Clear Soup with Dumplings

Clear Soup with Dumplings © kvalifood.com

Clear soup with meat and flour dumplings has become a classic in the Danish kitchen for good reason. The quality can vary a lot, though. Here is a really good recipe.

When I make soup I reckon on 200 ml (7 fl oz) of finished soup per person. This recipe serves 5.

Ingredients

Yields 5 servings

the soup

  • 1 l light chicken (or hen) stock — optionally made from 2 parts chicken to 1 part beef. Use about 1.5 kg meat in total.
  • 3 carrots
  • 2 leeks
  • 1 parsley root (or 3 stalks celery, or ¼ celeriac)
  • optionally some of the meat left over from making the stock

meat dumplings

  • 250 g minced veal (or pork)
  • 1 tbsp plain flour
  • 1 egg
  • 1 level tsp salt
  • 1 pinch pepper

flour dumplings

  • 75 g plain flour
  • 50 g butter
  • 2 whole eggs
  • 150 ml water
  • ½ tsp salt and freshly ground white pepper

Directions

The soup

Bring the stock to a boil.

Cut the root vegetables into small dice — about ¼ inch (½ cm).

Cut the leeks into ½ cm (¼ inch) thick slices.

Meat dumplings

Mix everything together.

Shape small balls — the smaller the better. Use a small teaspoon and shape them against the inside of your hand. Dipping the teaspoon in boiling water between dumplings stops the meat sticking.

Drop the dumplings into boiling water. Let them cook for 2–4 minutes.

Season with salt and pepper.

Flour dumplings

Melt the butter in a saucepan together with the water.

Stir in the flour.

Turn off the heat once the mixture is smooth, and leave it to cool for about 10 minutes.

Stir in the eggs one at a time.

Season with salt and pepper.

Shape the dough into small balls. You can use a teaspoon, or a proper dumpling piping bag. If there are two of you, put the dough in a sturdy plastic bag with a corner snipped off. One person presses out a long sausage of dough while the other snips it into dumpling-sized pieces with scissors as it hangs in the air.

Drop them into boiling water. Let them cook for 5 minutes.

Serving

Bring the stock back to the boil.

Add the meat dumplings and vegetables.

Bring back to the boil.

Add the flour dumplings and turn off the heat.

Serve with a piece of the meat in the bottom of each bowl if you like.