Stewed Chicken & Dumplings

One of my grand children's favorite meals when they come to our

house is my stewed chicken and dumplings.

I learned how to cook this dish from my Great Aunt Julia Baker,

with the help of her niece, my mother.

Anyone can stew a chicken, but what truly makes this dish is the dumplings!

Aunt Julia and Uncle Joe were both from pure Hungarian stock. Each of their parents came straight from Hungary.

They lived on his father's farm and took care of his parents (both of whom never learned English) and worked the farm.

One of my fondest memories of my Great Aunt Julia is her cooking.
She had a knack for making a truly great meal out of leftovers or stretching what she had on hand to feed company.

My Great Uncle Joe was quite an avid hunter and many times the "stewed chicken and dumplings" that she served was made out of canned pheasant or rabbit that he had shot and they had canned and stored.
When our family dropped in for a Sunday visit, one of our favorites was this dish. Mom tried and tried to copy her Auntie’s dumplings but couldn't get her to write down a recipe because she cooked by measuring the ingredients by using her hands and eyes.

One day Mom decided that she was going to learn how once and for all. We loaded up the car with all of the necessary ingredients and threw in some bowls and measuring devices just to make sure there would be enough, then I drove her to Aunt Julia's. We talked Auntie into making them while we switched bowls with her and measured the ingredients and wrote them down.

It took many tries to get it right, but we had a ball, and ate a lot of buttered dumplings.

With a little practice you can make this special treat a part of your family’s meals. And it’s a great meal extender for when extra guests show up for dinner. It’s fast and simple. And it also goes great with chicken, with or without the gravy.

Hungary boasts of having 116 types of dumplings of different tastes and textures and traditional uses. This is just one of them. I wish I could remember the Hungarian name for them, but since I can't I will just call them:

Hungarian Dumplings

1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
2-3 eggs

Fill a Dutch Oven half full of water and bring to a boil.

Mix dry ingredients, add the eggs and milk, mix well.

Dip a teaspoon into the boiling water

and then scoop out about 1/2 of the teaspoon full of batter

and immerse into the boiling water and gently shake spoon to release batter.

Repeat until batter is gone.

Cook until done (about 3-4 minutes after last dumpling is added)

As you can see the water foams up. If your pan isn't high enough

you may need to turn down the heat.

and remove and drain them.

Rinse with cold water to remove foamy coating.

"VIOLA" (pronounced wa-la')

Dumplings should be chewy inside and slippery outside with an egg noodle flavor. Coat with butter and serve as a side dish.

Or fix them as I do, unbuttered with stewed chicken and gravy.

Now for the rest of the dish.

In another Dutch Oven cover a cut-up chicken with water.

Add salt (less if you use one of them store bought ones with a saline solution already injected in the meat) and pepper. For a little color add some dried parsley.

Cover and bring to a boil and simmer for 1-2 hours or until chicken is just ready to fall off the bones.

Just before the chicken is done is when you make the dumplings. (Do NOT make the batter until the water is at a full boil.)

Remove the chicken.

Add 3-4 heaping teaspoons of corn starch (traditionally use flour, but I like the corn starch better) to 2/3 cup of milk and stir until dissolved. (cooking hint: add a little milk to all gravies to make the oil and water blend better, Oh you want another, ok, add a drop or two of yellow food coloring to enhance the eye appeal of any chicken gravy. What, MORE? Alright, if you need more flavor add some chicken boullion (omit the salt) or boil the chicken in chicken stock instead of water)

Pour into stock while stirring to make a thin gravy. Repeat if necessary.

Serve and add additional salt and pepper to taste.

Now eat until full and then sit back contented and comforted in knowing that you just served a meal full of hundreds of years old tradition.

Soup & Bicuits

Okay, call me a copycat if you must. But after writing the Vegetable Soup blog http://toooldcripples.blogspot.com/2008/10/try-ityoull-like-it.html and then Ang making a batch, I just had to make some myself. The soup has aged in the refridgerator for 3 days now, blending all of the flavors into SUPER soup. And I'm telling you it is DELICIOUS!!!

The only change I made was to include some of my paternal Grandfather's favorite "sodie biscuits", these were a MUST whenever he made up a batch of soup. And I admit, he made a believer out of me. I just love these things. He used to roll them out thin and made them more like a cracker than a biscuit, but their purpose was to "soak up the juice". I make them thicker because that's the only way wifey likes them. And everybody knows, "If Momma Ain't Happy, NObody's Happy".

So here's the Soda biscuit recipe;

Soda Biscuits Recipe

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon cream of tartar

1/2 Tablespoon shortening

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup milk

Mix all dry ingredients together, cut in shortening, add milk and mix to form a soft dough. Roll out on floured pastry board to a thickness of 1/2 inch. Cut with biscuit cutter. Place biscuits on greased baking pan. Bake in hot oven (425) for about 15 minutes.

Make them thinner and they get harder. Grandpa used to make’m like a thick cracker and used them only for soups or stews.

Try It....You'll Like It

My mother-in-law made the BEST vegetable beef soup. I often told her she could open a restaraunt and serve only this soup (and fresh homemade bread) and make a fortune.
It's rich and tasty, but may not be "healthy" by your doctors point of view.
I would come home after a long, cold day at work and this soup was the best cure both mentally and physicaly for the days woes. A comfort food beyond compare.

