DUMPLINGS - MADE WITH JUST FLOUR AND WATER

There are several dishes that can be made with just self-raising flour and water - and here are the ones I've posted so far.

Finally, I've got around to adding dumplings to this list - and, once again, they are simple to make, cheap - and surprisingly good!

Today, I had a rich vegetable sauce simmering on the stove, and I thought it's time I made the effort!

So I took a heaped dessertspoonful of self-raising flour, added a pinch of salt, 2 or 3 dessertspoons of water, and mixed it into a dough. This I kneaded for a couple of seconds, formed it into a ball and dropped it into the hot, bubbling sauce.

It had been in the sauce a minute or two before I took the pic, and it had already grown a little

Six or seven minutes later, I looked at it again.

Doubled in size

After about 10 more minutes I turned it over in the sauce - and left it for a further 20 minutes. Then I took it out and, with difficulty because it was very soft, sliced it in half...

It was light and fluffy - everything you'd want from a dumpling!

I should have made more - in the end, to bulk out the dumpling I tore pieces off a quarter of a soda bread I'd made earlier, and simmered them in the sauce.

Next time I do that, I'll make sure I add sufficient water, because the soda bread soaked up all the liquid - and my lovely sauce was nearly burnt!

I don't think these dumplings require measurements - but for those of you who don't agree with me, here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

1 mug or 200g self raising flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/3^rd mug or 125ml water

Method:

1. You'll need a stew of some kind to cook these in! :)

2. Place the flour and salt into a large mixing bowl, add the water and begin mixing with a table knife or similar.

3. Mix together into a soft dough, stirring and cutting through the dough as it forms, adding more flour or water as needed. 

4. Keep the dough as soft as possible - even a little sticky, since they're going into a liquid, after all.

5. Divide the dough into 8 or 10 or 12 pieces - depending on how big you want them - and form into balls a bit smaller than the size of a golf ball - then place these gently into your stew.

6. Make sure there is enough liquid in your stew to carry the dumplings. Turn them over after about 6-7 minutes. They'll be ready about 20 minutes after going into the stew.

Notes:

Ring the changes with these - make them with half and half white and wholemeal flour. If you don't have self-raising wholemeal flour, add a teaspoon of baking powder at the rate of 1 teaspoon to 100g of flour.

Add herbs and spices to the flour to pep them up a bit.

I posted this recipe on Mumsnet, and AmberLeaf responded:

"You should try Jamaican dumplings, plain flour and water, sometimes cornmeal [fine] 50/50 with the plain flour."

VEGAN PIE 'N' MASH

Earlier this week, I made a leftover veg curry into a Thai chilli non carne by adding coconut milk, Thai curry paste, lemon juice and soy sauce, red kidney beans and chunks of seitan - it made loads!

I had it one night with brown rice, and the next night with pan-fried curried wedges. Still there was some left!

So I decided to use it as a pie filling,  and have it for dinner tonight along with mashed potatoes.

The pie

Pie 'n' mash!

More pie!

It's easy to make a simple pastry with just self-raising flour, water and oil - but, to the flour I added half a teaspoon each of bouillon powder and curry powder and added tomato puree to the water. The oil I used was poured from a jar of sun-dried tomatoes.

The mash was made with broccoli and cheese (Violife), plus 1/2 tsp bouillon powder.

TEMPURA MADE EASY - SHALLOW-FRIED WITH FLOUR AND WATER

Some mushroom slices already cooked, some just added to the pan, and some sultana pikelets

Tempura is just a posh name for a flour and water batter. Most of the recipes you see on line use sparkling water, or beer, generally, and I usually make a yeast-risen batter. However, I was curious to see what could be done with just self-raising flour and water, with a view to adding it to my flour and water post.

(Now I've read the Wiki entry on tempura, I discovered I was closer to the original than I thought!)

I had my chance this morning, when a friend of my wife's popped round for a coffee. Whilst they were chatting I put a frying pan on with a little oil, poured some s/r flour into a bowl and mixed in enough water to make a thickish batter.