Disclaimer: I have no idea how this blog post will turn out. Sandy Cryer Gilzow is one of my oldest and dearest friends. I have been bugging her for a while to contribute. So when I finally got her cornered this week she was with our high school classmates, Carmen Loving Ogden and Jana Martin Rayburn. Sandy and Jana are cousins, and when they are all together a great time is guaranteed.  While on the phone with them, they were hysterical with laughter so I am not sure I got all the stories straight but here goes.

Sandy and Jana called their grandparents Daddy Buck and Mama Nannie. I suppose every kid called them that whether we were related or not. When I was a kid they lived in this big white house up on a hill in Chester. The house was originally owned by the town doctor. Daddy Buck, Mr. Whitworth, owned a sawmill. Mama Nannie, Mrs. Whitworth, ran a little grocery store. Everyone loved them.

When I asked Sandy to share a family recipe, this is the one that came to mind.  I nor anyone else I have asked has ever heard of anyone anywhere making dumplings like this. What follows are stories from Sandy and Jana about their grandparents and the recipe for TOMATO DUMPLINGs.

Aine: So tell me about this recipe. Where did it come from?

Sandy: Mama Nannie always made dumplings. Chicken and dumplings. Squirrel dumplings but I would never eat those. And these tomato dumplings. She made them as long as I can remember. And she always made homemade fries to go with them. I am sure she made them because they were an easy way to feed all of them and they didn’t cost much to make since there is no meat. You know they had 17 children, but only 14 reached adulthood. But that was a lot of mouths to feed.

Aine: Do y’all have stories about them that you tell your children?

Sandy: Well my favorite is this one about Daddy Buck. You know they didn’t have a lot of money, but Daddy Buck always did what he could for his grandchildren. So one day he comes home with this horse trailer and 14 ponies. One for each family. As a kid I thought I had died and gone to heaven. We were all so excited.  He had just gotten this wild hair and bought them for us.

Aine: Tell me about Mama Nannie.

Sandy: When she had the store, I used to love to go there. She had a three-wheeled bicycle. It had a large basket on the back. I used to love to ride it around.

The other thing I remember is the one Christmas she hung the Christmas tree from the ceiling. Not upside down but right-side up. There was so many of us and so many presents, she had to hang it from the ceiling so all the presents would fit under the tree. I just loved that.

Jana: I remember being at her house and killing the chickens with her. She was tiny and yet she could take a chicken and wring its neck in no time. Blood would be squirting off that chicken, and she just did it like it was nothing.

MAMA NANNIE’S TOMATO DUMPLINGS

Ingredients:

for the liquid to drop the dumplings in:

– 16 oz can tomato juice with 1 can water-if you have fresh tomato juice this is better but canned tomato juice will do in a pinch

– 1 Tbsp salt or to taste

– 3 Tbsp oil

For the dumplings:

– Large bowl of sifted flour

– 3 Tbsp oil

– 1 Tbsp salt

– 1 cup water

Directions:

1. Heat the first 3 ingredients and bring to a boil. You will drop the dumplings in this.

2. For the dumplings, first make a nest in the bowl of flour,

3. Add oil and salt in nest

4. Slowly add a little water and start working in the flour with your hand. Do this until you have used all the water. Keep kneading the dough until it is firm.

5. Pinch off a ball of dough and roll out thin onto a floured table.

6. Cut in strips and drop the strips in the boiling tomato broth one at a time so they won’t stick.

7.  Dunk the dumplings under the juice to cook them. Don’t stir or they will all stick together.

8. Serve with homemade fries.