Chicken and Dumplings

It's Always Freezer Season

I had never thought of using frozen biscuit dough as dumplings, even though it makes a lot of sense. The usual chicken and dumplings is almost like a thick soup with drop biscuits cooked, floating, on top. This is not quite that, but very similar. It's a one-pan, easy week night meal.

Honestly, I would cook the chicken longer than the recipe states, especially if you want to shred it. And I would probably either use leftover roast chicken (or rotisserie chicken); I would roast up chicken leg quarters if I needed to cook the chicken. They're cheap, and really hard to dry out from overcooking. Use what you prefer!

For my latest batch of freezer biscuits (https://cookwithheather.com/Its-Always-Freezer-Season-Buttermilk-Biscuits/), I cut out as many regular biscuits as I could, and then when I had to combine all the off cuts, I cut them into the dumpling shapes. I think that's a great way to use it all up, without worrying about the second (or third) rolling being too tough.

Captions

[00:00]: foreign
[00:05]: hello and welcome to cooking the books
[00:07]: with Heather today we're going to be
[00:09]: working once again from Ashley
[00:10]: christensen's
[00:12]: um it's always freezer season and we're
[00:13]: going to be using two recipes that we've
[00:15]: already made
[00:18]: um to go into this
[00:20]: so we're going to be making chicken and
[00:23]: dumplings
[00:24]: this will use both the chicken freezer
[00:27]: chicken stock recipe
[00:31]: um which I have some in the refrigerator
[00:33]: because I just made it not too long ago
[00:35]: so it's just in the refrigerator I have
[00:37]: more in the freezer for another time
[00:40]: um and we're going to be using the
[00:42]: biscuit dumplings so the freezer
[00:46]: biscuits that I made before I made
[00:48]: another batch of those recently and I
[00:50]: cut some of them into the dumpling
[00:52]: shapes like she recommends I did about
[00:56]: uh one rest one one roll first time I
[01:00]: cut out biscuits I got quite a few
[01:04]: um and then the rest of it I cut into
[01:06]: the dumplings so
[01:08]: we're making the chicken and dumplings
[01:10]: now and it's shouldn't be too bad
[01:14]: my oven is heated to 400 my cast iron
[01:17]: pan is on high heat and it is just
[01:20]: starting to smoke a little bit so I'm
[01:22]: adding
[01:23]: some
[01:25]: um
[01:26]: mine is grapeseed oil neutral vegetable
[01:29]: oil and we're going to put these chicken
[01:32]: breasts they are
[01:34]: bone in skin on chicken breasts and
[01:40]: while this is the number she calls for
[01:42]: it is
[01:44]: uh
[01:45]: about almost twice as much by weight
[01:49]: as she falls for so it's gonna be a lot
[01:51]: of chicken
[01:53]: um
[01:53]: we'll see
[01:58]: these are the only ones I could get it's
[01:60]: just the bread so
[02:05]: putting these in inside down and letting
[02:08]: them go for
[02:11]: about five minutes yeah four to five
[02:15]: minutes we want to wait till they are
[02:16]: pretty brown also
[02:24]: we're turning the heat down to medium
[02:26]: high so we're not going to keep it on
[02:27]: that really high heat
[02:29]: uh the whole time
[02:32]: please excuse me as I scream over the
[02:35]: sound of the crackling but these are not
[02:39]: seasoned in any way I did double and
[02:42]: triple check the recipe to make sure
[02:44]: that she didn't say that you should salt
[02:46]: and pepper them so they are unseasoned
[02:49]: uh we're just cooking them like this
[02:57]: it's been five minutes Moment of Truth
[02:59]: we're gonna see if we can turn these
[03:01]: over
[03:02]: if they're nice and brown
[03:08]: oh it's pretty brown
[03:12]: pretty loud
[03:20]: all right here we go
[03:22]: not bad
[03:24]: and this one
[03:27]: I'll finish this
[03:33]: all right
[03:35]: remember Let It Go on this side for
[03:36]: about four minutes
[03:39]: okay
[03:40]: it smells like it's burning I'm not
[03:42]: going to touch it
[03:44]: doesn't really matter at this point it's
[03:46]: going into the oven 400 degrees for I
[03:49]: think she says four to five minutes
