This dish is not just American and classic, but it’s also among the most comfortable foods you’ll ever taste. What’s even better is that this dumpling recipe can be used with almost any soup or stew.
| Prep Time: | 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 1 hr 45 mins |
| Total Time: | 2 hrs |
| Servings: | 4 |
| Yield: | 4 servings |
Ingredients
- 1 (3 to 3 1/2 pound) whole chicken
- 2 ½ quarts cold water
- 1 large carrot, cubed
- 1 stalk celery, chopped
- 1 onion, chopped
- 3 sprigs fresh thyme
- 1 bay leaf
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, or as needed
- salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
- ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper, or more to taste
- ½ cup creme fraiche
- ½ cup milk
- 2 teaspoons chopped fresh thyme leaves
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups self-rising flour
- 4 sprigs thyme, for garnish
Instructions
- Place chicken in a Dutch oven. Add water, carrot, celery, onion, 3 sprigs of thyme, and bay leaf. Bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 1 hour. Remove chicken from dutch oven and transfer to a bowl; set aside to cool.
- Increase heat and bring the stock to a simmer. Skim off any chicken fat that appears on top of the stock and reserve in a bowl. Combine 2 to 3 tablespoons of the reserved fat with flour in a small bowl; stir to make a paste, adding more flour if needed. Add the chicken fat and flour mixture to the stock. Reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes.
- Remove chicken meat from the carcass and add to the stock. Season with salt, black pepper, and cayenne pepper to taste. Continue simmering for 10 to 15 minutes.
- Whisk creme fraiche, milk, 2 teaspoons of thyme leaves, and eggs together in a large bowl. Stir in self-rising flour until almost entirely incorporated; do not overmix.
- Scoop large dollops of dumpling mixture on top of the chicken stock. Increase heat slightly to medium-high. Cover and simmer until dumplings appear light and fluffy, and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 10 to 15 minutes. Serve garnish with thyme sprigs.
- If you don’t have self-rising flour (which does work better here) you can use 2 cups all-purpose flour sifted with 3 teaspoons baking powder and 1 teaspoon fine table salt.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 750 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 60 g |
| Cholesterol | 217 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 4 g |
| Protein | 44 g |
| Saturated Fat | 14 g |
| Sodium | 1012 mg |
| Sugars | 6 g |
| Fat | 37 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Super yummy! Never added eggs to dumpling batter and I really like the result. Also appreciated learning how to make “self-rising” flour out of all purpose. Will make this again and again. Thank you, Chef John. I’ll be hunting down your jalapeño vinegar recipe, too!
Perfect , will do again
I’ve never had a chicken and dumpling soup/stew that didn’t have potatoes and peas, so I had to add it. Couldn’t imagine it without them.
Always love having this meal.
The dumplings were my first and I was very happy with how they turned out as was my husband. Could have been thicker but was delicious!
I used 2 breasts & 4 thighs, all bone-in, skin-on, instead of a whole chicken. We like a thicker stew, so I doubled the flour to thicken it more, and did as another reader suggested and used sour cream (what I had) and buttermilk in my dumplings. I had never used eggs in either dumplings or biscuits, but the reviews were so good I went ahead with it as written – and they were great! Big & fluffy and delicious. Thanks for this recipe!
Excellent recipe. I used about 3c roasted chicken that I had from a roasted chicken.
Made as directed. I have a hard time cooking so follow recipes exactly. The broth was flavorless. I just looked at the main number of reviews at the top and if I’d read through them I would have found that the broth is flavorless.
I really like this recipe and made a few modifications because I didn’t have all the ingredients and my wife had a dairy sensitivity. I used chicken breasts instead of a whole chicken. I used way too much chicken, so I’d recommend only doing about 2 – 2 1/2lbs. I also substituted a non-dairy coconut-based yogurt for the crème fraiche (using the rationale that coconut has a high fat content), as well as almond milk for regular milk. It worked just fine; the dumplings were a perfect consistency and rose just fine. I’m sure like anything else, it tastes better with the real deal, but it seemed great to us. I found 2 1/2 cups of cold water to not be enough liquid, so I kept adding accordingly to get a good ratio of chicken and veggies to broth. I think this is likely a result of using too much chicken, which may render this a moot point if you follow the advice above. This was fun to make and the perfect comfort food for a cold, late November meal.
I used sour cream instead of creme fresh and dried thyme instead of fresh. Perfect and easy!
Great basic recipe! For those who need a more flavorful broth, adding stock or bouillon is a good idea however buying a better “bird” definitely helps with the flavor. It was worth it.
Delicious. Made mostly as directed, but ended up with a 6lb chicken so I doubled up on other ingredients. We had leftover stew that I heated up two days later and this time I used the “Rolled Dumplings” recipe on this site and we really liked the dumplings from that recipe better than the ones here, but I’ll make the stew from this recipe again. Only change I’ll make to the stew is to double up on the veggies. Careful with the cayenne pepper, it’s great but it does a long way so make sure you add it to taste. We used about 3/4 tsp, but again we doubled the water and everything else.
Fantastic recipe, the chicken was so tender and flavorful! I will cut down the cayenne next time to 1/4 teaspoon as some bites were a little zippy for my family but this is another go Chef John’s keepers!
Made this Chicken and Dumplings last night for my family and they all loved it! The seasoning was neutral so everyone could adjust to make it their own. Thank you Chef John!
Didn’t have chicken breasts so used thighs, very good recipe! Supper flavour!
simply amazing
It needs something. I tasted it like he said & added some salt. Thought that’d be enough, it wasn’t. I’m thinking the suggestion of adding cream of chicken soup or something to thicken up the broth. I’ve only had chicken & dumplings once before, and those weren’t remarkable either. This dinner was edible but sort of bland & too thin broth. We did extra green beans to add a little something to this dinner. Oh & I had to put the whole thing in the oven for ~ 15 min at 350 to make the dumplings less gooey.
I made and it turned out great. Changes: just 2 of us eating, so I used 4 big drumsticks. In the bisquits part, I used bisquik and ommitted the 2 eggs. YUM
Chef John recipes never disappoint, It was delicious! I did add a bit more flour because I like the soup thicker.
I’m not new to chicken and dumplings and followed with more veges because I like it that way but his dumplings were awesome
Made this a super long time ago and don’t remember the criticisms, will update my review when I make it again, but this is definitely the best chicken and dumplings recipe! I made my soup thicker due to my preference but followed everything else exactly. The dumplings especially are just so wonderful, we love the airy texture!