CHICKEN & WHAT?

AN OLD-FASHIONED RECIPE FOR TENDER STEWED CHICKEN IN A RICH STOCK WITH SOFT DROPPED DUMPLINGS OR USE THE SAME RECIPE FOR ROLLED, CUT AND “AIR-DRIED” – CHICKEN AND PASTRY – WHICHEVER YOU PREFER!

The first Christmas we were together, my fiance and I spent it apart, because we were only a few months into a long-distance relationship. (He lived in the Fayetteville area and I lived near Charlotte.) Over the phone, we thanked each other for the gifts we had gotten each other and shared how we planned to spend the holiday with our families.

While describing his family’s Christmas dinner spread, my fiance said, “we’re having chicken and pastry.”

What in the world is chicken and pastry, I thought. His family is Southern who sticks to tried and true home cooking recipes. This perplexed me, because I am Southern too and thought I was familiar with just about every regional dish.

I asked him if the peculiar dish was anything like chicken pot pie.

“No, no, no,” he said. “Chicken and pastry is like chicken and dumplings.” Ding! Something I was very familiar with. Chicken and dumplings is one of my favorite meals especially on a cold night.

Chicken and pastry I have come to learn has shredded chicken, but it has more of a broth rather than sauce like I am accustomed to seeing in my grandmother’s recipe. It also uses longer, thinner strands of dough instead of pillowy pieces of dough my grandmother would mold with her hands.

A native North Carolinian, I’d never heard of this Eastern North Carolina-specific recipe.

According to Southern Kitchen, what we know as chicken and dumplings (or pastry) is a recipe that has evolved over the centuries from Europe. The earliest American recipes date back to the 19th century and mostly consist of boiled dumplings in a broth with shredded meat. In 1879, a recipe with chicken was published in a cookbook called “Housekeeping in Old Virginia” by Marion Cabell Tyree.

“In ‘Housekeeping,’ you’ll find two recipes for stewed chicken, one of which is simmered with ‘dumplings, made like biscuit but rolled thin.’ The stew is finished with a round of butter, rolled in flour and spices, which is used to thicken the broth,” according to Southern Kitchen.

Whichever name and recipe you decide to use, chicken and pastry is the ultimate comfort meal that can bring loved ones together for a hearty and delicious meal.