[03:51]: we're definitely going to go on the five
[03:53]: minutes
[03:54]: [Music]
[04:00]: ours were really large so I'm going to
[04:03]: set a timer for five minutes and then
[04:05]: we're gonna check the temperature and
[04:08]: she says it should be up to about 150
[04:11]: which
[04:12]: is it done for chicken usually you want
[04:15]: to get up to 165 but she says 150
[04:20]: and then later we're supposed to shred
[04:21]: it I don't know I'm gonna check it
[04:24]: um
[04:25]: in about five minutes so until then I'm
[04:28]: gonna clean up all these splatters
[04:30]: so it's been a little over five minutes
[04:32]: because we had a problem timer but um
[04:48]: also been quite a bit smoky
[04:51]: but I'm just going to check in the
[04:54]: thickest part of the breast but not
[04:55]: touching the bone
[04:57]: Where We Are
[05:05]: yeah we're at like
[05:07]: 56 degrees
[05:12]: I'm gonna go away for
[05:14]: I don't know 15 minutes or so
[05:17]: way longer but then again our breasts
[05:19]: are way larger about twice the size not
[05:23]: quite but almost
[05:25]: um so it's going to take longer to cook
[05:27]: so
[05:32]: I'm going to set a timer for 10 minutes
[05:37]: check it again
[05:39]: and I'll let you know how long the whole
[05:41]: process takes
[05:44]: when that's done
[05:46]: my chicken cooked in the oven for an
[05:48]: extra at least 30 minutes and we're up
[05:51]: to about uh 155 which is a little above
[05:55]: where she wants wanted it to be but also
[05:57]: a little below where I would expect it
[06:00]: to be but that's gonna that's okay we're
[06:02]: gonna cook it again so uh now we're
[06:05]: going to transfer this to a cutting
[06:08]: board to cool
[06:13]: and I want to remove there's a little
[06:16]: bit of
[06:18]: skin maybe meat just kind of stuck I
[06:21]: removed that
[06:23]: just so we don't have it in there
[06:25]: I'm going to turn my
[06:28]: stove to medium Heat
[06:31]: we're going to leave all of the juices
[06:33]: and everything that can accumulated in
[06:35]: the pan in there
[06:40]: and I'm adding some unsalted butter
[06:43]: which happened to be frozen because I
[06:45]: didn't have any out but that's okay
[06:49]: um
[06:50]: so we're going to let that melt
[06:53]: and then I've already got everything
[06:55]: else
[06:56]: pre-cut and all measured well not a lot
[07:01]: of measurements on this but I'm gonna
[07:03]: need I'm going to use
[07:05]: this shirt
[07:08]: um
[07:10]: so the all of the
[07:15]: the amounts of things we're using here
[07:17]: are pretty small but this is supposed to
[07:19]: meant supposed to serve about four
[07:22]: people so all together you know this is
[07:26]: not
[07:27]: a huge dish by any means
[07:30]: so what I'm going to be putting in here
[07:33]: now my Butter's almost melted
[07:37]: um I have a little bit of yellow onion
[07:41]: that I chopped
[07:43]: diced pretty small but not like not
[07:46]: finely but not large if that makes sense
[07:50]: and then we have
[07:52]: some celery and some carrot which is
[07:55]: also kind of small
[07:60]: and we're going to let this cook
[08:06]: stirring occasionally for five to seven
[08:10]: minutes so we're gonna let that sort of
[08:13]: hang out
[08:15]: so this has been cooking about uh seven
[08:18]: minutes the onions are only just
[08:20]: starting to turn translucent we they
[08:23]: don't have to be completely done at all
[08:24]: right now but we're going to add some
[08:27]: dry white wine I'm just using whatever I
[08:30]: had in the refrigerator I buy some like
[08:34]: a small box of wine
[08:37]: so it's a good thing to cook with and it
[08:40]: it's enough for cooking it's good it'll
[08:43]: last in the fridge for a while
[08:44]: but we gotta let this go
[08:47]: um for about
[08:48]: 10 minutes I'm just going to kind of
[08:50]: leave it be for 10 minutes until the
[08:53]: wine has reduced completely
[08:56]: so I assume this should be not dry but
[08:60]: more like it was before we added the
[09:02]: wine after 10 minutes so we'll see you
[09:05]: in 10 minutes
[09:06]: now wine has been reducing for 10
