Healthified Chicken and Dumplings

Dinner tonight was a winner for sure.

With the crisp air and cool breeze a meal that will warm me inside and out is just what I was craving. One of the first complete dinners that I remember making totally from scratch and for my entire family all by myself is chicken and dumplings. I remember going to Cracker Barrel as a child and only wanting chicken and dumplings as my meal. In my hometown, Fort Wayne, we have an annual fall festival called the Johnny Appleseed Festival. The two things I look forward to at that festival are the homemade cornbread (it doesn’t taste like any other cornbread) and chicken and dumplings. I can’t put my finger on it, but for some reason I really like chicken and dumplings. I also really like to put my own little touch on classic recipes such as this. So, tonight I made my version of chicken and dumplings.

Chicken and Whole Wheat Dumplings

Ingredients:

8 cups of chicken stock (can be homemade, stock in a box, whatever is your favorite!)
1 large chicken breast
1 small yellow onion, chopped
2 medium sized red potatoes, chopped
2 stalks of celery, chopped
1-2 carrots, chopped
1 can of corn, drained
1 1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup white flour
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup milk mixed with 1 Tbsp lemon juice

Preparation:

Pour the 8 cups of chicken stock into a large pot. Turn the burner on high heat and cover for about 3 minutes to allow the broth to warm up.

Place the chicken breast in the broth and allow to boil for 6-7 minutes or until the chicken is cooked all the way through. While the chicken is cooking in the broth, chop all of your vegetables (potatoes, onion, celery, and carrots). Once the chicken is cooked thoroughly, remove the chicken from the broth and allow to cool before shredding it while the vegetables are cooking.

Carefully put the vegetables in the broth.

Cover the vegetables and leave the burner on medium-high heat. allow the vegetables to cook for 10 minutes or until tender. While the vegetables are cooking, prepare the dumpling dough by mixing together the whole wheat flour, baking powder, salt, and milk with lemon juice. This will form a thick dough. Once the vegetables are tender, add the chicken back into the broth and place about 8 dollops of the dough onto the broth.