ISO Help with Dumplings

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mumu

Senior Cook
Joined
Feb 14, 2012
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347
I was told that dumplings are just biscuit dough. I have a rec. for something made in the oven and they want drop biscuits(can make with bisquick or use can biscuits) or is it dumpling on top .....its stew mixed with sour cream and these biscuits or dumplings on top,and bake till brown. What are they called would you say? Biscuits or dumplings? How does one tell the difference? Thanks.
 
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Some people knock open a can of refrigerator biscuits, peel them off and drop them on top of the bubbling stew and call it dumplings. However, I think if they are moist, they're dumplings. If they are browned and crisp, even on top of a stew, I would call them biscuits.
The stew with sour cream sounds interesting.
 
Dumplings are chewier than biscuits IMO. Biscuit dough doesn't compare to dumplings in my world. My dumpling recipe is an egg beaten in a cup of milk and added to a cup of flour with some salt, stir til mostly smooth and drop by spoonfuls into soup or stew to cook. Nice and chewy.
 
The clue I see if if "bake til brown" on top that is biscuits. And the stew is then baked with them on top , and not covered.

If you want dumplings, then drop the dough in, and cover the dish until they are cooked, As dumplings, they will be more moist tbroughout and puff up from the steam created.

For a less doughy underside on the biscuits, cook the stew first, as per usual, either covered or oncovered. Then introduce the bisucuit dough the last 20 minutes or so. If you put the dough on a cold stew and then put in the oven, such as if you were reheating it, the bottoms come out soggy.

I prefer biscuits because you can make extra in a pan alongside and eat with butter and honey or jam.
 
What are they called would you say? Biscuits or dumplings? How does one tell the difference? Thanks.
I don't see why it would really matter one way or the other, but FWIW I consider biscuits to be a standalone item that's baked, while dumplings are dough that's cooked in liquid.
 
i did add the drop biscuits after the stew was in the oven awhile probably 20 min. then added the drop biscuits? and when they baked the bottom was still weird like but top was brown.
 
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i dont know if this is a joke but got a pm says there are also biscuit type dumplings? Has anyone heard of these? thanks
 
why is it u have to cover the dumplings why they are cooking. i know it steams them....but have seen where they dont. Is the texture bad if dont cover
 
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To me a dumpling is cooked in liquid and incorporated into the whole dish more like noodles. Biscuits are on top as a crust or baked separately on the side. I'd be calling yours biscuits.
 
This is a great question and has finally lured me out of my status as lurker on this excellent forum. I was born and raised in England and have spent the last half century or so in the US, so I am familiar with the many varieties of both "biscuits" in the American usage ("biscuit" means "twice baked" in its original Latin configuration. It does not rise and is a "cookie" in the US.) American biscuits, made of flour, baking powder, and fat are close relatives of the English dumpling in composition, but not in cooking method. All dumplings that I can think of, with the exception of the baked apple dumpling, are cooked in stock or saline. Popular European examples include potato dumplings and the tiny spaetzle from Germany and the pasta based gnocchi from Italy. English dumplings use ingredients that are almost identical to the U.S. Southern biscuit, except that they traditionally use suet, cow organ fat, instead of lard, which is pig organ fat.
The seasoned "lumps" (origin of "dumpling" are dropped into beef stew, where they sit totally submerged and double in size from the action of the baking powder. Yum.
I first saw the biscuit topping mentioned in an English cook book by Anne Willan (Chicken Classics, 1992), and when I was living in San Diego about 15 years ago, it covered what was laughingly called "steak and kidney pie."
I consider it inferior to a pastry topping in both flavor and consistency and it is certainly not a dumpling, but when i cook for my culinarily challenged daughter (but not her daughter, who, at eighteen, is a gifted cook) I will serve pot pies in ramekins with this "biscuit topping" fancied up with a few mild spices and some parsley, and it is quickly made and satisfying.
Cheers
 
Howdy, Phil!
Welcome to D.C.!
I agree with the opinion that it is not necessarily the dough but the cooking method that distinguishes your run of the mill biscuit from the run of the mill dumpling.
In my neck of the woods for as long as I can remember, dumplings were made of corn meal, usually in a fish stew.
Now before everyone jumps at me about chicken and dumplin's...let me just say that Mrs Hoot and I had many a long discussion about chicken and dumplin's. In my world, until I met Mrs Hoot...everyone (and I do mean everyone) in my family, and friends, and neighbors called that particular dish chicken pie. If butter beans were added it became butter bean pie. Mrs Hoot had never heard of this term being applied to what she had always known as chicken pie, or chicken pot pie, which has a top crust and involves all manner of vegetables in a savory, thick broth.
I have finally relented in the discussion and have learned to use the term chicken pie to refer to the delicious top crust delicacy called chicken pie. I also have learned to refer to chicken in a thick broth with boiled dough..chicken and dumplin's.
But I still think of those delicate, delicious corn meal dumplin's we made here when I was a kid. I have tried to duplicate them with varying degrees of success....
 
I actually vote for the OP's dish to have biscuits baked on top.
Funny, growing up eating Penn. Dutch cooking, something you all would call chicken and dumplings was called chicken pot pie. I guess it doesn't much matter what it is called as long as it is good!
 
not in keeping with mumu's original post, there are billions of asian people who have another definition of dumpling.

i guess i shouldn't start a pudding thread then ... :cool:
 
you, you, you, don't mean Devils Dumplings ala Black Adder, I double dog dare you to post the youtube:cool:
 
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