Chicken Wing Gyōza

Chicken Wing Gyōza is basically a stuffed chicken wing that is deep-fried until the skin becomes crispy and golden brown. It’s not a gyōza with chicken wing meat inside.

It is crunchy on the outside and juicy on the inside. Chicken Wing Gyōza is very tasty without anything on it, but I find that eating it with mayonnaise adds a different dimension to the flavour.

Today’s recipe, Chicken Wing Gyōza, is another dish that I tried at Sekka Dining in St Leonards, which I mentioned in my post Pickled Cucumber and Shiitake Mushrooms. Chicken Wing Gyōza is no doubt a dish that is great for casual gatherings.

As soon as you see the steaming hot Chicken Wing Gyōza on a plate, you know you will need to use your hand to pick it up and eat it. When you bite into the stuffed wing balloon, straight away you will want some more.

What is in my Chicken Wing Gyōza

The ingredients can be grouped into chicken wings, and gyōza filling.

Chicken Wings

• Chicken wings without drumette portion
• Cooking sake
• Soy sauce
• Corn flour
• Oil for deep-fry (not in the ingredient photo below)

You don’t use the drumette, which is the largest and meatiest section of the chicken wing. Do you remember my recipe, Simmered Chicken Drumette in Sweet and Sour Sauce? I said that I was working on a new recipe project using chicken wings that does not require the drumette portion of the wings. Now you know what the new recipe project was.

left: wingette & tip used for today’s dish, right: drumette used for Simmered Chicken Drumette

I don’t know about where you live, but in Sydney it is difficult to find whole chicken wings at supermarkets these days.

Most chicken wings are sold as V-wings or cocktail wings. The former is the wing with no tip (which I desperately need for today’s dish), and the latter is the collection of wingettes and drumettes (which are useless for me).

I wanted to buy free-range chicken wings with tips, and the only place I could find them near where I live was Harris Farm Market. Thank you HFM!

Gyōza Filling

• Pork mince
• Peeled prawns
• Spring onion stems
• Cornflour
• Ginger juice
• Sesame oil
• Salt (not in the ingredient photo above)

I used pork mince and cornflour to bind the ingredients together because I wanted to have chunks of prawns in the filling to give a different texture to the gyōza. This was what Sekka’s Chicken Wing Gyōza had inside.

Instead of using pork and prawn, you can make filling with just pork if you like. I have not tried it yet, but you can actually use the standard gyōza filling. Nagi’s recipe, Japanese Gyoza (Dumplings), shows how to make gyōza filling with pork mince. It should give you quite a different flavour to my Chicken Wing Gyoza.

How to Make Chicken Wing Gyōza

I must warn you – you will spend a bit of time deboning the chicken wings. It took me about 15 minutes to debone 8 chicken wings this time, but when I first tried it, I took a bit longer. Before the recipe card, I added a video that shows how to debone a wingette as well as how to fill and close the wingette bag.

1. Using scissors (or a small sharp knife if you prefer), separate the flesh from the bones inside the wingettes without breaking the skin.
2. Remove the bones by dislocating the joint between the wing tip and the wingette. The wingette portion of the chicken wing becomes a small bag.
3. Marinate the chicken wings in sake and soy sauce.
4. Mix the filling ingredients well.
5. Fill the wingette bag with the filling.
6. Close the opening of the stuffed wing with a toothpick.
7. Dust the wings with cornflour.
8. Deep-fry twice, firstly at 160°C / 320°F, then at 180°C / 356°F.

There are a few steps in  making filling, even though it only takes up one line of the instructions (step 4).

Firstly, cut the prawns into cubes. Put aside some cubes, then flatten the rest of the cubed prawns using the side of a knife to make prawn paste.

Add salt to the pork mince and mix well until it develops stickiness. The salt in the pork helps the mince become stickier, which binds other filling ingredients well. Only after that, you mix all the ingredients.

You might find that the chicken skin is slippery and poking a toothpick through the skin is a bit hard. If you pull and stretch the skin, it is easier to put the toothpick through.

