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Chinese Appetizer Recipe Week: Egg Rolls

@J. Kenji Lopez-Alt

I would call it a Kenji Roll. :)

Chinese Appetizer Recipe Week: Egg Rolls

@J. Kenji Lopez-Alt

I'm sorry if my comment was made to seem condescending or negative to your expertise or knowledge. The only qualm I had was with this article on this page talking about egg rolls, but with all of the pictures showing spring rolls instead. It would be easier to just say that this article was about spring rolls, and that the techniques can be used for egg rolls too. If it's in a spring roll wrapper, it's a spring roll.

Of course, egg roll wrappers can accommodate meatier fillings, and even the one in a "cheese-burger egg roll" a friend found in South Florida. (Not recommended. It's pandering.) Egg Roll skins can usually hold a better seal than spring rolls for longer, higher temperatures.

The fact is, too many people mistake the two, and from restaurants who might be accused by customers of mislabeling after doing a Google Images search for egg rolls and seeing these, or quick responses such as by myself after seeing the picture and the content not matching, there's a lot of education that has to be made for this part of Chinese American Food culture!

I'm sorry for the rantive nature above. I just spent a day last week wrapping egg rolls for my family's restaurant in Puerto Rico. And treatises on food culture can come up when you do the same task for most of the day.

eggrollstan at 2:23PM on 04/12/11

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Chinese Appetizer Recipe Week: Egg Rolls

I kind of wish that the picture shown would be of an actual eggroll, but unfortunately yet again the spring roll takes its place.

The skin of an egg roll, the dough being enriched by the addition of egg yolks, is thicker, which allows for heartier fillings, and in larger quantities, leading to a larger product, approximately the same as two spring rolls. When cooked (usually fried), the skin takes on a crackly, stretchy fried dough consistency, much like from crab rangoons, which also were derived from the use of the same skin to wrap something else, but you could use a single skin divided into four parts.

eggrollstan at 1:38PM on 04/12/11

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