[09:08]: minutes it's not entirely gone but I'm
[09:11]: gonna call it good
[09:12]: um and now there's more ingredients
[09:14]: we're going to add
[09:17]: some garlic just minced up garlic
[09:24]: here we go
[09:26]: we're gonna add
[09:29]: some fresh corn
[09:36]: there we go
[09:40]: and
[09:42]: just cut off of one it was basically one
[09:45]: cob of corn depending on how big they
[09:46]: are but it was just just cut off the cob
[09:49]: and then
[09:51]: we have some waxy potatoes that are cut
[09:55]: into approximately one inch pieces
[09:59]: um
[10:00]: I'm using Yukon Gold you could use red
[10:03]: skin potatoes you don't want something
[10:05]: like a russet that will get kind of
[10:07]: mushy waxy will stay more together
[10:10]: um so I just need to
[10:14]: drain this it's just been sitting in
[10:16]: water to keep it from getting Brown
[10:19]: so there we go that goes in
[10:26]: now there is an ingredient that is
[10:29]: optional and we are leaving it out
[10:33]: um
[10:34]: she calls for gochu Chong which is a
[10:38]: Korean sort of spicy sauce not a lot of
[10:42]: it but enough that I am concerned my
[10:45]: children won't eat this
[10:47]: if they think it's too spicy so
[10:50]: mix that all up and then
[10:53]: uh
[10:59]: we're going to sprinkle over flour and
[11:03]: mix it all up until
[11:05]: and cook it until it sort of makes a
[11:08]: little bit of a roux
[11:11]: she says until it starts smelling toasty
[11:13]: so this might be a little bit
[11:16]: just cook until it starts smelling
[11:18]: toasty so that's
[11:21]: interesting
[11:24]: we want to Brown that flour a little bit
[11:26]: I guess
[11:28]: all right so we're gonna just let that
[11:29]: cook for a little bit
[11:32]: I don't smell anything yet besides
[11:34]: the lovely garlic and vegetables
[11:37]: I think I'm smelling a little bit of
[11:40]: toasty now so it's time
[11:43]: to add our chicken stock so we made the
[11:47]: freezer chicken stock
[11:48]: which will be linked below and whenever
[11:51]: I can up there I'm kind of surprised
[11:54]: that it is not a gelatiny at
[11:58]: refrigerator temperature so that's a
[12:01]: little weird usually it is when I do it
[12:02]: I don't know if it's there's a little
[12:04]: bit of gelatin in there but it's not
[12:05]: super gelatinized
[12:08]: uh gelatinous
[12:10]: but
[12:12]: there we go uh when I made it I
[12:15]: pre-measured it for this recipe since I
[12:18]: knew that's what
[12:19]: we were going to be using it for
[12:23]: and just let that in the refrigerator
[12:25]: until we were ready for it
[12:28]: but I've got more in cubes in the
[12:30]: freezer
[12:32]: increase the Heat
[12:33]: to bring it to a boil she says hi
[12:38]: higher than media pies where I went
[12:43]: so we're going to bring it to a boil and
[12:45]: then turn it down to a simmer so
[12:48]: a simmer is our goal but we want to
[12:50]: bring it down bring it up to a boil
[12:52]: first
[12:54]: I'm also going to try to get all of this
[12:58]: juice from The Cutting Board
[13:03]: into
[13:05]: there just so I don't spill it all over
[13:08]: everything even though there's a lot on
[13:10]: my countertop too great anyway
[13:14]: in a little bit we're gonna have to deal
[13:16]: with this
[13:17]: I need to clean up my camera
[13:19]: so we're pretty much out of oil
[13:23]: now I need to reduce the heat to kind of
[13:25]: keep it at a simmer
[13:28]: I'm gonna go with like a four maybe go
[13:31]: down to a three
[13:33]: uh on my stove
[13:35]: somewhere below medium usually
[13:38]: um
[13:40]: and we're going to simmer this for 10
[13:42]: minutes which will turn it into the
[13:45]: consistency of gravy keep our fingers
[13:48]: crossed
[13:49]: um that is the plan so we'll see in back
[13:51]: about 10 minutes
[13:53]: my gravy has been cooking for about 10
[13:56]: minutes it's not super thick it has
[13:59]: thickened up some
[14:00]: but we will be cooking this more so I'm
[14:04]: okay
[14:05]: we do need to taste this and add salt
[14:07]: and pepper at this point
[14:12]: and it needs
[14:14]: a lot of salt
