WHAT IS A DUMPLING?

The word ‘dumpling’ can mean many different things in the culinary world: fluffy balls of wheat flour and animal fat floating to the surface of hearty stews; delicate parcels of dough filled with meat or vegetables and then steamed; or firm little lumps of potato, egg and flour served in a thick sauce. Savoury and sweet dumplings are widespread across the world, with simple varieties served as an everyday meal in the home or in school and factory canteens. More elaborate versions are prepared once or twice a year for celebrations and festivals.

Any official definition of the word ‘dumpling’ is likely only to partially describe what is an extraordinary variety of foods. This difficulty in finding a universal definition is also caused by the fact that the English word ‘dumpling’ is used as a shortcut translation for a long list of foods that have very similar characteristics but also very well-defined identities and vocabulary in the language of the country from which they come. The glossary at the end of this book provides an idea of these differences and similarities. A chef in Chiang Mai, Thailand – well-versed in Asian dumplings and in their sometimes very subtle differences – once said to me, pointing at a number of bamboo steamers on a dim sum trolley, ‘Chinese dumplings: same same but different.’ This popular Thai saying seemed quite appropriate in the circumstances.

In order to match the meaning of the original language, some translations are required to be less telegraphic than the simple word ‘dumpling’, and might extend to a fuller description of the food including its ingredients, cooking method and presentation. The single Italian word carmelle, for example, captures very succinctly all the following characteristics: a dumpling made of a thin wheat wrap, ricotta cheese and spinach filling, shaped as a wrapped boiled sweet, boiled in water, served with melted butter and sage, and typical of the town of Piacenza, northern Italy. The English translation, correct but far from comprehensive, would simply be ‘Italian type of filled dumpling’.

The Oxford English Dictionary limits its definition to ‘a small savoury ball of dough’, excluding other shapes and omitting any reference to the possible presence of a filling. On the other hand, it accepts ‘boiled, fried and baked in a casserole’ as suitable cooking methods. For the purpose of this book, my definition of a dumpling, which I have developed over many years of research and in-depth conversations with chefs, cooks and enthusiasts, as well as a fair amount of eating, extends to both unfilled and filled varieties, including what is sometimes described as filled pasta. However, I prefer to exclude frying and baking as cooking methods, since these result in what people usually recognize as fritters or small pasties rather than dumplings.

Many unfilled dumplings are very easy to prepare, being nothing more than a few basic ingredients mixed together, dropped into boiling water, drained and served with a stew or rich sauce. To make things even simpler, they can also be cooked directly in the broth or casserole in which they will be served. This type of dumpling is used to add bulk to a meal and as an alternative to potatoes, pasta or rice. The simplest recipes include just wheat flour and water; other typical ingredients include breadcrumbs and fat, sometimes with the addition of herbs, cheese or egg. In Africa, wheat flour is replaced by millet, yam or other local starchy ingredients, while in Central, Eastern and Northern Europe potatoes tend to be the main ingredient of choice. Unfilled dumplings are not ideally served on their own, since they taste bland and, although filling, are not particularly nutritious.

Filled dumplings consist of a layer of dough wrapped around a seemingly infinite variety of juicy and tasty fillings. There is no limit to the imagination when it comes to possible ingredients, the only constraints being availability – clearly linked to geography and seasonality – and tradition. Also, once the art of preparing and rolling the dough and shaping individual dumplings is mastered, depending on whether the dumplings are intended for a quick and simple everyday meal or for a special occasion, more unusual and elaborate combinations of ingredients and flavours can be developed. Filled dumplings are a complete course in themselves and do not need any substantial accompaniment beside the filling; they are served with the simplest of sauces, or with no sauce at all.

My passion for dumplings has meant that I have enthusiastically tried all the following: meat fillings – beef, pork, mutton, chicken, rabbit, yak, duck; vegetables – cabbage, spinach, nettles, mushrooms, pumpkin, chestnut, fennel, artichokes, onions, seaweed; cheese – blue cheese, ricotta, cream cheese, mozzarella; fish – salmon, pollack; seafood – shrimps, lobster, crab; and sweet varieties including fruit, jam, nuts, chocolate and chocolate/hazelnut spread. I have not yet cooked or been offered a peanut butter variety, but that does not mean it is not available or worth trying. In short, the rule for choosing a filling is that anything goes. In fact, most dumplings, as with many other traditional dishes, were originally intended as a way of using up leftovers, and many recipes make use of stale bread, breadcrumbs and day-old stews, roast meat or fish, saving the time of preparing the filling and resulting in interesting and unique combinations of flavours.

