Homemade Egg Rolls = YUMMY

I love Chinese food. It's always my first choice for restaurants, and it's just so yummy and I love how there are different courses to the meal. Our favorite Chinese restaurant is Sampan, which has only 2 locations, both in Salt Lake. My meal of choice starts with the complimentary crunchy wontons , then hot and sour soup, then fried rice/egg roll/mushu shrimp or walnut shrimp or sweet and sour shrimp (love shrimp, can ya tell?). Mmmmmm. SO not healthy, but oh so good and the meals always give me leftovers! I'm so glad Jake appreciates the food as much as me. Of course, if we could, we would go to PF Changs all the time and enjoy their heavenly lettuce wraps. Those are aaaamazing. But Sampan is right up there!

My mom and I were the only big Chinese food fans in the house growing up, and she had the most awesome egg roll recipe that I learned how to make. I used to help her in the kitchen with various meals and desserts, but this is one of my favorites (right up there with breakfast casserole). It's kind of a process, and goes much faster with 2 people, so we've made them as a team several times. The great thing is that it makes about 35 egg rolls, so you wrap them and freeze for months (if they last that long) and just take a few out at a time and cook them up in the oven till they're nice and crispy again. I made these with Jake when we were dating, because it's fun but mostly to try to impress him. Then my mom and I made some last summer when she was here, so I felt it was high time again! So I made them tonight. And I ate 2 but I'm craving another right now. Anyways, on to the recipe

Mama Toone's Egg Rolls

3 chicken breasts, cooked and chopped
1 medium onion coarsely chopped
3 stalks celery, sliced diagonally
1 can water chestnuts, drained and chopped
1/2 head of cabbage, coarsely chopped
2 cups fresh bean sprouts
1 package frozen chopped spinach, thawed
2 1/2 tbs soy sauce
1 t. salt and pepper, each, to taste
2 packages egg roll wrappers (found in refrigerated produce section)
vegetable or canola oil for frying

Note: They're not like the ones you usually get at chinese restaurants. No ginger, no oyster sauce, no shredded carrots. Just yummy veggies and chicken for a great homemade taste!

Ready, set, go! Saute the onions, celery, bean sprouts in a large pot in 1/4 cup of butter over medium high heat. Let them start to get nice and soft. Beautiful sight.

Then start adding the other friends to the pot....spinach, chicken (I just boiled 3 frozen chicken breasts in some seasonings before starting the egg rolls, and chopped it small). water chestnuts, soy sauce, salt and pepper and cabbage. Let it all wilt together and don't worry- it'll shrink! The cabbage cooks down. But isn't it a delicious looking mixture? All the veggies make the fried egg rolls seem not so bad.

Now the fun begins- start rolling! Just follow the instructions on the egg roll package...basically lay it diagonally, fill horizontally, bring up bottom, tuck in sides, roll up, and fold over the top. I stick it in place with a little dab of water. I used a 1/3 measuring cup to portion out the filling.

Once you have a few ready to go, pop them into the skillet, wok, or electric fryer. Whatever suits your fancy. I actually have a wok that I've used approximately 1 time before, so this was a perfect opportunity! Fill it with an inch or so of vegetable oil, and heat to medium high. Fry each egg roll for a few minutes until lightly browned, flipping to each side.

When finished, lay on a baking pan lined with paper towel. Revel in the beauty of fried egg rolls. Keep rolling and frying (this is where it's handy to have 2 people, but tonight I did it all by myself and was just fine) until all the filling is gone. It gets a little juicy at the end, so be careful not to burn yourself when it makes the oil go wild! Drain the juice from roll before frying if you can. I used a little over 1 and a half packages of wrappers, so with the rest you can make some yummy wontons if you'd like! And be sure to enjoy it all with some yummy sweet and sour sauce.
To freeze the ones you don't immediately devour, just break off squares of saran wrap and wrap individually or in pairs, and then stick them in freezer ziploc bags. So we're having the missionaries over for dinner for the first time on Thursday, and I plan to serve these baked egg rolls, plus won tons and a rice and broccoli dish. That'll be sad if they hate Chinese. If they do, they'll eat it all anyways, and I'll be mad that I wasted my beloved egg rolls on them.

After dinner, Jake got the sudden desire to make apple crisp with all the apples he picked from his parent's tree. I just had to snap a picture of him expertly peeling and dicing 10 apples. So cute. It turned out SO good, by the way. P.S. How did you like my wannabe Pioneer Woman tutorial? Minus the high quality step by step photos, hopefully it was entertaining and that someone will actually make these!