View Full Version : Chicken and Dumplings: Thank You, Trisha Yearwood
Bailey Guns
10-06-2017, 20:51
My wife and I have been married 28 years. She's a Yankee. By the Grace of God, I'm not. My mother and most of my family is from Alabama.
In Alabama, women folk know how to cook Chicken and Dumplings. You put all the chicken and such into a pot and the dumplings are little chunks of dough that cook in the mixture like...noodles, I guess.
Yankees do not know how to cook Chicken and Dumplings. My wife, a great cook, makes Chicken and...biscuits. She puts the dough on top of the liquid mixture and the dough cooks up like a biscuit. It's good...but it's not Chicken and Dumplings.
I've tried to tell her that's not correct for the bulk of the 28 years we've been married. We've had this argument so many times I've lost count. Enter: Trisha Yearwood and her cooking show. My wife is a fan. Or maybe, was a fan.
Tonight Trisha, who is NOT a Yankee as she's from Georgia, which is right next door to Alabama, made Chicken and Dumplings. And guess how she did it? That's right. Throw the dough into the mixture and cook it the correct way.
I was not watching the program so I wasn't aware of this. My wife made the egregious tactical error of telling me about it. It's gonna take a long time for the smug smile to leave my face and, yes, I'm going to remind her about it every chance I get. Or until she gets really pissed.
Thank you, Trisha Yearwood. I am vindicated at last.
Sounds like your life would have been different if you had married Trisha Yearwood.
Great-Kazoo
10-06-2017, 21:10
Sounds like your life would have been different if you had married Trisha Yearwood.
Wrong side of the tracks.
Aloha_Shooter
10-06-2017, 21:40
Alton Brown did a show on this around season 2 of Good Eats ("Don't Be Chicken O' Dumplings") and explained the differences between the northern style and southern style as coming from different parts of Europe. Both methods are historically correct.
Transcript of the show is available at http://www.goodeatsfanpage.com/season13/dumplings/dumbplings_tran.htm
Well, loyal viewers, your faithful host is pretty much doomed. You see, what my mom thinks chicken dumplings should be and what my mother-in-law thinks—knows that they should be— are, ... Well, let's just say that their views are somewhat conflicting.
So, why can't my mother's chicken and dumpling recipe abide that of my mother-in-law, or vice versa? Well, I'll tell you this. It's got nothing to do with chicken. You see, my mother and our family, going back a dozen generations, belong to the school of big, floaty, fluffy dumplings, a.k.a. "swimmers". While my mother-in-law and her kin, going back, I don't know, a thousand years, are of the hard, flat, and slippery dumpling school, a.k.a. "slickers."
Although my mother's family hails from the north Georgia mountains—Cornelia, to be exact—diligent research clearly shows that our style of dumplings hailed not only from north of the Mason-Dixon line, but ultimately eastern, in northern England, Norfolk, to be exact.
Now my mother-in-law's family is from north Carolina—Cornelius, to be exact—which is only 146 nautical miles northeast of Cornelia. Now there, their flat dumplings are more authentically southern and they descend from the hard dumplings of southern England, specifically Sussex. Which, I might add, was invaded in 477 A.D. by Saxons from Germany.
I grew up in Yankee country and I can tell you those Belgian and German woman make a mean chicken and dumplings.
My grandma was the best, Ma ain't bad either.
Who on earth makes chicken and dumplings by putting biscuits on top of chicken? That's like saying you made chocolate chip pancakes by spreading nutella on pancakes.
If one wanted chicken and biscuits, one could visit the fine dining establishment of Popeyes. But putting biscuits on top of chicken and referring to it as chicken and dumplings...heresy of the highest order.
My Grandma was of Dutch, German stock and a Quaker to boot from Ohio, guess how she made chicken and dumplings? That's right. Cooked like noodles WITH the chicken.
RIP Grandma Ruth. And God Bless Trisha Yearwood.
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Bailey Guns
10-07-2017, 08:14
Sounds like your life would have been different if you had married Trisha Yearwood.
I'm thinking more along the lines of Terri Clark...even if she is a Canuck.
My mom made it with the big, fluffy floaters on top, and sometimes with thick, fat homemade noodles in the pot too. OMG it was good! I'd KILL to know how to make it, or to be able to make 1/4 of the awesome stuff she used to cook. She was a farm girl from a very large family in Missouri, and she went to some cooking school when she was young.
In, not on, for the Dumplings, agree. My wife also makes Chicken and Butterball soup.
I'm thinking more along the lines of Terri Clark...even if she is a Canuck.