[14:23]: it's got a very sweet flavor right now
[14:25]: because of all the vegetables and it
[14:28]: both in here and in stock
[14:31]: so
[14:33]: I'm not going to measure
[14:36]: because it's going to need a lot so I'm
[14:39]: gonna
[14:43]: stir that in
[14:47]: paste it again
[14:53]: better still need salt
[14:57]: because
[14:59]: there is no salt on the chicken either
[15:01]: and we haven't added that yet
[15:13]: my guess is that was about a tablespoon
[15:15]: of salt
[15:20]: this diamond crystal kosher Which is
[15:22]: less salty than table salt
[15:25]: by weight
[15:26]: by volume not by weight but by volume
[15:35]: we're gonna stay with that for now
[15:40]: we're gonna turn up the heat just a
[15:43]: little bit to get it make sure it
[15:45]: simmers while we add our dumplings
[15:49]: these are from Frozen I made these it
[15:52]: was a second batch of the biscuits that
[15:54]: I made and um cut them kind of like a
[15:57]: gnocchi size and I'm just going to count
[15:60]: them out as I toss them in because
[16:01]: that's how they are listed in here
[16:05]: that's how many she says to put it
[16:09]: now we're going to cook these uh I'm
[16:12]: gonna make sure it's simmers so I'll
[16:13]: probably have to turn it back down in
[16:14]: just a little bit after everything sort
[16:16]: of comes back up to temperature after
[16:18]: adding all those frozen dumplings um
[16:21]: but she says from Frozen 15 minutes
[16:24]: and while these cook now that the
[16:29]: chicken is cool
[16:31]: uh we're supposed to
[16:34]: basically take off all of the skin and
[16:36]: the bones and
[16:38]: pull it I'm not sure it will pull
[16:41]: um
[16:42]: given the temperature that we cooked it
[16:44]: to
[16:45]: but I will do my best I've got a plate
[16:48]: to put all the stuff I don't want on
[16:51]: and uh I'm gonna use my fingers because
[16:55]: that's the easiest
[16:57]: thing to use in my
[16:60]: experience
[17:02]: I'm gonna just make a pile yeah it's
[17:04]: definitely
[17:05]: not quite as done as I would want it if
[17:08]: I weren't going to cook it again
[17:10]: if it weren't going to go into
[17:13]: something like this I would definitely
[17:16]: want it to be closer to 165 rather than
[17:20]: 155.
[17:23]: um taking it out at about 160 would be
[17:27]: what I would suggest if you were cooking
[17:30]: it to eat
[17:33]: just like that also you would need to
[17:35]: season it but anyway I'm going to keep
[17:37]: pulling this and uh
[17:41]: keep an eye on my my uh chicken and
[17:44]: dumplings over here my gravy to make
[17:47]: sure it doesn't boil too much but uh
[17:50]: we'll see you back in about 15 minutes
[17:53]: so this has been cooking for 15 minutes
[17:55]: and it's gotten a lot thicker
[17:58]: um
[17:58]: some of the dumplings kind of fell apart
[18:00]: a little bit when I stirred it near the
[18:03]: beginning so you might want to be real
[18:05]: careful if that matters to you
[18:08]: got all my chicken here it's a lot of
[18:10]: chicken I'm gonna add as much as I feel
[18:12]: comfortable adding here
[18:16]: um
[18:17]: I don't want it to be super dry because
[18:19]: the chicken took up all of the
[18:21]: the gravy
[18:24]: but
[18:28]: I definitely am going to use at least
[18:30]: half of it
[18:35]: try to get that
[18:36]: Incorporated
[18:42]: it was not super hard to pull with my
[18:44]: hands so that's you know that's good
[18:48]: I think that might be enough chicken
[18:51]: for this I don't mind having a very
[18:54]: um
[18:56]: protein heavy
[18:58]: dish that's fine with me but I don't
[19:01]: want it to be
[19:03]: less gravy like so now all we have to do
[19:06]: is
[19:07]: let this heat up Let the chicken sort of
[19:10]: come back up to temperature
[19:12]: just make sure it's heated through
[19:14]: and then we'll serve it so we'll let you
[19:16]: know what we think in just a minute
[19:18]: [Music]
[19:26]: on this episode of cooking the books
[19:28]: with Heather you watched me make chicken
[19:30]: and dumplings from Ashley Christensen
[19:32]: and Caitlin Goins it's always freezer
[19:35]: season
