Chicken and Dumplings Recipe

If you’re studying up on which wine goes perfectly with an exotic cut of ostrich meat, this isn’t your type of fare. If you want really good home cooked food that takes only a little bit longer than ripping open “grandma food in a box”, this is the chicken and dumplings recipe you’ve been looking for.

Chicken and dumplings is an old-fashioned dish that many people remember their mom or grandma making. When a lot of people talk about comfort food, they’re talking about the foods that remind them of home and when their lives were simpler. Home cooking and comfort go hand in hand in so many memories.

With recession worries, bills to pay, and schedules that are enough to make a spinning top look like it’s going in slow motion...it’s no wonder that people are searching for a little bit of simplicity and comfort in their daily routine.

When you make chicken and dumplings you find out very quickly the secret to culinary happiness that great cooks know. They know that it's not a waste of kitchen skills to make a tasty dish from another era. They know that you can take care of your soul in a world that tells your body to keep going at full speed, just by turning a few simple ingredients into a nourishing meal. This meal.

Chicken and Dumplings

Filling Ingredients:

1 whole chicken, cut up (3-4 pounds)
8 cups water
3 medium carrots (diced)
3 stalks celery, chopped
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
parsley
poultry seasoning
 

Cream of Chicken Soup Ingredients:  **(see note below)

3/4 cups additional chicken broth
1/4 teaspoon poultry seasoning
1/8 teaspoon onion powder
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon parsley
dash of paprika
3/4 cups milk
1/4 cup + 2 Tablespoons flour
 

Dumpling Ingredients:

2 cups flour
1 cup milk (whole milk)
1 Tablespoon baking powder
3 Tablespoons butter, softened
1/2 tsp. salt

Directions:

1. Place chicken in a large pot with celery, carrots, parsley, thyme, poultry seasoning, salt and pepper to taste. Cover with 8 cups of water.

2. Simmer for one hour, until tender. Remove the chicken and cool enough to remove the meat from the bone.

3. Return chicken meat to pot and broth.

4. Make the cream of chicken soup by boiling in a medium-sized saucepan: the 3/4 cups additional chicken broth, 1/2 of the milk, and the seasonings for about 2 minutes.

5. In a bowl, whisk together the remaining milk and flour. Add to boiling mixture and continue whisking briskly until mixture boils and thickens.

6. Add the cream of chicken soup to the chicken meat and broth in the large pot and simmer gently.

7. To make the dumplings mix flour, baking powder and salt. Work in the butter with fingertips. Gradually add the milk.

8. Roll into golf ball sized balls, then flatten to 1/2 inch thickness.

9. Drop carefully into the hot broth and simmer the chicken and dumplings 10 minutes longer, making sure to ladle broth over the dumplings to submerge them as they cook.

**Note: You many substitue one can of cream of chicken soup in place of the homemade version. If you decide to do this, skip steps #4 and #5. We recommend trying it at least one time with the homemade version.