St. Sam's and St. Bede's Recipe Pages
                Bon Appetit!
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Fricasee Chicken and Dumplings

1 broiler-fryer, cut up
2 cups water
2 chicken boullion cubes
1 med. onion, chopped
2 ribs celery, diced
2 bay leaves
1 t. seasoned salt
1/2 t. seasoned pepper
2 T. flour
dumpling batter

Simmer chicken covered with boullion, water, celery, bay leaf & ssnd salt and pepper 
for 45 min. or until chicken is tender.  Thicken liquid with flour blended with a little 
cold water (may need more flour than the 2 T for thickening).  Drop dumpling batter by  
tablespoonfuls onto chicken pieces.  
Cover and steam 10 minutes, or until a toothpick tests clean.  
Serves 4.

Dumpling Batter

1 tsp. baking powder
1 cup sifted cake flour (or 1 c-2T sifted all-purpose flour = 7/8 c sftd a-p flour)
1/2 t. salt
1 T. shortening, margarine, or butter
3 T. milk
1 egg
2 T. chopped parsley 
1 T. finely cut chives
(I usually increase the parsley and chives--those amounts work fine for
dried, but not for fresh)

Combine flour, baking powder, salt.  Cut in shortening.  Add parsley and
chives.  With fork, beat egg with milk.  Stir into first mixture to blend.

Only serves 2 who really like them--I usually double the dumpling recipe when cooking for more 
than one, but they don't make great leftovers, so I wouldn't double it feeding one--I'd make new 
dumplings bringing the leftover gravy, maybe stretched with water or canned broth, back to a
simmer.  Also, the chicken and gravy can be stretched to more than four, depending on how you cut 
up the chicken.

Make sure nobody eats a bay leaf--can be dangerous--best removed when dishing out.

This is a lower fat (and cheaper at the store) version of the classic fricaseed chicken--the 
original was made with an old fat hen, and is much higher in fat, and yellower--also the hen is 
tougher and takes longercooking, and more flavorful, and all the fat makes the dish much yellower-
-the boullion cubes are to compensate for the shorter cooking and less flavor in the young fryer, 
and if the beige color isn't appetizing toyou, you might want to add a drop or two of yellow food 
coloring when thickening the gravy.

From: Sibyl Smirl 
Date: Wed, 14 Feb 2001 
Subject: Re: Chicken and Dumpliings