Purple flower dumplings with pork and peanut filling

Lightly crush the toasted sesame seeds. Grind the roasted peanuts until fine but not powder, with no large pieces.

Grind white peppercorns to a fine powder, then add garlic and cilantro stems and pound into a fine paste with no chunks.

Mash fish sauce into the lean ground pork to break it into small pieces.

In a wok with a little oil, saute the paste and diced onions low and slow until the onions are translucent and very soft.

Add the pork over low heat, chopping it up with the spatula so it does not clump.

When the pork is mostly cooked, add plenty of palm sugar and cook until it dissolves and the liquid dries up.

Add the peanuts and sesame seeds and keep cooking until very dry and the sugar starts to caramelize to a darker brown; it should be dry and sticky.

Cool the filling completely, as cold as possible.

Form balls of filling of about 6 to 7 grams each (a little more than a packed teaspoon), packed tightly; refrigerate while making the dough.

Soak the dried butterfly pea flowers in just-boiled water for 10 to 15 minutes, then strain, pressing out as much water as possible.

Add lime juice to turn the water reddish-purple; the flour will shift it back toward blue.

Whisk together the rice flour, arrowroot starch and a little glutinous rice flour; no sugar, salt or seasoning.

Stir in the lukewarm purple water until there are no lumps, then add coconut milk. Strain the batter to remove lumps and lime pulp.

Cook in a nonstick pot over medium-low heat, stirring and scraping without stopping, folding the cooked bits into the raw, about 5 to 6 minutes, lifting off the heat if it goes too fast, until no longer wet looking but not fully cooked.

Knead on the work surface while still warm until more or less smooth; keep covered with a slightly damp towel or plastic wrap.

Cut pieces of dough of 7 to 8 grams each, press into a circle about an inch and a half across, then crimp only the edges thinner to at least two inches.

Add a ball of filling, bring the edges up and pinch closed, then tap the seam flat into a bell shape.

Dust with flour and pinch out petals with the tweezers from the bottom up, layer between layer, dipping the tweezers in flour every three pinches; finish the top petals with a smaller tweezer.

Place gently in the steamer and steam right before serving, 5 minutes for one layer or 6 to 7 for two.

Blow off excess flour and brush with garlic oil soon after steaming so they do not dry out.

Serve with green leaf lettuce, cilantro, a little fried garlic on top and a couple of chilies.