Any minced meat, fish and vegetables, in any variations, carefully wrapped in the finest dough, is a traditional dish for national cuisines of several peoples. Dumpling analogs such as khinkali, sorcerers, manti, jiao ji have long been known in world culinary. So where did the dumplings come from? Whose dish is it? Dark and obscure is the history of this amazing and beloved product. Russian and Siberian cuisine dumplings have long been recognized as their own.
So who invented the dumplings? I have to admit that this dish originally has Chinese roots. Today, in this kitchen with its history of five millennia, there are analogues of almost every modern dish. The history of dumplings takes us to a very distant past. But only here to challenge the fact that it is in Russia that this dish has the greatest popularity, no one will undertake.
So dumplings - is it a Russian dish or not? The traditional idea of ​​their history has developed this way: they were brought into Russian cuisine by the peoples that once inhabited the Urals. Russians appeared in these parts in the XIV-XV centuries. And only as an idea is the theory put forward that among Komi, Permyaks, Siberian Tatars and other peoples in the European northeast of Russia dumplings appeared from China and other ancient Asian states.
Dumplings: history of origin
One thing is obvious, dumplings got to Russia through a difficult, even roundabout way. So who was the first to invent this unusually tasty and so widespread dish, native to different national cuisines, peoples and countries? And not many culinary inventions are ready to boast of this. So what will the history of dumplings tell us?
The Platonic treatise entitled “Feast” (385-380 BC) describes a dish that painfully resembles dumplings - pieces of meat wrapped in noodles. And the ancient Roman Petronius writes about him. And in the comedy of Aristophanes, a contemporary of Plato, it is said that at the feast nobility was treated by fried test bags filled with other products.
But all the same, culinary historians agree that it was China that "dumplified" Europe.
Russian history of dumplings
There are many versions of the appearance of dumplings on Russian soil. First of all, it is worth recalling that until the 1820s. there is no mention of dumplings in any culinary book of Russia. Even the “Soldier's Kitchen” of 1786 never mentions them - the most popular culinary book of S. Drukovtsev
Someone explains this by the fact that for too long dumplings in the Ural and Siberian cuisines were considered a regional dish, and all-Russian fame gained only in the 19th century.
And some argue that this cuisine by the Great Russians from the center of Russia was not particularly recognized.
Dumpling artifacts
Many familiar author of culinary articles of that time, Ekaterina Avdeeva, in 1837 wrote about “dumplings” as a word used in Siberia. That in Russia they are called ears, that they are made from pasta with chopped beef, also with mushrooms or fish, they are frozen and they turn into pebbles. In this form, they are taken on the road, and it is worth lowering them into boiling water, the food is ready and very tasty.
If you look at the documents of an earlier time, you should familiarize yourself with the magazine review of 1830 of the common words of the inhabitants of the Orenburg province, where the author has to compare them with Ukrainian dumplings to describe the dumplings. He says that dumplings (dumplings or perm) are like tiny boiled pies, “a kind of Little Russian dumplings, not only with cheese, but with beef,” which are the favorite food for Perm.
The history of dumplings tells that in 1817 this dish was still real exotic. That is exactly what his college adviser N. Semivsky described: “Dumplings, small pies with minced meat or stuffed, prepared according to the example of the Chinese. They are good especially in winter, they must be boiled in water. Very good travel soup is made from dumplings. They are eaten cooked with red vinegar. ”
Although there are other documents. "The painting of the royal dishes" (1610-1613) contains a reference to "mantou with lamb." And Karamzin in stories about food that was on the table of Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich mentions manti.
Four peoples fighting for dumplings
Disputes and disagreements over dumplings - whose national dish, have not subsided to this day.
- Finno-Ugric peoples living in the Urals (Udmurts, Komi-Permyaks).
The most important proof that dumplings should be considered their invention is the very word "dumplings" for them. It originates as "ear-bread." And the dumpling looks like an ear. It is perfectly stored in the winter in an ordinary bag, if left in the cold, in a cellar or in a canopy. Yes, and cook dumplings as easy as shelling pears. And for the filling it was possible to take the meat of sacrificial animals, since the inhabitants of the Urals have enough rituals of animal sacrifice.
Although the word “dumpling” is Finno-Ugric, but this food is exclusively Chinese, and also festive New Year's. Jiaots in China cook with a wide variety of fillings, which the Chinese consider edible. And their meat is not the most important thing. And in shape, the jiaots look like a coin, they even have a hole in the middle, a real symbol of wealth, a wish for health and wealth.
These are confident that only in Siberia the most generous dumplings are the original food of the Siberian. The thinnest layer of dough and filling, in which finely crushed ice is added - and here you have huge quantities of product after the cattle is clogged or the hunt was successful. Yes, and you can store all the time that frosts hold.
