Pi

I made chicken and dumplings today. Well, I made it in the sense that I was responsible for gathering all the ingredients and placing them in a cooking vessel.

I discussed previously how I take help where I can get it these days. I used to boil a whole chicken with onions, celery, salt and pepper until the chicken was done. Then I would strain the whole thing into another pot and let the chicken cool until I could remove it from the bones without losing my fingerprints. Meanwhile I would mix the dumplings using a recipe I got from Mary Jane, who got it from her mother--- sift the flour and salt; cut the shortening in; add the milk; mix; knead briefly; roll thin and cut into the desired squares. Then bring the broth to a boil, drop the dumplings in and let them cook until done. Then add the chicken back in and dish it up. Delicious!

Now, since the grocery store does such an outstanding job of roasting chickens, I buy their product and maybe serve the drumsticks to Wayne for the first chicken meal. A day or two later I empty a large can of chicken broth into a big pot. I usually add 4-6 more cups of water and some flavor cubes...chicken, chipotle, onion...and bring that to a boil. I open the freezer and get out my package of Mary B's frozen dumplings and lay the strips out to thaw enough to be able to cut them easily with a pizza cutter. I cut each strip into about 16 squares which are approximately 5/8" X 5/8". After cooking they will be slightly over 1" square...bite-sized. Once the broth is boiling and I've stirred all the little dumplings in, I reduce the heat to low, cover and cook about 45 minutes. While they are simmering, I take the remains of the roasted chicken from it's little plastic casket, remove the skin, and cut up whatever is left of the breast. Usually, that's enough meat. I scoop the jellied broth from the bottom of the casket and try to make sure none of the hardened fat adheres to it. That jellied broth goes into the pot the next time I take the lid off. Once the dumplings are done, you turn it off, add the chicken, and dish it up. Delicious!

I'm not sure I save a whole lot of time with the dumplings, but I do save the hassle of measuring, mixing and rolling. On the downside, I don't have any good dumpling dough to eat. Today's broth seemed pretty salty. I never add salt when using chicken broth and bouillon cubes, so I probably should have added only one chicken bouillon cube instead of two. To try and remedy that, I peeled and cut two new potatoes into large pieces and dropped them into the broth. I also added large pieces of celery. I had no intention of eating the potatoes or celery...I was only using them to absorb salty flavor. I also cut up a couple of carrots (which I don't usually put in chicken and dumplings) and added them. When all was ready, I did fish out the potatoes and celery but left the carrots in.

Now, here comes the "pi" part. After it had cooled enough, I got out a large squarish plastic container to put it into. I looked at the level in my round pot and wondered if it would fit in the plastic container. Immediately, I thought of using math to figure this out and turned to get the calculator out of the drawer. As I took a step, I reviewed the value of pi. With my next step I realized I couldn't recite it past 3. Then I started laughing because I remembered (only) the punchline of a joke about pi. The punchline goes, "Pi are round, cornbread are square." Then I decided that I'd throw caution to the wind and just hope it fit...which it did.

I have looked it up and can now tell anyone who has forgotten that pi= 3.14159...........on and on. What I would have done with that information if I had remembered it in the kitchen is anybody's guess. But, I'm pretty sure it would have involved finding a ruler.