Childhood Turkey Soup with Dumplings

Last night I introduced our kids to soup with dumplings.

When I was a child, my mom used to take a little bit of this, a little bit of that, and somehow throw it all together and end up with a big pot full of yummy. To this day, homemade soup is one of my most favourite meals to create. It's nutritious, easy on the wallet, and perfect to use up the little bits and pieces left in your fridge and pantry at the end of the month.

It rained all day yesterday, a cold and driving rain, the wind was blustery, and altogether miserable. Not that I'm complaining...we need the rain. But we really didn't want to turn the furnace on again, and our house was so cold. This soup did a marvelous job of warming us up from the inside-out.

Dumplings are really easy to make, just a bit gooey while you're mixing up the dough. My second son thought he "sort of, kind of, maybe liked them", and my first son gobbled his up.

Dumplings are basically baking powder biscuits cooked in the soup. They get dropped in to boiling soup in small globs of dough, where they expand and grow as they cook. They're moist, because they get cooked in hot stock. They absorb some of the liquid, so you do want a good amount of soup to work with. You can flavour them with seasoning, spices, herbs, cheese, garlic...anything you want, really. It would be a great way to add interesting layers of flavour to your soup. For the boys though, I wanted to go with plain. Change is hard! Adding dough to the soup was change enough for those two.

The best thing about soup is that you can use up your leftovers- less food waste, and your budget goes further. And homemade soup is invariably more nutritious than store bought. You control the ingredients you add.

Leftover soup and grilled cheese sandwiches with fresh vegetables is what we're enjoying for dinner tonight. Tomorrow morning's #tuesdaysoupseries giveaway is this childhood turkey soup with dumplings recipe.

Do you have any special recipes you turn to when the weather is foul or when you need a throwback to comfort food from your childhood?

Enjoy your day, friends,
Stacy

You may also enjoy:

• ​Slow Cooker Split Pea Soup
• Slow Cooker Pork and Potato Soup
• How to Make Homemade Stock

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