Does Terri Clark know how to make chicken and dumplings?
theGinsue
10-07-2017, 10:54
While I'm sure I did at some point, I never recall having chicken & dumplings (C&D) growing up in MO. My wifes family was from KY and her Aunt Wina was known throughout the family for making awesome chicken & dumplings (noodles IN). Most family get togethers would include a huge pot of C&D.
On one of our visits I got Aunt Winas recipe for making them and tried it at home a few months later (yes, homemade noodles IN the pot). My wife enjoyed them, but told me they weren't as good as her Aunts. On our next visit to KY I verified the recipe and watched how Aunt Wina made them - taking copious notes along the way. About a year later I tried making them again. Same result, very good but not as good as Aunt Winas. I resigned myself to the fact that I'd make good C&D but they'd never equal Aunt Winas. Aunt Wina passed away 3 years ago and I'm the only one who ever bothered to try to learn how she made this dish. While I know that they'll never be quite as good as hers, I'm happy that I can at least get in the ballpark.
Now, for another dish with a similar twist. I've seen dozens of recipes for cobbler whereas a pie crust is used on top. I learned how to make cobbler from my grandmother - a MO Southerner - and using pie crust is a pie, not a cobbler. Proper cobbler should have large dollops of a sort of drop bisquit type of dough dropped on top of the mix - no crust. The top of these "bisquits" gets crusted up but the bottom is soft and saturated with the juices of the fruit. I learned on, and still only make, blackberry cobbler. That's good eats.
StagLefty
10-07-2017, 11:05
Does Terri Clark know how to make chicken and dumplings?
Who cares after looking at her pics ? [ROFL2]
Bailey Guns
10-07-2017, 14:34
Who cares after looking at her pics ? [ROFL2]
Exactly. Who cares if she cooks?
And...good story, Ginsue.
Alton Brown did a show on this around season 2 of Good Eats
Another AB fan?! Kewl. [Dinner]
My Mother made a mean C&D. Through the years, I have made C&D but they weren't Her"s. Recently, I went on a C&D binge to make "Her" C&D. For a simple dish this was hard. Got close on the sixth try. Wintr is coming and time for round 2.
One of my favorite stories:
Had a friend who made the BEST green chili. He was Hispanic and this was his Mother's recipe. His wife could never quite make it the same. Good but not right. MIL's response was "Dear you can get close but you are a Gringo.".
The same for C&D?
I think the problem with people passing recipes from old to young is subtle modifications in the recipe. My grandma used to pinch and dash and eyeball most ingredients. My wife, she uses 40 measuring cups and spoons for most cooking. All of us over 40 should thank our lucky stars that our wives are trying and getting it close. I know some millennials do cook, but by and large the average twenty something girl is not interested in cooking. My friends with kids in their 20's, that age brags about not knowing how to cook. They seem to take pride in not knowing how to most things.
OtterbatHellcat
10-08-2017, 11:20
Like.
I think the problem with people passing recipes from old to young is subtle modifications in the recipe. My grandma used to pinch and dash and eyeball most ingredients. My wife, she uses 40 measuring cups and spoons for most cooking. All of us over 40 should thank our lucky stars that our wives are trying and getting it close. I know some millennials do cook, but by and large the average twenty something girl is not interested in cooking. My friends with kids in their 20's, that age brags about not knowing how to cook. They seem to take pride in not knowing how to most things.
If they can't do it via an app on their phone, they just can't do it.
My wife doesn’t cook so making the transition to a twenty something year old woman wouldn’t be terribly difficult.
Bailey Guns
10-08-2017, 11:57
^^ Strictly for nutritional purposes?
What else would I do with a good looking girl half my age?
I must say that I've never made chicken and dumplings- until this thread, I never realized there was a difference. As the spouse is diabetic, noodles and dumpling-like ingredients are a no-no. That being said, I did successfully pull off a pretty successful meal I dubbed "Chicken Panic" when I ended up working late and had to whomp up a meal for eight people that were arriving at our house in two hours- I shredded and dumped some canned chicken (that I had canned a year ago) in the bottom of a casserole dish, heated and added a layer of mixed vegetables, made a 'gravy' of cream cheese and chicken stock (and some crumbled bacon) and dumped it over the veggie layer and let it sink in. I quadrupled an almond-flour biscuit recipe and sort of plopped it on top, leaving spaces between the biscuits, sprinked shredded cheddar on top and threw it in the oven on 350 for 30 minutes.
