February 13th is National Crab Rangoon Day! Crab rangoons are deep-fried dumplings served within American Chinese restaurants. These Chinese wonton wrappers, in a triangular or flower shape, are filled with a combination of cream cheese, lightly flaked crabmeat, scallions, and garlic.
This traditional appetizer was invented at a Polynesian-Style restaurant in the mid 1950s. Crab rangoons are often referred to as crab pillow, crab puffs, crab cheese wontons, or cheese wontons.
They are usually served with soy sauce, plum sauce, sweet and sour sauce, or mustard for dipping purposes. In case you’re curious what the difference between wontons and rangoons are…wontons are typical Chinese/Cantonese dishes and are often boiled in preparation. Rangoon is a deep-fried dumpling found in other South East Asian countries and is popular with crab served inside. Hungry yet? Me, too!