The following story and recipe were contributed by Theresa Smith.
My memories of Abbie’s Chicken and Dumplings
by Theresa Smith
This recipe is my favorite because it was the first thing I learned to cook from my grandmother, Abbie. I called her by her first name because she didn’t want to be considered old enough to be a grandmother. She was always loads of fun.
Every summer I visited her and some of my best memories are of her and her friends playing cards. They all smoked cigarettes, drank a beer, and would slip in an occasional cuss word or two (if Abbie were alive today she’d croak knowing that I’ve told this story, but really it was a great lesson in life). I thought I had died and gone to sin city, because drinking, smoking, and ”wordy durds” never happened in my house and most likely not in Abbie’s either except when her friends came to play cards.
Canasta Queen
Abbie played a mean game of canasta and was the most generous person I ever knew. My other grandmother (Meme) was just as generous, but I will save her story for another time. Abbie had lots of widow friends and in the early afternoons we’d put on a pot of chicken and dumplings for her gal pals and they would come over for canasta and supper. We played nickel on the corner canasta (gambling, another sin) on Abbie’s screened in front porch watching all the people go by waving to “Miss Abbie” (everyone called her that).
After I saw the movie Ya Ya Sisterhood it dawned on me that Abbie and her friends were letting their hair down. They were good church going women, but when they stepped onto Abbie’s front porch, they were young girls again just having a little fun. They had been friends since they were little girls and they were as close as sisters. What a great example to me those ladies were, although smoking and beer is not part of my life, I admired them for being themselves with each other.
Abbie taught me how to cook, clean, and iron. As soon as I was tall enough to stand on the kitchen high chair (step stool), I wore an apron and was expected to learn to cook and wash dishes.
Sometimes I think back on those happy times with my grandmother Abbie in Greenville, Mississippi. In my mind we are standing side by side in her cozy kitchen. The walls are papered with a watermelon pattern and she is wearing snazzy high heels and an apron over her dress. I’m sitting on the yellow kitchen stool, watching her with love and admiration, and wearing my apron too.
Our typical meal to go along with the Chicken and Dumplings was green beans, candied yams, cucumbers with onions, vinegar, a little sugar, salt and pepper, biscuits, ice cold sweet tea, and chocolate fudge cake. My oh my, those were the days when I could eat anything!
Abbie’s Mississippi Delta Chicken and “Dumplins”
4-5 lb. cooked skinless chicken, or 6 boneless skinless chicken breasts
at least 6 cups of water
2 chopped carrots
2 chopped ribs of celery with leaves
1 chopped large onion
1 1/2 t. thyme
1/2 t. rosemary (can leave this herb out)
2 t. salt
1/2 t. fresh ground pepper
Cut up the chicken discarding the skin and as much fat from the chicken as possible (don’t use the gizzard, heart, and liver); cover chicken with water and boil in a large dutch oven till the meat is tender and falls off the bone; drain the chicken saving the broth for the soup; store the chicken and broth in the refrigerator several hours or over night; pull the meat off the bone and put into dutch oven; from the broth skim fat that has formed on top and discard, add to the chicken; prepare all of the vegies and add to the pot; low simmer for 30 minutes; add the herbs and spices and cook on low for 15 minutes; cover pot and turn off stove; prepare the “dumplins”
*If you use chicken breasts, boil in 6 cups of chicken broth; refrigerate for several hours or over night and pull apart chicken into bites sizes
Recipe for “Dumplins”
2 c. flour
3 t. baking powder
1 t. salt
2 T. parsley
4 T. butter or margarine
3/4 to 1 c. milk
Combine dry ingredients; cut in butter or margarine until mixture crumbles; add the milk slowly stirring with a fork until dough holds together; roll out as for a pie dough, slice and drop in with chicken mixture
cook 20 minutes. serves 8-10
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