Gloria’s Chicken and Dumplings

Five weeks until the daycare. I'm counting and I know I shouldn't count because counting makes time move slower — I learned this in the foster system, where counting days until a hearing or a move or a birthday just stretches the waiting until it's unbearable. But I count anyway. Five weeks. Thirty-five days. I will walk into a building and someone will hand me a room full of toddlers and say, here, these are yours for eight hours. The thought is terrifying. The thought is the best thing I've ever been terrified of.

I've been reading about toddler development at the library. The Prattville library is small and smells like old carpet and the children's section has a stuffed caterpillar that's been there since I was in middle school and was already falling apart then. I checked out two books — one on child development stages, one on activities for one-to-three-year-olds. The librarian, Mrs. Duncan, asked if I was expecting. I said no, I'm starting a job. She said, "At the daycare?" I said yes. She said, "Those kids are lucky." She doesn't know me. She doesn't know anything about me. But she said it like she meant it, and I put that sentence in the same drawer where I keep all the kind things people have said to me, which is a small drawer but not as empty as it used to be.

Wednesday night Gloria taught me chicken and dumplings. This is not a recipe you rush. You start with a whole chicken simmered in water with celery, onion, salt, pepper — let it go for an hour until the meat falls off the bone. You pull the chicken out, shred it, strain the broth. The dumplings are just flour, baking powder, salt, and shortening, cut in like biscuit dough, then you pinch off pieces and drop them into the simmering broth. They puff up, soft and pillowy, and the broth thickens around them into something that's not quite soup and not quite stew but is entirely comfort. Gloria says chicken and dumplings is what you make when someone needs to feel held but you can't hold them. Food that hugs you from the inside.

I need to feel held this week. Not because anything is wrong — nothing is wrong, everything is moving in the right direction for the first time — but because right directions are as scary as wrong ones when you've never had a direction at all. Gloria didn't ask why I needed it. She just made the dumplings and sat me down and said, "Eat, baby." And I did. And it helped. It always helps.

Gloria wrote the recipe down on a folded piece of notebook paper and tucked it into my coat pocket before I left that Wednesday night, and I’ve read it probably a dozen times since. It’s not a complicated recipe — it’s the opposite of complicated — but there’s a patience to it that I’m still practicing. If you’re in a season of waiting, of counting days toward something good and scary, this is the right thing to make. Start it in the afternoon. Let the house fill up with that smell. Let it take as long as it takes.

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 1 hr 30 min | Total Time: 1 hr 50 min | Servings: 6

Ingredients

1 whole chicken (3 1/2 to 4 lbs)
3 stalks celery, roughly chopped
1 medium yellow onion, quartered
2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus more to taste
1 teaspoon black pepper, plus more to taste
8 to 10 cups cold water
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup vegetable shortening, cold
3/4 cup whole milk
2 tablespoons fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped (optional)

Instructions

Build the broth. Place the whole chicken in a large stockpot with the celery, onion, 2 teaspoons kosher salt, and 1 teaspoon black pepper. Cover with 8 to 10 cups of cold water. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce to a low simmer. Skim off any foam that rises in the first 10 minutes.
Simmer low and slow. Cook uncovered at a gentle simmer for 60 to 75 minutes, until the meat is completely tender and falling from the bone. Do not rush this part.
Pull and shred the chicken. Using tongs, lift the chicken out and set it on a cutting board to cool slightly. Strain the broth through a fine-mesh sieve into a large bowl, discarding the solids. Return the strained broth to the pot. When the chicken is cool enough to handle, pull all the meat from the bones, discarding skin and bones. Shred the meat into bite-sized pieces and set aside.
Bring the broth back to a simmer. Return the pot of strained broth to medium heat. Taste and adjust salt and pepper. You want a steady, gentle simmer — not a rolling boil.
Make the dumpling dough. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and 1 teaspoon salt. Add the cold shortening and cut it in with a pastry cutter or two forks until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs, the same way you’d start a biscuit dough. Add the milk and stir just until a shaggy, soft dough comes together. Do not overwork it.
Drop the dumplings. Using a spoon or your fingers, pinch off rough tablespoon-sized pieces of dough and drop them directly into the simmering broth. Work quickly around the surface of the pot. Do not stir once they’re in.
Cook the dumplings. Cover the pot and cook for 15 minutes without lifting the lid. The dumplings will puff and become soft and pillowy. The broth will thicken naturally around them into something between a soup and a stew.
Add the chicken back. Gently stir the shredded chicken into the pot, nestling it between the dumplings. Simmer uncovered for 5 more minutes. Taste once more for salt and pepper.
Serve. Ladle into deep bowls, making sure everyone gets plenty of dumplings and broth. Scatter a little fresh parsley on top if you have it. Eat it while it’s hot.

Nutrition (per serving)

Gloria’s Chicken and Dumplings — Food That Hugs You From the Inside