Just like Japanese Fried Chicken (Karaage Chicken), you fry twice so that the chicken skin becomes crunchy.

If you are not keen on deep-frying, you can cook the stuffed chicken wings in the oven instead. I added a brief instructions for Oven-baked Chicken Wing Gyoza in the Note section of the recipe card.

Getting ready to bake Chicken Wing Gyōza in the oven.

It is worth the effort!

You can find different versions of stuffed chicken wings in other Asian cuisines such as Vietnamese and Thai. The fillings are made of quite different ingredients with the country’s typical flavouring. What is the same in all these dishes is that you need to remove the bones from the wingettes, which is a daunting task.

You may wonder if it is worth the effort of removing two tiny bones from all the wings, battling with toothpicks, and deep-frying twice, only to consume them in a minute or two. But I can tell you that it is so worth it because they are delicious, and your diners will be delighted.

Once you get the hang of it, it’s not so difficult to debone chicken wings. Below is the video for deboning and stuffing the chicken wings, and I also included a step-by-step photo in the recipe card. But I must admit I like it deep-fried.

WATCH HOW TO Make It – Debone and Stuff Chicken Wings

I hope you try Chicken Wing Gyōza. They are so good!

Yumiko

5 from 5 votes

Print

Chicken Wing Gyōza

Prep Time

25 mins

Cook Time

20 mins

Marinating time

30 mins

Total Time

1 hr 15 mins

 

Chicken Wing Gyōza is basically a stuffed chicken wing that is deep-fried until the skin becomes crispy and golden brown. It is crunchy on the outside and juicy on the inside. It goes well with chilli mayonnaise.

Cook Time assumes the wings are deep-fried in two batches.

Don't forget to see the section 'MEAL IDEAS' below the recipe card! It gives you a list of dishes that I have already posted and this recipe that can make up a complete meal. I hope it is of help to you.

Recipe Type: Appetiser, Main

Cuisine: Japanese

Keyword: Gyoza, Stuffed chicken wing

Serves: 8 pieces

Author: Yumiko

Ingredients (tbsp=15ml, cup=250ml)

• 8 chicken wings (only wingette and tip, no drumette, note 1)
• 1 tbsp cornflour
• Oil for deep-frying

Marinade

• 1 tbsp cooking sake
• 1 tbsp soy sauce

Gyōza Filling

• 70g / 2.5oz pork mince
• 2 pinches of salt
• 100g / 3.5oz peeled prawns
• 2 tbsp green onion (white/light green part) finely chopped
• ½ tbsp cornflour
• ¼ tsp ginger juice from grated ginger
• ¼ sesame oil

Serving

• Chilli Mayonnaise (note 2)
• Cabbage pieces

Instructions

Deboning Chicken Wings (watch the video in the post)

1. Using scissors, cut the tissue that connects the thinner bone (radius) and the thicker bone (ulna) of the chicken wing.

2. Then cut the flesh around both bones little by little to detach the flesh from the bones.

3. Also detach the flesh between the two bones.

4. Gradually move the scissors deeper to detach the flesh more than halfway through.

5. Using your fingertips, push the meat down to expose the bones.

6. Hold the tip of the radius with your right fingers (for the right hander) and hold the joint between the wingette and the wing tip with your left fingers. Then, twist and tilt the radius more than 90 degrees to pop the joint (note 3).

7. You should see the end of the radius (which was in the joint socket). Push the bone upwards, then remove it (the tendon and meat around it naturally come off).

8. Do the same for the ulna (note 4). If required, detach more tissue from the bone with the scissors. Now you have a hollow bag where the radius and ulna used to be.

9. Repeat the deboning process for the remaining wings.

   

Marinating Wings

1. Put the deboned chicken wings and all the Marinade ingredients in a zip lock bag and massage well.
2. Remove the air as much as possible from the bag and seal. Marinate for 30 minutes.

3. Pat-dry the chicken wings.

Making Gyōza Filling (do this while marinating chicken wings)

1. Dice the prawns into about 1cm cubes. Put aside ¼ of the prawns.

2. Using the side of the cooking knife, flatten the remaining (¾) prawn cubes to make paste.

3. Add two pinches of salt to the pork mince in a bowl. Mix and pound the meat with your fist several times so that the mince becomes sticky.