[19:36]: so this used two previous recipes one
[19:39]: that we just made mostly for this
[19:41]: although we still have some the freezer
[19:44]: chicken stock
[19:45]: and one that we made quite a while ago
[19:48]: and just cut in a different way the
[19:51]: um
[19:53]: biscuits the freezer biscuits except you
[19:56]: cut them into sort of one inch pieces
[19:60]: to make them look like dumplings
[20:02]: or gnocchi which is another thing you
[20:05]: can use them for supposedly we haven't
[20:06]: tried that yet
[20:08]: so
[20:10]: this recipe was pretty easy Once you
[20:13]: have all those things done uh it kind of
[20:16]: comes together relatively easily the it
[20:19]: has a ton of vegetables in it which is
[20:21]: good it's um a one pot
[20:25]: kind of meal kind of cook everything in
[20:28]: your cast iron skillet so that's great
[20:30]: love that
[20:32]: um
[20:33]: and it it is not one of those meals that
[20:36]: you're going to have a lot of leftovers
[20:37]: it says it serves for and that's about
[20:40]: right for this recipe so
[20:44]: it's not one of those ones that just
[20:46]: makes a lot
[20:47]: um
[20:48]: so keep that in mind depending on how
[20:51]: many people you're cooking for but yeah
[20:53]: it was pretty easy
[20:55]: uh you could definitely just use a
[20:60]: rotisserie chicken instead of you know
[21:01]: cooking the the chicken separately and
[21:04]: and cutting up cutting it up I think
[21:06]: it's been a while since we actually made
[21:09]: this so took a little long little bit of
[21:12]: time to to film this part
[21:15]: um I seem to recall that my chicken took
[21:17]: extra time to cook because it was
[21:22]: kind of large compared to probably hers
[21:24]: because she asks for like about two
[21:28]: whole breasts and my two whole breasts I
[21:30]: believe were
[21:32]: like
[21:34]: maybe almost double the amount the
[21:37]: weight that she calls for so yeah it's
[21:40]: not
[21:42]: unusual not unexpected that it would
[21:45]: take longer to cook but other than that
[21:48]: all of the cooking times were pretty
[21:50]: good don't worry if at the beginning
[21:53]: before you put your dumplings in you
[21:55]: feel like it's the it's too loose it's
[21:58]: not thick enough those dumplings and the
[22:01]: cooking that you do with the dumplings
[22:02]: in there that it absorbs a lot of of the
[22:05]: juice it makes it a lot thicker
[22:08]: um so it ended up being good I I kind of
[22:11]: prefer my gravy and stuff like this on
[22:13]: the thick side anyway so that was it was
[22:15]: perfect for us
[22:17]: um
[22:18]: and
[22:20]: is a little bit difficult to stir
[22:23]: without breaking those dumplings up so
[22:25]: you really have to be
[22:28]: you don't want to stir too much at that
[22:30]: point and when you do you want to be
[22:32]: very careful but that's about it and if
[22:35]: you if you don't mind that they get a
[22:37]: little broken up it's it's okay doesn't
[22:39]: matter then
[22:40]: um so yeah we enjoyed the recipe it
[22:42]: tasted really good I would definitely
[22:44]: make something like this again I would
[22:47]: probably use it as a
[22:50]: a sort of a blueprint rather than a
[22:53]: recipe where I would use pre-cooked
[22:55]: chicken put whatever vegetables I happen
[22:57]: to have on hand in
[23:00]: um and then of course use the the
[23:02]: chicken stock the that we made or any
[23:05]: chicken stock that I happen to have on
[23:07]: hand
[23:08]: um yeah I would certainly do this again
[23:10]: if you have if you haven't made the
[23:12]: biscuits and you have biscuits
[23:15]: in the freezer or whatever you can just
[23:18]: cut those up you don't have to make that
[23:20]: that recipe but so it's definitely a
[23:23]: great sort of comfort food that you can
[23:26]: do on a weeknight
[23:29]: in one pot
[23:30]: so if you already have those other
[23:32]: things already done
[23:35]: um so if you enjoyed watching me make
[23:37]: this please give me a thumbs up hit the
[23:39]: Subscribe button and come back and watch
[23:41]: me make something else next week
[23:42]: foreign