We have an argument going on in my house. It's over dumplings. As in Chicken and Dumplings. When my wife and I got married I was surprised to find that her dumplings were thick and round and bread-like in the center. The dumplings I had known were as flat as a nickel, cut into squares, and sort of slippery.
I lived with this with only moderate complaining. But I missed the dumplings I was used to. So recently my wife relented and made a batch and I made a shocking discovery. She has ruined my children.
My children thought that the flat-style of dumpling was disgusting and refused to eat them. I tried an appeal to family heritage. It did not work. I tried equating the flat dumpling with the doughy strips on a cobbler, knowing that they like the gooey-ness of those. The chicken/peach comparison did not meet with success either. I appealed to Southern patriotism. My wife objected to this.
My irritated wife insisted that the thick bready dumplings were the true Southern dumplings and that my flat ones were a yankee concoction. I retorted that the flat dumpling was the true Southern dumpling and that hers were some sort of mutated German dumpling. This did not sit well since she has no Germanic limbs on her family tree and I do. She attempted to turn the argument using my German heritage as a weapon.
This was a specious argument however since the flat dumpling was descended through my mother's side of the family. A family that dwelled farther back in the Southern woods than any other. My mother's side of the family had only been out of the woods twice in the last 200 years. Once to send sons to fight for General Marmaduke when the yankees invaded and once to avenge Pearl Harbor.
A quick look at Google also showed that its top results for "Southern dumplings" were also of the flat variety. But I admittedly did not look very closely and questionable results. Unfortunately, neither my wife, or my children, were impressed with my high-tech evidence either.
I'm afraid that it's too late to save the flat dumpling for posterity in my family. Hundreds of years of flat dumpling history will end with my generation. A chain, hundreds of years long, leading deep into the backwoods of history, has been broken. A pretender will take the place of the true Southern dumpling in the heart of the generations to come.
Maybe the grandchildren can still be saved.
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11 comments:
I mistakenly thought all chicken and dumplings were southern. Now I find out some of them are German! Oh, well, I like both kinds of dumplings. I'm sorry your children were led astray, tho. Maybe they can come to appreciate cultural diversity in dumplings...
I mistakenly thought all chicken and dumplings were southern. Now I find out some of them are German! Oh, well, I like both kinds of dumplings. I'm sorry your children were led astray, tho. Maybe they can come to appreciate cultural diversity in dumplings...
No matter when this was posted. I'm looking to make these flat dumplings, for my husband. When his mother passed on, with her went these marvelous simple creations that he misses.
The family came from North Carolina and Maryland. It seems the same ingredients are used for both drop and rolled(flat)dumplings, it's all in how the dumpling is shaped. Is this true?
I have to agree that the flat dumplings are the true southern dumplins (No 'g' on purpose. :) ). My mother is from southern Florida and my dad is from Georgia. Flat dumplins are what I grew up with and now miss since my wife makes the ball variety. When I make a pot of my squirrel and dumplins (They taste just as good as Chicken & Dumplins, I swear!) the flat dumplins are the ones I make. My family won't eat them because they have squirrel but that just leaves more for me.
Aww! Many questions are now answered. I have been dying to make my great grandmothers "flat" dumplings, but have never been able to master it. They always end up the bready type.
Interesting to learn the flat type are German because there are strong German lines in my great grandmother's family.
I will still endeavor to master the German version because I loved them, but I have to confess I never met a dumpling I did not love & flat or bready I will never turn them down!
I grew up in northeastern Indiana from German & English stock. We always had the fluffy style, simmered dumplings and I only came across the flat kind, later, in the south.
I referenced this post in my blog at Fried Coffee in an article called .
http://blog.temporarychef.com/food/dumpling/#more-915
Alton Brown of "Good Eats" on foodnetwork did a show on this.
The flat ones are German and the fluffy ones are French. My family and I like the flat ones.
I just finished making the dumplings for chicken and dumplings. I learned to make them with flour, stock, and olive oil (no kdding). I know that is weird but my mom's Italian and my dad is from Texas. This was flat out my favorite food aa a child and I am making it today because it is also my son's and he has a terrible cold. I knead the dough a bit, it comes out a little stiff, then I roll it out thin as I can. I take the flattened dough and gently roll it up and then cut it so I can unroll it in strips. I cut all the strips into diamond shapes about 1 inch long and almost as wide. Nothing is better. I have never eaten any besides my mom's and mine.
I don't know about flat dumplings - I've never heard of them except in southern US recipes- but round dumplings are definitely not French! They're British - a kind of pudding, originally made with suet and descended from the great British pudding family, along with spotted Dick, haggis, fruit pudding, clootie dumpling, rag puddings and so on.
Puddings were a distinctly British food, the staple here from mediaeval times until the introduction of the potato from the new world (thanks!). A dumpling in a stew or soup is basically an unflavoured pudding. In Scotland we still make them with suet (mmm!).
For making kids eat flat dumplings - could you compare them to pasta? I've never had them but they look a bit similar to thick lasagne. I realise this is probably sacrilege, but it would be worth it it if it made them eat it.
Just to add a funny little fact that I got from a TV programme about American cookery - the Navajo in Arizona use dumplings in their stews - I don't know if they always did or if they picked it up from the settlers, but they've been doing it long enough to have a legend that if you make round dumplings you will be killed by hail! Their dumplings are neither flat nor round, but finger-shaped.
Dear Fellow Arkansan, I totally agree with you about this dumpling idea. Just wish your children could have been saved! I'm mentioning your blog post in my own: www.cheaposnobs.com.
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