4. Add the prawn paste and the rest of the Filling ingredients to the bowl with the pork. Mix well.

5. Add the cubed prawns that you put aside earlier to the bowl and mix well.
6. Divide the filling into 8 equal portions.

Stuffing Chicken Wings (watch the video in post)

1. Hold a chicken wing in your left hand (for the right hander), with the opening facing upwards.

2. Using a small spoon or a pate knife, fill the wingette bag with one portion of the filling (note 5). It is easier to fill the bag with a small amount of filling at a time.

3. Push the filling down slightly so that the filling is about 5mm / 3⁄16" below the opening rim (to leave room put through a toothpick).

4. Close the opening with a toothpick by putting the toothpick through from the outside of the wing (thicker skin) to the other side (thinner skin). Then put it through from the other side back to the outside of the wing (note 6).

5. Push the toothpick through the flesh sufficiently to secure the seal.

6. Repeat for the rest of the wings.

   

Deep-frying Chicken Wing Gyōza (note 7)

1. Heat oil to 160°C / 320°F. The oil should be at least 4cm / 1 9⁄16" deep.

2. Lightly coat the stuffed chicken wings with cornflour.
3. Deep-fry chicken wings for 6 minutes (do not overcrowd the oil).

4. Turn them over and cook further 2 minutes. Transfer to a tray lined with kitchen paper.

5. Repeat steps 2 & 3 to fry the rest of the chicken wings.
6. Bring the temperature of the oil up to 180°C / 356°F. Cook the chicken wings again for a couple of minutes. Transfer to the tray.

7. Serve immediately with chilli mayo and cabbage pieces.

Recipe Notes

1. 8 whole wings weighed 1kg in total. After removing drumettes, it became 550g / 1.2lb. After removing bones inside the wingettes, it became 204g / 0.4lb.

Here is the perfect recipe, Simmered Chicken Drumette in Sweet and Sour Sauce, to use up the leftover drumettes.

2. I mixed several dashes of tabasco into 2 tablespoons of Kewpie mayonnaise.

3. I find that it is easier to pop the joint when you bend the bone against the natural bending direction of the joint.

4. Removing the ulna can be more difficult, due to stronger ligaments that hold the joint. If the bone does not pop, use the scissors to cut the ligaments that are holding the bone (be careful not to make a hole in the skin!).

5. The cavity should be filled to 80% full, rather than to a maximum capacity. This is because the chicken shrinks when heated and the gyōza will explode if it is overstuffed.

6. You should have sufficient skin left at the opening for you to be able to put a toothpick through. If the filling reaches to the edge of the opening, you may need to remove some.

By putting a toothpick through from outside of the wing makes the closing end of the flesh bends to form a natural bulge on the right side of the Chicken Wing Gyōza.

7. If you are not keen on deep-frying, you can cook the stuffed chicken wings in the oven instead. The skin of the chicken wings may not be as crispy as those deep-fried and the bottom side of the chicken wings won't be golden brown, but it is equally tasty.
Follow the instructions up to the point before deep-frying. Then, continue as follows:
1) Heat the oven to 180°C / 356°F.
2) Place chicken wings on a baking tray lined with aluminium foil or baking paper.
3) Spray the surface of the wings with oil.
4) Cook in the oven for 20 minutes.

8. Nutrition per piece. It is assumed that a half of the marinade is discarded and the oil absorption rate of Chicken Wing Gyōza is 5%.

serving: 70g calories: 282kcal fat: 26g (40%) saturated fat: 4.1g (21%) trans fat: 0.2g polyunsaturated fat: 4.5g monounsaturated fat: 16g cholesterol: 43mg (14%) sodium: 264mg (11%) potassium: 92mg (3%) carbohydrates: 4.2g (1%) dietary fibre: 0.2g (1%) sugar: 0.1g protein: 7.6g vitamin a: 3% vitamin c: 1.7% calcium: 1.1% iron: 2.5%