Chicken Once, Chicken Twice, ...

It's not chicken soup with rice, although I love that too.  No, my family's favorite soup is Chicken Soup with Dumplings.

I started with my mother's recipe long ago and over the years have changed it up a little bit as I've acquired kitchen savy.  

We had chicken more and more often the older I got.  My mom told me once that when she was young, they didn't often have the chicken breast but the "lesser" parts -- thigh, drumstick, etc. I think -- but as chicken became more of a staple in America, and the white meat more available, we had chicken breast a lot at my house.  My mom would put lemon pepper and butter on them and bake them in their skins.  They were good.

Fast forward to now and I have to say, I'm not a fan of the chicken breast.  Dry and mealy unless treated very carefully.  I'm not usually one to baste my chicken in butter as mom did (too calorie conscious) so baked chicken breasts are just out for me.  I usually poach those boneless skinless ones and use 'em in something else.  Now, thighs?  I can get behind some boneless thighs -- grilled, stewed.  It's come full circle.

Enter my CSA and their free range whole birds.  I can taste the difference between these birds and grocery store chicken breasts and I love free range bird.  I buy extra when they have them and they are absolutely worth the money.  Here's one of the things I do with a whole chicken.  Perfect for colder temps.

Mom's (Almost) Chicken Soup with Dumplings

• 1 medium roasting chicken
• 1T seasoned salt (I use Lawry's)
• celery tops
• 1t Penzey's Shallot Salt
• 1 bay leaf
• 1t garlic powder
• 1/2 t white pepper
• 1 1/2 c diced celery
• 1 1/2 c carrot coins (I rough chop peeled baby carrots but any carrots are fine.  If you peel them, wash 'em first and put the peels in the stock.)
• 3 c Bisquick baking mix
• 1 c milk
• salt and pepper

Baking time: 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 hours depending on the chicken.  Stovetop time: 35 to 45 minutes.

A Note about the pan:  I have a pan like this pan, technically a Dutch oven I think, and I use it for the whole dish.  You need something shallow enough to roast in, wide enough to accommodate lots of dumplings and deep enough to accommodate soup.  Or you need multiple pans...

A Note about the dumplings, which are not the usual kind but drop biscuits.  Faster and easier than rolled dumplings, which my family finds gummy.  Just warning you.

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Pat the seasoned salt all over the outside of the bird and in it's cavity.  If possible use the pan you'll make the soup in to bake the bird until just done -- 165 in the thigh or until the drumstick wiggles pretty good.  Pull it out and let it cool enough to handle it and take most of the meat off the carcass and put it and all the skin and leavings back in your pan on the stove top.  Refrigerate the meat to use later in the dish.
2. If you have time, put the carcass back in the oven for 15 or twenty minutes at 400 and get it nice and brown.  This step is worth your extra time.  Browned carcass and skin makes superior stock.  Just sayin'.  If you don't have time to add this step, just go ahead -- it'll still be really good.
3. Pour 6 or so cups of water into the roasting pan over the carcass and scrape up the bits from the bottom of the pan.  
4. Chop the top 3 inches (the leafy part) off of your celery bunch and toss it in the broth.  Add the shallot salt, bay leaf, garlic powder and white pepper to the stock and boil for 15 or 20 minutes while you dice the celery and chop the carrots.  Longer if you want, just watch the water level.  You can't do this part too long -- yummy stock just gets better.  Sometimes, if I'm feeling gourmet, I'll add a glug of sherry at this point.  Sherry and poultry are a match made in heaven.  And please use drinking sherry, not cooking sherry.  Please?!
5. Strain the stock through a fine sieve or through several layers of cheese cloth and return it to the pot.  Throw away the carcass and bones and skin now.   
6. Add to the stock the carrots and celery and diced chicken you pulled from the carcass.  Check the stock for saltiness and adjust to taste.  You may want to add water at this point so you'll have enough for soup -- eyeball it. Bring soup to a bare boil -- more than a simmer but not rolling.
7. Mix Bisquick and milk.  I use a small scoop to drop the dumplings one by one into the boiling soup.  Salt and pepper the tops of the dumplings and let them cook in the soup for 10 minutes covered and 5 minutes uncovered.  

The only complaint I get about this soup is that it's too hot to eat when I serve it.  Which I do right when the dumplings are cooked through.  They thicken the stock a little and a burned roof of the mouth is worth it I think.  

I used to make only a single recipe of dumplings but now I do a recipe and a half since everyone goes back for extra dumplings.  They're pretty good the second day too, if they last that long.  

This recipe is actually a pretty quick dinner, with a little planning.  I usually bake the chicken after carpool, around 4 p.m.,  and I can even run an errand or two while it's in the oven.  My biggest problem is remembering to thaw the bird!  The 45 minutes at the stove at the end are no more than I spend making any other dinner.  

Can you use canned stock and cooked chicken?  Sure.  Still good.  Will the soup be better if you make your own stock from a bird you roast yourself?  Um.  Yes.  Yes.  Yes.

Happy weekend!

Comments

[Joy]

Oh YUMMM ... sounds fantastic, and *real* dumplings (down here when they say dumplings, it's noodles). Just picked up 2 stewing hens at Soulard today - this may happen to 1 of them. Other's going in the freezer for later :^)

[Carole]

Sounds delicious and perfect for this time of year.

[Bridgett]

The CSA has totally changed the way I look at chicken. Chicken once and twice instead of roast the danged thing with veggies and only chicken once...We had chicken gumbo this past week and then chicken stock to make risotto and then creamed chicken with homemade dressing last night. My family likes the chicken and dumplings too, real ones (Joy: my mother in law means noodles, too, which is disconcerting), although mine don't do well reheated. So I only make enough for that night and then make more as needed. Hmmm.