Thomas, I've never heard of using pie crust for making a cobbler. My Grandma had the best rhubarb cobbler recipe. :)
Aloha_Shooter
10-08-2017, 22:25
Now, for another dish with a similar twist. I've seen dozens of recipes for cobbler whereas a pie crust is used on top. I learned how to make cobbler from my grandmother - a MO Southerner - and using pie crust is a pie, not a cobbler. Proper cobbler should have large dollops of a sort of drop bisquit type of dough dropped on top of the mix - no crust. The top of these "bisquits" gets crusted up but the bottom is soft and saturated with the juices of the fruit. I learned on, and still only make, blackberry cobbler. That's good eats.
I would tend to agree that a cobbler is not a pie but ... again going back to AB (especially since you said the magic phrase!), there are several different types of cobbler: http://www.goodeatsfanpage.com/season9/cobbler/cobbler_trans.htm
AB: Oh, well, I was thinking about cobbler.
DD: Well, we have Brown Betty.
AB: Who’s she?
DD: That’s baked fruit with layers of buttered bread crumbs.
AB: Okay, uh, what’s a buckle?
DD: That’s fruit cooked with yellow cake batter.
AB: A crisp?
DD: Oh, that is fruit topped with a mixture of butter, sugar, flour, and nuts or oats. It’s known as a 'crumble' in England.
AB: And yet these are all still cobblers. Okay, I have to ask about "the grunt".
DD: Love grunt. That is fruit topped with biscuit dough, ...
COOK: [off camera] Order up, Deb.
DD: ... and cooked on top of the stove to create a dumpling-like texture. It’s called "grunt" because that’s the sound it makes when it cooks.
COOK: [off camera] Order up, Deb.
AB: Very charming. What about a "pan dowdy"?
DD: That’s cobbler in which the dough is pressed into the fruit, creating an uneven, ...
COOK: [off camera] Deb! Order up!
DD: ... or dowdy appearance. KEEP YOUR SHIRT ON, HALE! I’LL BE RIGHT THERE! So, what will you have?
AB: Um, can I have just a minute to consider my order?
DD: Whatever.
AB: Wow, she didn’t mention that there was "surly tart" on today’s menu. Heh, heh. Surly ...
So, all of those things that she gave in that lovely recitation are all technically cobblers, which means that we could consider just about any device containing cooked fruit and dough that’s not a pie, to be a cobbler. Now where I grew up, a cobbler is usually a very deep dish application with layers of hot fruit interspersed amongst these kind of thick layers of crust. The crust is composed of a dough that’s kind of half pie dough and half biscuit, and, well, it’s ... let’s just blow this joint and go make some.
Of the types he mentions, the buckle and the crisp are what I'm most used to making as a cobbler. Boy Scouts typically make buckles for peach cobbler. I always found canned peaches were too sweet for my taste so I liked to make a crisp-style cobbler using fresh apples (preferably 3 different varieties but I digress). I prefer the crisp style for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is that I can make the mix for the topping ahead of time and don't have to worry about refrigeration for it while camping. What Ginsue is referring to is the ones AB and and Deb called a grunt -- to be fair, the dough AB refers to is kind of halfway between biscuit dough and pie crust so that may be why the lazy people resorted to store-bought pie crusts for the top (they may argue that the lack of a bottom crust means it's not truly a pie).
http://www.goodeatsfanpage.com/season9/cobbler/cobbled(21).jpg
Our family's food heritage does not include chicken & dumplings. I know what I like, and the dumplings are closer to pasta than biscuits.
The only cobblers we had with any frequency were blackberry, and they had dobs of biscuit dough on top...which apparently is a "grunt".
I do like peach and apple cobblers in what appears to what's posted above as "crisps".
I also know who BG's fantasy crush is.
This thread has been very educational. Almost "too" educational.
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Our family's food heritage does not include chicken & dumplings.
Mine neither. Mine includes stuff like gumbo, etouffee, and boudin.
Mine neither. Mine includes stuff like gumbo, etouffee, and boudin.Oh, you lucky guy. That's some good eating.
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Bailey Guns
10-09-2017, 06:55
I also know who BG's fantasy crush is.
Which one?
Biscuits on top of chicken = chicken and dumplings:
https://img.buzzfeed.com/buzzfeed-static/static/2017-02/27/6/tmp/buzzfeed-prod-fastlane-03/tmp-name-2-18549-1488194344-2_dblbig.jpg
Aloha_Shooter
10-09-2017, 08:33
Exactly. Who cares if she cooks?
I also know who BG's fantasy crush is.
Which one?
Terri Clark is a pretty woman but I'm still all about Martina McBride ...
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