Vegetable Beef Soup

2 Gallons Water
1 1/2 lb. soup bone (BEST) or 2-3 lbs. rib shanks
3 lb. well marbled, beef chuck roast (fatty as possible)
3 Tbls. salt
1 Tbls. pepper
2 cups diced onion
1 1/2 cup diced celery
1 large rutabaga diced
2 cups diced carrot
1 med. Cabbage chopped
2 - 28 oz. cans diced tomatoes
3-4 lbs. potatoes, about 2 quarts
beef bouillon cubes

Boil soup bone for about an hour in the water. While this is cooking, trim fat from the roast, cut into chunks and add to the pot. Cube the meat, reserve.
Remove bones and trim any meat & dice into cubes, Return all meat and bones to the pot.
Add salt & pepper.
Add onions. celery, rutabaga, carrots, cabbage & tomatoes and simmer for at least an hour.
Add potatoes last hour of cooking.
This soup is best if cooked all day & then reheated.
Add vegetables in order as you cut them up, this gives proper cooking time to each vegetable and works out better than just dumping them in all at once.
Remove fat chunks and add bouillon cubes if necessary before serving.
Makes a large pot of soup.

Cabbage Recipes

Well it's that cool rainy time here in Michigan, which means that it is time for "Comfort Foods". Since so many of you like recipes and cabbage dishes are my favorites, here are a couple. No pictures but plenty of flavor.

Mock Boiled Dinner (Cabbage & Bacon)

1/2 large or 1 small cabbage
10 strips of bacon
4 whole allspice berries
1 Qt. chicken stock
salt and pepper

Slice cabbage in 1" strips. Line the bottom of a 10"x 15"x 2" glass casserole dish with half of the bacon.
Layer sliced cabbage on top, add chicken stock, salt and pepper to taste & allspice berries.
top with remaining bacon. Bake uncovered at 375 degrees for 1 hour. Serve.

Cabbage Casserole or Un-Stuffed Cabbage

1 1/2 lbs. ground beef
1 lg. onion, chopped
1 head cabbage, chopped
1/4 c. uncooked rice, regular or long grain
1 can tomato soup + 1 can water
1 T. brown sugar
salt and pepper

Brown meat with onion; drain. Grease a casserole dish with butter or margarine. Layer cabbage, meat, rice, cabbage, meat, rice, ending up with cabbage on top. Combine soup, water, brown sugar, salt and pepper. Pour mixture over cabbage. Cover and bake at 350 for 1 hour.

Critters & Food

My wife and I were standing on the front porch this morning planning our day and spotted this guy flying from across the road.

It prompted me to grab the camera. We don't see many Praying Mantis' around here, but I know they are around.

I think that this is what attracted him because he flew by our morning glorey encrusted sunflower.

The chickens came around the front porch too. One of our Barred Rock Roos and a couple of Rhode Island Red hens and a Grey Leghorn hen.

And Mr. Americanna too.

Gracie was taking a nap under a Hollyhock.

And Abbey was napping on the porch.

Harley and Bear were sleeping inside, while Smeagol the Beagle was off for her morning walk.

Ethel our male cockatiel (we named him too young and we were told it was a female by the store owner) was bouncing around (or maybe it was me).

Yesterday we made a large roaster full of stuffed cabbage. Yum Yum!

Earlier for lunch, I made an old family favorite, Yellow Wax Bean Soup.

I don't know if it is a true Hungarian recipe because I am sure the recipe has been modernized somewhat, but my mother's family made it for generations. A little bit of Heaven in a bowl.

YELLOW WAX BEAN SOUP

2 lbs of fresh yellow wax beans, cut up
4 stalks of fresh dill, (or more to taste)
1 can evaporated milk
1 stick of margerine
2 tablespoons flour

Put the beans and dill in a large pot with enough water to cover. Boil until tender crisp. remove from heat and allow to cool a bit.

Add the evaporated milk. Stir well, and bring soup back to a boil.
In a saucepan, melt the margerine and stir in the flour, cook for 2-3 minutes until thickened. then add to beans.
Add more water if too thick.

Serve and season to taste with salt and pepper, and if you are really traditional a little vinegar.

I usually omit all seasonings and enjoy just the light flavors of the beans and dill. To those who usually heavely season foods, this will be a very bland dish.

Salsa Recipe

One day I decided to try to can some salsa. I couldn’t find a decent recipe so I called
Mom to see if she had one. She didn’t so together we worked this one out over the phone.
Well that year we had very watery tomatoes and after cooking them “forever” without getting
the consistency I was looking for and with the vegetables getting tender I decided to add the
tomato paste and “Viola”. After allowing it to age a WHOLE week I finally opened a jar.
It had turned out perfect. With just the right consistency and tender-crisp veggies and just enough bite (about mild to medium). I have been using this recipe since 1990 and it has always turned out great. Remember that if you use a low acid tomato to use more vinegar. I usually use a mix of tomatoes from beefsteaks to cherry. The cherry tomatoes give it a naturally sweet flavor. Around our house an open jar is an empty jar, so try a batch and see how long it lasts.

10 Quarts chopped peeled tomatoes
3 Cups diced green peppers
1 1/2 Cups diced red or yellow sweet peppers
1 Bunch of celery diced
4 Cups of onion diced
1 Head of garlic chopped fine
2 Cups of yellow hot banana peppers diced or vary amount or type of hot pepper to your taste.
2 ½ Tablespoons of salt
2 Cups of vinegar
1 Cup of sugar
2 Tablespoons of chili powder or more to taste
4 Tablespoons of paprika
3 – 6 oz. cans of tomato paste (or more or less as needed)

Cook down tomatoes until moderately thickened. Adjust seasonings to taste.
Then add all other ingredients, except tomato paste.
Cook until vegetables are almost tender.
Add enough tomato paste to thicken.
Pour into hot sterile jars and seal.