Preparing filled dumplings from scratch can be a tricky and sticky business. It requires practice and patience and is better achieved with more than just one pair of hands. In fact, it is traditional in many cultures for all women of the same family to gather in the kitchen to make dumplings for the feasts that mark particular celebrations, such as for the Catholic Christmas celebrations in Poland or Italy, the Chinese New Year or the eve of Jewish Yom Kippur. The rolling of the dough, the pounding of the filling and the shaping of the dumplings are of course made less onerous by the convivial atmosphere in the kitchen, the presence of children and the sharing of the latest family news and gossip. This is also the most immediate way of passing down recipes and skills to the younger women in the family, and first-timers are encouraged to persevere even if their initial attempts produce less than optimal results.

Once prepared, dumplings can be dried or frozen in large quantities and are then ready to be cooked, when required, in just a few minutes. Many types of ready-to-cook dumpling are now available from supermarkets, Eastern European delis or Asian stores. They are either packed in vacuum containers with a shelf life of several weeks, or can be bought frozen in large family bags and cooked in boiling water when required. Although the whole experience of making dumplings is worth celebrating and perpetuating, it does clearly take a lot of skill, effort and time. In societies that have changed beyond recognition, where the average time dedicated to cooking a meal barely reaches 30 or 40 minutes, the convenience of pre-packed, tasty, easy-to-cook dumplings is welcome and allows the preparation of fast but healthy and complete meals without having to cook from scratch. Traditional recipes coexist on the shelves of supermarkets with new and seasonal varieties. Italian tortellini, for example, are no longer limited to the traditional Parma ham filling but are made with Spanish chorizo and sundried tomatoes or Swiss Emmenthal cheese and juicy raisins. These combinations are the result of the fusion of regional ingredients into tasty and well-balanced recipes accessible to all thanks to the ever-increasing globalization of food supply.

When talking about dumplings, size definitely matters, as it is a defining characteristic of the different varieties. The largest dumplings are served individually or in twos, and often date back to very old, traditional recipes developed from staple ingredients and leftovers. Central European gomboc, African fufu and South American tamales are impressive in size and certainly good plate-fillers. At the opposite end of the scale, ‘dropped’ dumplings such as the German or Austrian Spätzle and Hungarian csipetke are tiny little things made of dough cut into very small pieces and rolled into oblongs before being dropped in boiling water for a few minutes. Such examples are testimony to the fact that the generic word ‘dumpling’ can only begin to describe the many varieties being dished out day in, day out throughout the world.

Dumplings Around the World

The geographical spread of the dumpling covers most of the globe, from the Alpine regions of Europe to the Mongolian steppes; from sub-Saharan Africa to rural Japan; and from the maize fields of Latin America to Chinese communities throughout the world. Dumplings have always coexisted as versions of an unpretentious, filling peasant food, making small amounts of meat stretch far enough to feed large families and communities, or as elaborate, refined parcels of dough, wrapped around delicate fillings and served for special occasions.

When looking at the history of the dumpling, it is possible to draw a historical parallel with the well-known debate about whether Italian spaghetti came before or after Chinese noodles. In fact, some types of filled dumpling carry with them interesting questions that remain largely unanswered: is there a documented link between Italian ravioli, Russian pelmeni, Central Asian manti and Chinese wontons? To what extent did Marco Polo, or any other Venetian merchant for that matter, play a part in culinary exchange and influence between the spice-rich Far East and the established traditions of European kitchens?

The dumpling has developed independently in many different parts of the world through the use of common ingredients. Travel and commercial exchanges have contributed to the transfer of certain shapes and combinations of tastes from country to country and across continents.

The intensive military and commercial activities of the Repubbliche Marinare (the city-states, including Genoa, Pisa and Venice, that flourished in Italy between the tenth and thirteenth centuries) acted as a catalyst for cultural and culinary exchange, as merchants and crusaders alike travelled across the Mediterranean and ventured further into the Middle and Far East than ever before. For example, during the twelfth century ravioli, a square dumpling made of a filling sealed between two layers of thin pasta, began to spread from Genoa to Parma and Venice, and from there to other regions in Europe, in particular through Hungary, Poland and Bohemia. Medieval commercial fairs provided an opportunity for merchants to exchange goods and currencies, and attracted crowds from nearby and faraway towns and villages. Food and drink constituted a big aspect of these commercially motivated and extremely lively gatherings, which owed their popularity also to the presence of acrobats, storytellers, magicians and women of ill repute. The frequent fairs held in Genoa’s harbour, then an important centre of commerce in the Mediterranean, certainly played a big role in extending the popularity of ravioli among sailors and merchants from further afield.

