My sister Emilie is right; it really is all about the dumplings

There was a time when one went to the butcher shop - or the back yard - and fetched back something called a "œstewing hen."

Modern chickens go from hatching to the grocery store in a matter of weeks, but not the stewing hen. It is what gave us such phrases as "œa tough old bird" and "œno spring chicken."

What brings this to mind is a recipe I recently retrieved from the younger of my two sisters. It is the recipe for my favorite dish in all the world, a main course so delectable that it comes to mind every time there's a cold winter day. This recipe was carried by my grandmother's old German mother as they traveled by wagon to Nebraska in the 1840s, and has been handed down mother to daughter ever since.

I once had it written down someplace, written out by my mom in her perfect handwriting, but it got lost and I've done without it for years. Now my sister Emilie has relieved my suffering. This is appropriate because she is named after our grandmother and shares the family women's mastery of this best of all possible meals.

It is the family recipe for chicken and dumplings, and I'm now going to share it with you. Winter is here with its short, gray days and long nights. It is important to have access to the most comforting of comfort food.

You begin, of course, with a chicken. If you can find a stewing hen, so much the better, but what's important is that it be a whole chicken (though it should be cut up). The reason is that you cannot get proper chicken stock unless it's all there - skin, fat, bones, the works, because the juice involved here is chicken stock, not chicken broth. (Chicken stock, like other meat stocks, gets very thick when chilled. That's how you can tell the difference between stock and broth.)

The chicken is put in a pot and just covered with water. Add some salt, pepper, a bay leaf, and - very important - poultry seasoning. Bring the whole business to a boil then set it to simmer for three hours or so. Alternately, put these items in a pressure cooker and cook it for half an hour or a little longer, until the meat is falling off the bone. Either way, your home will smell wonderful long before it's done.

While you're enjoying this aroma, prepare the dumpling dough. This requires two cups of flour, a teaspoon of baking powder, one egg, and a little milk. I realize that "a little" is imprecise, but you'll be able to tell when it's right: You're looking for something that can be rolled out that isn't as stiff and unwieldy as pie dough but that is a little thicker than cookie dough.

When the chicken is well and truly cooked, such that if it really is a stewing hen it's fall-apart tender, remove the chicken from the pot and skim off any foam that may have formed. Take out the bay leaf, too. Now we're at the good part.

Set the stock in the pot to a low boil. On a flour-covered surface, roll out the dough to no more than a quarter-inch thick. You'll need to flour the rolling pin a lot, also the breadboard or counter where you're rolling it. The dough should have a dry-flour surface all the time. You can do it in a couple of batches if the surface is small.

When it's all rolled out, cut it into diamond-shaped dumplings that are about three inches from tip to tip the long way. Our mom and grandmother used a very sharp knife for this, but Emilie has flung down and danced upon tradition and employs a pizza cutter.

Then comes the fun. Drop the dumplings, one by one, into the boiling stock. They will sink to the bottom but, in a minute or two, will float back to the top. The flour on the outside of them will thicken the stock. When all the dumplings have floated to the top, they're done.

You can pick the chicken meat off the bones and put it back in, or serve it separately. It doesn't really matter because the chicken has in many respects lost its importance.

"It's all about the dumplings," as Emilie put it, and I agree heartily.

Consume it at once. It can be reheated, carefully, later, so leftovers are good, but there probably won't be any.

You will discover how the chicken flavor has entered the dumplings, and you'll find yourself inventing ways to get maximum gravy to arrive at your mouth with each dumpling.

And you'll discover that the winter blahs have somehow, for that day, disappeared entirely.

If that doesn't make it "comfort food," I can't imagine what would.

Editor's note: Dennis E. Powell was an award-winning reporter in New York and elsewhere before moving to Ohio and becoming a full-time crackpot. His column appears on Mondays. You can reach him at dep@drippingwithirony.com.