Toong Tong (Golden Money Bags )

One of the food I learned to prepare during a previous part time job as a waitress in a fine dining Thai restaurant was toong tong. From not knowing anything about wrapping curry puffs, using wantan skins, making pad thai to delicious desserts - I now can proudly cook up some Thai food, one of my favourite Asian food.

Fridays - a day each week I always day dreamed about what to cook when Saturday comes, because weekends are the only days during the week that I get to go to the morning fresh market nearby my house, and cook up something nice for hubby and I to enjoy at home. Deep fried wantan came up to my mind. And so I thought, "Wantan it is for tomorrow!"

Come Saturday morning, I suddenly remembered the beautiful Golden Money Bags (called Toong Tong in Thai) that my ex-boss used to make me learn and prepare. Gosh, remembering her... very persistent and smart restaurateur she is. Anyways, I shall refer to her as Parn. Parn thought me a lot of things - I never had any food or restaurant experience prior to working woth her as a waitress. But she trained me well, my only regret was that I lost contact with her after I came back to Malaysia.

Time flies and 5 years has passed by. I still remember all the resipes I learned from Parn and Kitti, our very nice, skillful, funny chef. He would sneak some delicious food from the kitchen to us staffs when Parn's not looking! :-) (Parn, if you come accross this, please forgive us for the nawty things we did, am sure you won't reall mind now!)

Toong Tong was one of the favourite entre people ordered. It's wantan skins wrapped like a bag with chives, and delicious minced meat inside. Ofcourse, commonly people use pork mince to make these. Since I do not eat pork, I use chicken, prawns, or any other delicious monce meat as substitute. Never tried with fish tho. It will be like deep fried fish balls. Hmm.

They may look difficult to make but are not. A great idea if you have guests coming to your house for lunch or dinner, and you want to make something special :-) Try it, cos everyone woill love these gorgeous money bags!

:: Toong Tong (Golden Money Bags ) Recipe ::

Ingredients (serves 4)
1 cup vegetable oil (for frying)
200g lean chicken meat
50g fresh prawns, shelled
2 water chestnut, finely chopped
1 tablespoon chopped fresh coriander

10 chives, halved and blanched in hot water
20 wanton (gow gee) wrappers

Salt and pepper to taste

Sweet chilli sauce, to serve

The purpose of blanching the chives is to soften them, making it easy to tie the money bags. Just blanch for 10 seconds in hot water and set aside.

Mince chicken meat and prawn, add a dash of salt and pepper. Add the chopped corianced and water chestnut, mix well.

Place 1 wantan skin on a clean flat surface. Spoon 1 heaped teaspoon mince mixture in centre of the skin. Fold up sides to form a pouch. Pinch to enclose filling. Tie with a chive to secure. Open up the top sleeves of the skin to form a "flower", making it look nice after frying. Cut off the extra chives after wrapping the money bags. Repeat with remaining ingredients.

Heat 1 cup of oil in small pot over medium-high heat. Cook money bags for 3 to 4 minutes or until golden brown. Drain on paper towel. Serve with sweet chilli sauce.

Note:
You could use other mince meat instead.