In the thirteenth century Genovese and Venetian merchants, including Marco Polo’s family, travelled east to conduct commercial dealings and exploration. Marco Polo’s account of his incredibly exotic journey, whether fully founded on personal experience or embellished with tales heard along the way, provided inspiration for countless generations of explorers and travellers, as well as insight into the way of life of the nomadic Tartars, or Mongols, including their ceremonies, travels, food and social rules. As Marco Polo was travelling eastwards, the Mongols, led by Ghengis Khan, were travelling west across the steppes of Central Asia, conquering neighbouring civilizations and deriving sustenance from dumplings filled with mutton, yak and horse meat, and boiled on open campfires. For Ghengis Khan’s Mongols, as for today’s Central Asian nomadic populations, meat-based dumplings were an important part of the diet together with dairy products including goat’s and mare’s milk, cream and cheese.

Central Asia gradually became a melting pot for different traditions of filled dumpling, as commercial exchange and geopolitical developments brought ingredients and recipes from Italy, China and Mongolia into contact with traditional varieties already present in the region. It is notable that in Turkey dumplings are also called Tatar böregi (Tartar pasties), and significant common threads across Central Asia are the filling of minced lamb, often charged with black pepper and other spices, and the habit of smothering dumplings in garlic, yoghurt or sour milk.

Claudia Roden, a food writer particularly knowledgeable about Middle Eastern and Jewish cooking, recognizes the strong connection between Italian and Central Asian dumplings in 'The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand and Vilna to the Present Day' (1997):

Pasta came to Poland as a result of Italian presence at the royal courts and also by way of Central Asia. That may be why the cheese kreplach [a type of filled dumpling], sauced with sour cream, owes more to the Turkish-Mongolian manti with yoghurt poured over than to Italian ravioli or cappelletti.

The fact that Russian pelmeni is filled with a mixture of meats strongly flavoured with black pepper and spices not native to Russia is also often used to corroborate the theory that pelmeni originated in China and was carried by the Mongols to Siberia, the Urals and as far as Anatolia and Eastern Europe. However, although influences from the Far East are very plausible, the origin of the Russian dumpling is not clear. One possibility is that it originated in the Urals as pieces of meat wrapped in very thin bread called pel’nyan’, which means, in native languages Komi and Mansi, ‘bread ear’. It was then spread across Central Asia by Russian explorers and pioneers. It is also possible that it was developed by hunters, who needed light, easy-to-prepare, nourishing food to take with them on long hunting trips. Pelmeni fitted the purpose, as it keeps for a long time in sub-zero temperatures and is quickly boiled in pots of water over an open fire.

Other types of dumpling can be found in eastern Europe. These include Ukrainian varenyky, which derives its name from the verb ‘to boil’, and Polish pierogi, which is made with various fillings, one of which is practically identical to the Russian dumpling and aptly named Russkie pierogi. However, the word pyrogi, both in Russia and in Ukraine, describes not a dumpling but a type of fluffy baked bun generally filled with fruit or poppy seeds.

The same phenomenon as that in Central Asia can be easily mapped out across Africa, South America and Northern Europe. In these regions, a variety of very similar unfilled dumplings developed at first independently in different places, making use of common and plentiful ingredients, then spread across each continent, giving rise to interesting hybrid recipes.

On the African continent, unfilled dumplings of similar appearance and taste can be found under different names in a number of countries in the west, east and south. They are a staple and consist of the local carbohydrate source – yam, sweet potato, sorghum, millet, cassava or maize (both originally from South America) – cooked, pounded, shaped into dumplings and served with stewed or roasted meat, fish or vegetables. Kenkey, a popular variety in West Africa made of a maize sourdough wrapped in banana leaves and steamed, is equally common in the Caribbean as mangu or mofongo. In South Africa sweet souskluitjies are a favourite among Afrikaans children; these are quite different from dumplings found elsewhere on the continent as they are made with self-raising flour, egg and milk, boiled in plenty of water and served in a very sweet cinnamon syrup.

