If we had to choose one food dish that’s the most common around the world, we’d had to choose the dumpling. You can find dumplings in pretty much every form in almost every country in the world. In fact, this article from CNN’s travel section counted a full 30 different types of dumplings from as far as China to the southern U.S.. It seems like there’s one thing we can all agree on – and that’s that dumplings are delicious.

Backing up a little, if for some reason you’re not familiar with dumplings, they’re basically little pockets of dough filled with either savory or sweet fillings and then cooked.

Dumplings are one of the easiest types of dishes to make since basically all you need is dough (flour and water) and a filling – if you even want to fill them at all. Many people, especially in the Southern U.S., eat basic flour dumplings with no filling served in the broth that they were cooked in. It doesn’t get much more simple than that, and that’s what we’re going to teach you how to do today.

Once you’ve mastered the dough and the dumplings, you can move up to experimenting with stuffing ideas, such as minced pork or finely chopped veggies or even sweet berries and sugar for a dessert dumpling.

Now, on to the dumplings!

How to Make Dumplings

To start, you’ll need your ingredients for the dough: 1 cup of flour and 1/2 cup of water. If you are making dumplings for a large group of people, just remember the 1:1/2 ratio of flour to water. You’ll also need salt to taste. Sift the flour into a mixing bowl and add the water slowly as your mix together. You want the dough to be a little stiff, so you may need to adjust the amount of water as you go along.

Heat up or create your own broth and bring to a boil on the stovetop. If you prefer not to use a broth, you can bring salted water to a boil instead. Once the dough is thoroughly mixed through, pull off small pieces of dough and roll in your hand until they’re circular in shape. You can make the dumplings as large or as small as you’d like, but most of the time, people aim 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Drop the dough into the boiling broth and let it cook for 15-20 minutes or until the dumplings are completely cooked through.

If you use a broth, scoop some of the broth into serving bowls with the dumplings and serve as a dumpling soup. Or you can drain the broth and just toss those bad boys on a plate. Either way will suffice.

How do you make your dumplings? Have any secret recipes you want to share with us? Let us know in the comments!

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