Welcome to the always-tasty, and mouth-watering, Food Fridays! I’m excited to share with you some of my favorite recipes! For this first week, I’ve decided to share with you a dish that I grew up eating: Dumplings. It’s really easy to make and I’m happy to share my family’s recipe with you!

For this recipe, I don’t always measure the ingredients, but I will give you our recipe as it is written down. You can double the recipe to increase the amount of dumplings you make, which I like to do for leftovers for the next day.

Supplies that you will need to get started:

• A medium-sized pot
• Soup Mix (Lipton’s Soup Secrets Noodle Soup mix, Chicken Noodle Soup, Bouillon Cubes, etc.)
• A ladle/curved spoon to get the dumplings and soup out when it’s done

First, you want to put around 6 cups of water into the pot and add whatever you want for the soup, I use chicken flavoring soup. I use Lipton’s Soup Secrets Noodle Soup mix. If you don’t have that available, you can also use bouillon cubes or Chicken Noodle Soup. Just follow the suggested water amount directions on those packages. Turn your stove onto medium-high heat. Now your ready to mix the dumplings together!

Ingredients (Remember to double everything if you’re doubling the recipe!):

• 1/2 Cup Water
• 1/4 Cup Butter (half of a stick, softened to room temperature)
• 2/3 Cup Flour
• 1/2 Tsp Salt
• 2 eggs

Mix all of these ingredients in a bowl to the consistency of a thick paste. I don’t always use the 1/2 Cup of water. If it seems too runny, add more flour. If it seems too thick, add a small amount of water. Remember, when cooking, a little goes a long way! The thicker the batter is the harder the dumplings will be, and you also risk a more floury flavor. The runnier the batter is, the more little pieces floating around you will have when the dumplings are finished. Don’t be discouraged if you don’t get it right the first try! Cooking takes practice!

Next you want to make sure the soup is boiling on the stove, which it should be close to doing at this point. Once it’s boiling, you can go ahead and drop the dumpling batter into the soup. I use a 1/4 measuring cup to scoop up the batter and dump it into the soup. You want to dump it in close to the surface of the soup so that you don’t splash yourself with the boiling water.

Then you turn down the stove to medium heat and let it simmer for about 15 minutes. Don’t stir the dumplings for at least the first 10 minutes! I usually just leave them be and don’t stir them at all.

Once the 15 minutes are up, you are ready to enjoy! I season them with a dash of salt on top before I eat them. If you notice that they still have some batter in the middle, just put the dumplings back in and continue to simmer for a few more minutes.

For a savory twist, you can add pre-cooked chicken pieces to the soup either when you first mix the soup or before you drop in the dumpling batter.

Enjoy and let me know what you think about this recipe!