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Farmers' Dumplings

A savory dumpling made from bread crumbs, milk, egg yolks, beef suet, sugar, flour, baking powder, boiled for an hour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Farmers' Dumplings

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Soak the bread crumbs in milk until fully absorbed.

  2. Beat in the whipped egg yolks, beef suet, and sugar.

  3. Gradually mix in the flour and baking powder, alternating with the stiff egg whites.

  4. Form the mixture into large balls using floured hands.

Wrap and boil

  1. Prepare the dumpling cloths by wringing them out, then butter and flour the insides.

  2. Enclose the balls in the cloths, leaving room for expansion, and tie tightly.

  3. Boil the dumplings for 1 hour.

Serve

  1. Serve with brandy or wine sauce.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + beeftop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,759 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Dry bread crumbs
Soaked in milk, they form the soft body and bulk of the dumpling.
Milk
Softens the bread crumbs and adds moisture to the mixture.
Egg yolks
Enrich the mixture and help bind it together while adding tenderness.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the dumplings tender and moist as they cook.
All-purpose flour
Provides structure that holds the dumpling together during boiling.
Baking powder
Releases gas during cooking, helping the dumplings rise and turn light.

The step that matters

Wrapping the balls in the cloths. The dumplings swell as the leavening releases gas and the starch sets, so room must be left. If wrapped too snugly they can burst, while a loose or poorly sealed cloth lets water in and makes them soggy.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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