In Latin America where the staple food is maize, dumplings – either filled (with meat, cheese or raisins and dried fruit) or unfilled – are made with masa, a dough of maize flour and limewater, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed. The name varies from tamales to humitas, depending on the country.

In Central and Northern Europe, where one of the main sources of carbohydrate is the potato, the tuber is boiled and mashed, or grated when still raw, and then combined into dumplings bound by egg, fat or milk. Dumplings are then shaped into balls or ellipses and boiled in water. Although very similar, they have many different names, in various languages and local dialects, that often mean ‘potato ball’, ‘potato cake’ or ‘potato dumpling’. Some examples are Norwegian potet klub and potetball, Polish kopytka, German Kartoffelkloesse and Danish frikasseboller.

Jewish dumplings also developed a distinct identity through the interaction of Jewish communities with ingredients, foods and traditions around the world, mainly in different parts of Europe and the Middle East, following the diaspora. The best-known Jewish dumplings are the unfilled knaidl (matzah balls) and the filled kreplach. Claudia Roden writes:

The Yiddish word knaidl is derived from the German Knödel, meaning ‘dumpling’. Since the early Middle Ages, dumplings of all kinds have been popular in German, Czech and Austrian cooking, and came into the Jewish diet. All over Eastern Europe they epitomize the robust peasant and poor man’s food.

Stuffed pasta shaped like giant cappelletti or tortellini came to the Jews of Germany through Venice in the early fourteenth century.

The birthplace of Asian dumplings is China, where the thousands of combinations of different shapes, fillings and recipes can be broadly grouped into three types: wontons, jiaozi and baozi. Because of the difficulty of transliteration and translation, not to mention regional differences that are sometimes substantial and sometimes very subtle, it is difficult to summarise in a few words the traits of these Chinese specialities. However, the following should serve as a very general description: wonton is made of a very thin dough wrapper and usually served in a broth or steamed. Jiaozi are made of a thick and chewy dough, and shaped like a horn or a big Brazil nut. It is usually steamed or boiled and served with a soy-based or hot chilli dip; pan-fried jiaozi are known as guotie (pot-stickers). Baozi are filled buns made of a fluffy, bread-like dough and steamed. In certain parts of China they are called mantou, although the name mantou mainly refers to plain, unfilled baozi.

From China, the wonton travelled west through the Mongolian steppes and east to Korea before crossing the sea, and became a popular staple food in Japan under the name gyoza. At the same time the baozi also travelled and became established, under different names, in other Far Eastern countries and as far as Hawaii. The Hawaiian version is known as manapua and was brought to these Pacific islands by Chinese migrants in search of work, who started selling it on the streets, initially walking around with baskets of steaming filled dumplings and then selling from vans parked at street corners and on popular beaches. Now manapua is also available in bakeries, restaurants and supermarkets.

As is the case with the Chinese dumplings in Hawaii, many food exchanges are a direct consequence of the historical and economic factors that are behind migration. With migrant populations come suitcases and trunks, soon followed by crates and containers, of traditional foods from their countries and regions of origin. For example, dumplings became an established food in North America after migrants from Italy, Germany and other parts of Central and Eastern Europe reached the New World at the same time as waves of migrants from China and other Asian countries. It is curious that in the USA ‘ravs’, originally an Italo-American contraction of the word ravioli, became a common term sloppily extended to cover any type of filled dumpling that came from outside the country, irrespective of whether it is Italian ravioli, Polish pierogi or Russian pelmeni. In addition, Chinese wontons are often referred to in the USA as Chinese or Peking ravs.

The fascinating phenomenon of ingredient swapping and cross-referencing between cooking traditions and recipes continues today. Contemporary twists to traditional recipes are more and more common thanks to increased global sourcing of ingredients and foods, affordable travel and immediate access to information. The result is a continuous revision, adaptation and mutation of traditional recipes with a marked impact on regional and local cuisines. For example, cream cheese wontons are now served in North American Chinese restaurants, and Mars bar and Nutella momo (a boiled dumpling traditionally filled with mutton or vegetables) is very popular with homesick, chocolate-craving backpackers in cafés across Nepal and Tibet.

Written by Barbara Gallani in "Dumplings - A Global History", Reaktion Books, London, UK, 2015, chapters one & two. Digitized, adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.