Serves 6 to 8
Time: 1 hour
I’m dedicating this month to comfort food recipes to help get you (and me) through the winter. Try as I might to traipse around in a hoodie all year round, I have to come to terms with the reality: winter is here. And that means lots of time warming up indoors. Maybe someday I’ll have a fireplace, but for now the heat of the stove gets me through.
So let’s kick things off with a comfort classic! You can think of it as a play on vegan chicken and dumplings or just take it for what it is — a soul-satisfying, thick and hearty stew with chunky potatoes and carrot, creamy white beans, all laced through and through with dilly yumminess. The dumplings soak up all that goodness on the outside, while staying deliciously doughy in the center.
The funnest part is spooning in the squashy squishy dumpling dough only to reveal beautifully firm and plump dumplings when you lift the lid minutes later. Makes you feel like a kitchen god. Or maybe that’s the cabin fever setting in.
Recipe Notes:
~If your baby carrots are the plump kind, then slice them in half on a diagonal. If they’re thin, don’t bother. And if you’d like to use adult-sized carrots, peel and slice them in 1/4 inch diagonal pieces.
~I use a Le Creuset Dutch oven for this. You don’t need to use cast iron, but the wider the pot the better, because you need lots of surface area to make the roux and cook the biscuits later. If you don’t have a wide pot, then using a large, deep pan will work, too.
For the stew:
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 medium sized sweet onion (like Vidalia or Walla Walla), quartered and thinly sliced
1 teaspoon salt
3 cloves garlic, minced
6 cups vegetable broth, at room temperature
2 stalks celery, tops removed, sliced 1/4 inch thick
1 1/2 pounds potato, in 3/4 inch chunks (peel if they’re russets)
1 cup baby carrots (see note)
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill
1/2 teaspoon sweet paprika
Fresh black pepper
1 15 oz can navy beans, rinsed and drained (about 1 1/2 cups)
For the dumplings:
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoons dried rosemary, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsweetened almond milk (or soy)
2 tablespoons olive oil
First we’re going to make a roux, but it has a little less fat than a traditional roux, which means it doesn’t get as goopy. If you’d like a more traditional roux, just add extra oil.
Preheat a large, heavy bottom pot over medium-low heat.
Add the oil and sprinkle in the flour. Use a wooden spatula to toss the flour in the oil, and stir pretty consistently for 3 to 4 minutes, until the flour is clumpy and toasty.
Add the onion and salt, and toss to coat the onions completely in the flour mixture. As the onions release moisture, they will coat more and more. Cook this way for 5 minutes, stirring often. Add garlic and stir for 30 more seconds or so.
Stream in the vegetable broth, whisking constantly to prevent clumping. Add the celery, potatoes, carrot, dill, thyme, paprika and black pepper, then turn the heat up and cover to bring to a boil. Keep a close eye and stir often, so that it doesn’t clump or boil over.
Once boiling, reduce the heat to a simmer and let cook uncovered for 20 to 25 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the stew is nicely thickened and the potatoes and carrots are tender.
In the meantime, prepare the dumplings.
Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the rosemary. Make a well in the center and add the milk and olive oil. Use a wooden spoon to mix together until a wet dough forms.
When the stew is ready, mix in the beans and plop dough right on top of the stew in spoonfuls. You should get about 14 dumplings. Cover the pot tightly and cook for about 14 more minutes. The dumplings should be nice and firm. Use your ladle to dunk them into the stew to coat.
Ladle stew into bowls, topped with dumplings. And serve!
This is one of our favorites. My guy says “rosemary dumpling soup?” at least half the time I ask what we should make for dinner. LOVE it and so glad it made it into Isa Does It. Thanks!!
Just made this incredible dish. THANK YOU! This recipe is perfect and delicious. My omni/carni husband ate 3 bowls 🙂
Love this stew–made it for the first time. Good warm and hearty meal in the winter! Dumplings are delicious but was wondering if chic pea or other flour can be substituted for the all purpose flour.
I’m Diabetic and have to count carbs. Any idea how many are in this?
this recipe is just amazing! made this one for me and a gluten free version for my other half and they both were great!
Do you mind telling me how you made them gluten free. I tried to sub with gluten free all purpose mix and it didn’t work out for me. Wondering if you have a tip or trick! Thanks
Josie
me and hubby made this today, totally YUM! especially for winter. total hit, hubby said keep it in my favorite recipe file!
Hello,I was really excited to try your soup since I’m currently sick with a kidney infection and wanted a nice home-cooked soup after eating crummy “vegan” attempts of meals at my local hospital.I wanted to make the vegan version of chicken and dumplings.I followed your dumpling recipe but only one dumpling turned out to be cooked–the rest unfortunately were raw and weirdly made my entire soup taste like egg.I’m wondering if 14 minutes was the accurate cooking time for the dumplings?Thank you so much for posting the recipe any how. I’m usually quite the vegan chef,but being extremely Ill I may have misunderstood the instructions.
