Chicken and Dumplings

We need food to survive.  Not only for our physical well-being, but mental, as well.  Food serves as a portal to our memories--the basis on which we build our lives, memories of events that shaped us.   Food shapes so much more than just the physical self!  The smell of food triggers the memories.  The taste can take us back to joyful events!   Food is an amazing thing--and preparing it is an art, whether it be fine art or rustic, cooking is an art that can be developed.

My Mom is an amazing cook.  Not fine dining fancy, but certainly satisfying the fancy of her family's appetite.  She learned by her mother's side, as did I.  And like me, Mom put her own stamp on family meals.  Mom has a great recipe for Chicken and Dumplings.  I loved coming home from school to the smell of the chicken stock reducing.  It's a true homemade recipe.  She wanted chicken and dumplings, but had never made it, so she just started throwing things together that seemed right.  Seems she was right!


My recipe card is quite stained--an indication of how good a recipe is.  I actually don't even use the card anymore.  Chicken and Dumplings is permanently in my brain.

My favorite 'Mom Recipes' are written in my scratchy script, dictated to me over the phone onto a 3X5 index card.   As she gave me the recipes, it would lead into one story or another, we'd end up laughing or crying, whatever the case may be.  Even sharing recipes triggers memories.

So....I call her own the phone.

Me:  Hi Mom.  What are you doing?
Her:  Oh nothing, just sitting here working on a baby blanket.  (she's crafty as well as a good cook)
Me:  Well, I was wondering, could you tell me how to make chicken and dumplings?
Her:  Oh well that's easy......

 

First you steam chicken in small amount of water until tender.  Take the chicken out of the pot and let it cool so you can put it apart.  To your water add carrots, celery, onion, salt and pepper.  Let that simmer for a while and put the chicken back in the pot.  For gravy, add flour, milk, salt and pepper and pour that in.  When all that boils, add the dumplings.  Then you just cook them until they are done.


That's it?   Uh.....really?  A million questions ensued.  How much salt, pepper, water?  How much onion, potato carrots?  Do you just dump the flour in?  What??  I'm thinking this is quite vague.

"Oh, just how ever much you think you'll need" or "Until it tastes good" were her replies.  Oh-kay...

Ummm.....not so helpful, or so I thought.  But that is how I learned to make chicken and dumplings and many other good tasting foods.  I learned to taste recipes, make sure they were well-seasoned, as Chef Ramsey would say.  Mom gave me the basics and I developed from there. 

Oh, I should add....the secret to the dumplings--refrigerator biscuits, pinched apart.  The flour Mom always shook out separately with the milk, then poured it into the bubbling broth. OH...OH...the other most important part.....reduce your stock after you take the chicken out, and before you put it back in.  That's where you get the flavor, reducing that stock!

I always found it funny that Mom developed her own Chicken and Dumpling recipe.  While giving me the recipe I learned that my mom doesn't even like chicken.  She'll eat it if she has to, but it's never a first choice.  Seems she grew up near a poultry processing plant.    I think it gave her chicken issues.

The End