As the temperatures continue to drop outside, I thought I would share my recipe for homemade chicken and dumplings. After a long day, this never fails to remind me of sitting on my parents couch bundled up in blankets and laughing the night away. So much of what we do at NC Planning is geared toward letting families have peace of mind so that they may get back to living, laughing and loving.
LCM’s Homemade Chicken and Dumplings
Chicken:
1 chicken cut into about 8 pieces (about 2 to 2 ½ pounds)
4 ribs of celery
1 large onion, chopped but not too fine
2 bay leaves
2 chicken bouillon cubes
½ teaspoon of salt
¼ teaspoon of black pepper
¼ teaspoon of garlic powder
Place cut chicken and remaining ingredients listed above in large pot. Add 4 quarts of water, bring to a simmer and let simmer about 35-45 minutes. I typically remove chicken at 40 minutes and cut into a thick piece to ensure fully cooked. Remove chicken from pot and let cool. Separate meat from the bone and return to pot. Keep warm.
Dumplings:
2 cups of all purpose flour
1 teaspoon of salt
ice water
Mix flour and salt in bowl. Place in pile in center of large bowl. Slowly drizzle in water tablespoons at a time until the dough begins to pull away from the bowl. Form dough into a ball and roll out on a flat surface. Cut into small 1 inch pieces. Depending upon the size of dumplings you prefer pull pieces apart into smaller pieces. I typically pull apart into two ½ inch pieces.
Before adding your dumplings, add a can of cream of celery soup to the pot and bring to a simmer. Depending upon preferred thickness of your gravy you may want to add additional corn starch by adding 2 tablespoons of cornstarch to ¼ of water and stir into pot.
Once simmering, add in dumplings and allow to continue to simmer. Be careful not to stir too much once the dumplings are added. Allow 5 minutes for the dough to cook and ENJOY!