I am making this today! It is a blustery stormy day in Nova Scotia. It is simmering on the stove as I type this. Can’t wait to taste it – it smells divine!
One of my favourite dishes is dill stewed potatoes, so naturally this stew was one of the first recipes I tried from your cookbook (which I picked up because of the irresistible design, but now recommend to everyone because it is one of the most sensible cookbooks I own, making cooking easy, tasty and for the most super part quick just as it promises).
I really love how the dill of the stew meets the rosemary in the dumplings. It makes it every bit as savoury and interesting as a good chicken stew. I’ve added it to my growing list of recipes to cook again.
The only issue I had, seeing as I am from Sweden and we don’t have Yukon Gold potatoes here, was picking a good potato for the stew. I don’t know if Yukon Gold is a firm potato, suitable for frying etc., or if it is a soft potato more suitable for mashing and for recipes where the potato must fall apart? I ended up choosing one of my favourite firm potatoes, Cherie, which can be eaten with the shell. It worked wonderfully in this recipe and added a nice touch of colour but it would have been nice knowing what kind of potato you originally had in mind for this recipe. 🙂
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Holy Shiitake! This was so good! I didn’t have any celery or paprika, but it was deeeeelish!
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Keep it up!
Made this last night, just added in a carton of thinly sliced shiitake mushrooms with the rest of the veggies. It was SO good! My husband and I had to contain ourselves from eating the whole pot of soup in one sitting!
Sitting here in 80 degree weather actually waiting for a 30 below Minnesota winter day to be able to have this to warm up with. Never thought I would be looking forward to winter!
Thank you so much for this recipe! I made it exactly as written and my omnivore boyfriend can’t stop raving about it! This stew is perfect for Fall and I’m looking forward to make it again when the weather gets chilly. The dumplings came out perfectly and I might try doubling the carrots next time. Thanks again!
As I look up this recipe again (for the thousandth time), I realized I’ve never told you how much my family completely adores this recipe. It’s a staple, even in our south Texas summers, I just love it. My husband said to me 5 or 6 weeks ago now that he would go vegan so long as I make “that dilly stew” once a week! Easy done deal! Thank you so much for this I can’t wait to have it again tonight.
I made this last night!! It’s delicious! Such a great chilly night recipe! I am currently enjoying it for lunch right now. We love your recipes!
This stew is amazing! I couldn’t believe how flavorful it was. I was so worried I would mess up the dumplings, but they came out perfect. I will make this again and again.
Thank you for this recipe – it is scrumptious and a definite one to make again. Yummy!
This was amazing! Soothed my upset tummy today and I will make this again and again. Delicious! Thanks for the great recipe!
This has become one of our firm family favourite recipes, from a book where every single thing we’ve tried has been an absolute winner! Much love from the UK xx
I made this a few times now, my question, what do you serve it with? As it already has so much in it!! Thanks!!!
This is such a great recipe. It has become a staple in my house anytime the weather is cold. Dinner tonight!
Hi Isa! I’m loving your cookbooks! I’m making this stew now and it smells amazing. Question…is there a reason you used dried rosemary in the dumplings instead of fresh?
i threw in a bag of frozen peas with the beans and the dough to add that extra green and texture 🙂
mine were pre-steamed but i’m pretty sure it also works with frozen fresh since there’s plenty of time while the dumplings cook!
An instant easy favorite here, one of those easy and ‘accidentally’ vegan meals. I love that because of the dumplings and the consistency you don’t need to serve it with bread- it’s a one pot whole dish unto itself.
I did omit the beans because we didn’t have them, and I used cilantro and curly parsley as my fresh herbs because I didn’t have dill or thyme- turned out beautifully. I also used fresh rosemary because that’s what I had on hand- about a tablespoon full, chopped fine. Sweet potatoes because that’s what I had.
Only potential issues were that I didn’t stir enough after putting in the dumplings- the potatoes began to stick to the bottom of the pan (but that could be bc they were sweet potatoes and get soft more easily/quickly) and to be careful with the salt if you’re using bouillon to make the stock- the salt was pretty high in the result, but I love salt so it was good with me.
Super easy/simple, very flavorful- we’re adding this to the rotation for sure- thanks!
Made this last night and had everything required without needing to go to grocery (thanks to fresh rosemary and thyme outside and seemingly always having fresh dill on hand in fridge). Delicious soup that fed 3 of us who were very full with at least 3 portions as leftovers. It reminds me of my mother’s mushroom barley soup with matzoh balls (knaidlach) thrown in on top. Never realized till making this (after I said that I don’t think I’ve ever made dumplings) that matzoh balls are essentially dumplings. My niece suggested this for dinner after being introduced to Isa’s cookbooks by her vegan friends—who told her that they have never made a bad recipe from her cookbooks.