Easy Chicken And Dumplings

Ingredients:

Chicken and Broth
1 whole chicken
1 large onion, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
1 celery stalk, chopped
3 - 4 garlic gloves, crushed
salt and pepper

Dumplings broth
Anne's Dumplings, frozen pastry strips

Cooking Instructions

Chicken and Broth

Place chicken in stock pot. Add vegetables and seasoning. Cover with water. Bring to a boil, turn down heat. Cook until the chicken is tender and the meat is falling from the bone. Remove chicken from stock. Set aside on a baking sheet and allow to cool. Carefully strain the vegetables from the hot stock.

Dumplings

Bring the stock back up to a low boil. Begin adding strips of Anne's Dumplings to the pot 3 or 4 at a time. With a long handled spoon move them around in the stock gently allowing them to begin to cook through before adding more. Once all of the pastry strips are in turn the heat down to a simmer. Check and stir often. Dumplings will settle to the bottom and stick and scorch. Scorched dumplings are not good. While the dumplings are simmering, pick the meat from the chicken and shred or tear into bite size pieces. Add the meat to your dumpling pot. At this point you can also add a small package of frozen peas and carrots. The bright colors dress up the dish and make it more interesting to the eye. As the dumplings cook they will absorb a lot of the stock. If the stock remains thin like soup you can add a can of cream of chicken soup to get a creamier consistency. If it gets thick, beyond stew like, add stock (or water) to thin it out. Add a can of cream of chicken soup to get a creamy consistency. You can add a few peas and carrots to add color. Before serving, taste the dumplings. Dumplings need salt, you may have to salt the pot while it simmers. Something my old Aunt's did to dress up the dumpling pot - Once the chicken and dumplings are cooked make a pastry crust and seal the top of the pot. Brush with butter and bake like a pie. It is so nice to break through the crust and scoop up a creamy helping of the chicken and dumplings.


Note: For noodle soup you simply need a quart of stock and some egg noodles. Put the chicken carcass into another pot with water and those limp cooked vegetables and set to boil again. Believe me there is still a lot of flavor in there to cook out. Strain the broth and place back into a clean pot. Bring the stock to a boil, add flat egg noodles, cook until tender.