
Andibut I know King Kali.
TannerThinking about this now, maybe my take on this ghost dumpling isn't the best because. I eat
Supsthe handle for King Kali. I like to eat the whole thing. I mean,
Anditechnically you could, but it's raw. it's raw. dough.
SupsAnd
Tannerall dough, yeah, And so, I love that part, that's my favorite part. So if I'm like, No,
SupsI hate this
Tannerkind where it falls apart. Maybe other
Supsare like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, normal. Yeah, So, we've got four dumplings. For very interesting and unique. we have to guess which one Andy made up. But could
Tannercould you do it, please?
Supsthe four dumplings, please? Serve
Tanneragain.
AndiYes, of course. Let's get your tasting menu. So, dumpling number one, Almondoo, the fish dumplings of Korea. number two, Nyonya Bakchang, the blue dumplings of the Malay Peninsula.
Supshave that back
AndiDumpling number three, the Ariake dumplings, the alien dumplings of Japan. And dumpling number four, Pista Solo, the ghost dumplings of Kazakhstan. of those I invented.
TannerWow, You made a really creative dish here. Hmm. So it comes down to, do you think you can make dumplings out of fish? Do you think that you can dye this blue? Why would you eat this eel And was Andy so uncreative
Supsthat she
Tannerone that falls apart, Depends I'm leaning more towards the Eel
Supsthing. Eel thing. Okay. Because it's just So gross to me. Yeah. Yeah, and it fits Japan, but
Andiyeah, something's off about it.
TannerYeah.
SupsI see what you mean.
AndiYeah.
TannerSo for the first two.
Supsyou would
Tannerthem. the first one, the physics of it kind of
SupsExactly. doesn't hold up. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know how you can
Tannerthe fish
Supsfish hold together Mm-Hmm. for a while. Like they Don't stay together, Right.
AndiSo,
Supsright, Tanner, take your pick. I think it's the eel. Okay. I do not believe the alien one.
TannerOkay. number
Supswith Omandu.
AndiOkay. Number one, fish. I love how Tanner picked the eel simply because it's the grossest to him. Yeah, definitely. It's not about any, he's not, it's not strategy.
TannerNo, it's
Andigross. I'm looking at it like a menu. I'll take one, two, and four. Thank you. So, you were both wrong.
SupsOh, no,
AndiI don't know if I should be insulted a little
TannerIt's the fourth
Andibecause yeah Yeah, piece the solo is not a thing. I don't know who would want to eat Busted up dumplings. I'm a hundred percent with Tanner on that where it's like, it's that's literally was my inspiration was like Thinking about how like when you cook soup and
Supsyour dumpling
Andidissolve and fall
Supsapart and it's like just the worst thing and I'm like Like a wonton soup, like
TannerLike they're
AndiYeah, but they don't fall apart. So that's the that's fine Dude dumplings and soup hundred percent best thing ever Broken? Dissolved dumplings in soup? Nasty as hell. No one wants to eat that.
TannerSo, the fillings and things comes from Monty. Yes, we did have Monty, we had
Andiso Monty is a
Tannerclass of
Andidumplings from Central Asia, from this region. So that's the, the filling comes from Monty. But what's extra interesting though, I asked quiz about 3000 and it gave me a list of 10 dumplings from around the world and then it gave me sources. So I was like, great. Piece, the solo of Kazakhstan, it listed, so I clicked on the link. The link didn't have any mention of Kazakhstan. It was all Chinese dumplings. So that
Supswas weird.
AndiSo then I Googled
SupsPista solo,
Tannerthe solo.
Andiit
Tannerdoes not exist.
AndiIt's an AI aberration.
Supsmade it up. It
Andiinvented that name.
TannerI didn't ask it to invent
AndiI didn't ask it to invent anything. It just straight up invented this name and picked Kazakhstan.
TannerAnd that
Andiname means nothing. it's an aberration, AI aberration and, and invented that name. And then I invented the dissolving because who would want to eat
Tannerup See. dumplings. So, We did
SupsYeah.
TannerKazakh. Yeah. Good. See, we, I remember the meat and all the soups.
Supsquestions.
Tannerwe ate
AndiHe ate so much,
TannerCome
Supson.
Andiwe Did have a lot of
SupsYeah, Okay.
AndiHow's that dumpling?
SupsYeah, well,
Andinot fall apart. Nobody wants falling apart dumplings.
SupsYeah,
TannerMan, I need to
SupsIt followed me to do a better job of documenting. Yes, please! I mean, what's the advantage? What's
AndiWhat's the point of you going to all these places if you're not going to eat more dumplings? It's like, I'm like Tanner, I can think of
Supsseparate dumpling dishes
Andiwe had.
TannerOh
Supswow,
Andishould have known. I should have known. I known. I really should have. It's the worst. All right. Thanks for listening to this episode of I Should Have Known. We'll be continuing celebrating Asia next week. Quizmaster Tanner will be doing a find the fake Pokemon,
SupsSo,
AndiGet ready for that. You gotta catch them all. And as always,
TannerWas drunk on horse milk!