Minced meat, which is wrapped in dough cakes, is made only from minced meat, salt ... and ice. And no bulbs and garlic, as is customary in the European part of Russia. Only yielding to modern taste, pepper is added.
It was they who, riding on cavalry all over southern Siberia and the Urals, for a long time without leaving China alone, tied all these peoples together and adopted the recipe. For nomadic pastoralists, they serve as an excellent semi-finished product, which on a long hike serves as a real salvation. The Mongols will be very surprised if someone, when asked about dumplings - whose national dish is, claims that it is not theirs.
So who is the author?
So the question of who invented the dumplings is difficult and simple to answer. The idea of ​​wrapping meat in a dough is so obvious that anyone could have thought: the Chinese - in China, the Russians - in Russia, the Greeks - in Greece, the Mongols - in Mongolia, and the Germans - in Germany. By the way, the latter are convinced that the authors of the dumplings are Protestant monks. In the besieged fortresses, they allowed people to survive.
National features
To cook dumplings today, it is enough to buy a ready-made semi-finished product in a store and cook at home, steam, fry. But the recipe for delicious dumplings should be in the arsenal of every housewife.
How to sculpt dumplings
Rarely today is there a house where dumplings are molded in the old days, almost festively and in a family way. When the head of the family cuts the minced meat in a meat grinder, the hostess prepares the dough and then all the households in the mugs of dough, squeezed where with spoons, where cups or glasses, put the filling. Dumplings curled up and blinded. Sometimes rolled dough is cut into flat squares. This way you do without scraps and save time.
By the way, for true craftsmen, any carving is completely unacceptable. Nobody will convince them that only real rolled dumplings can be made of dumplings individually rolled out for each dumpling. And the smaller they are, the tastier.
This seems like the easiest dish. But over the entire period of fame and popularity of dumplings in Russia, many different recipes for their preparation appeared. It has long been known that the classics - Siberian dumplings - can also be prepared in different ways.
All the differences, first of all, in the filling: it can be beef with a small addition of fat or pork fatter and, of course, onions and crushed ice. So the filling does not stick when sculpting to the hands, and the dumplings are preserved juicy.
For dumplings, the form remains very important. After all, it was she who once gave him the name. And what should it be? Any housewife will say that it is necessary to mold the dumpling like a chubby crescent and easily, without pulling too much, connect the ends.
Siberian dumplings
To make dough for them, only flour with water is taken. That's right, not a bit of salt. They pour flour into the slide, and pour almost icy water into the hole in it. Steep dough is kneaded, easily behind hands. Now it should lie down for half an hour, covered with a damp towel.
Three types of meat are used: beef, pork (it is selected with lard), sokhatin. And again, without salt, without onions and other spices. Stuffing finely chopped.
But there can be any dressing for dumplings: simple sour cream, ghee, carrots, onions, garlic, etc.
Chinese dumplings
Knead the dough traditionally on flour and water. But the filling is chosen very different: meat, vegetables, eggs with leek, meat with vegetables. The most famous dumplings in China - this is "lotus on the water", refers to the most complex form, fashioned manually with 13 holes, or the "Empress Mother", filled with chicken and so small that resemble pearls.
Ural dumplings
In this case, it’s much more correct, in fact, to talk about dummies. In Russia, two words were mixed - "dumplings" and "perm" (Perm food) - and dumplings, so beloved by many, have survived to this day. And for those living in the Urals, for a very long time they were a ritual dish, a real symbol of cattle sacrifice. By the way, a partridge egg or other game could be added to the dough.
Ural dumplings - a dish that is prepared as follows. The meat in the filling is formed in strict proportion: beef - 45%, lamb - 35%, pork - 20%. Pepper and a large amount of onion were added to the minced meat. So, inside each dumpling, a delicious broth was accumulating. Stuffing was certainly prepared exclusively in a wooden trough with the help of a chop. The dumplings themselves were steamed, it was not customary to cook in water or on broth.
When this recipe for delicious dumplings was adopted by the Tatars, their dish was exclusively from lamb. It occurred to the Russians to mix beef and pork in equal proportions.
How to cook dumplings
To cook dumplings, you need to boil water, salt it, add bay leaf and onions, and then throw the dumplings themselves.
But it is much better if there is meat broth cooked on the bone. If you do not cook in it, then just dip the already prepared dumplings into it. Their taste will be much better and richer.
One can argue about whether dumplings are a traditional Russian dish or not. How many people - so many opinions. But the fact that dumplings for a Russian is a real holiday is undeniable. If they are sculpted in the family circle - this is a double celebration. Because such a product will certainly retain the warmth of the hands and hearts that prepared them. It has a very special taste, which cannot be compared with the semi-finished product from a nearby store.
No matter what people consider this dish their own, for a long time they will preserve and cherish their own old recipes, create new ones, and the next generation will eat and praise such delicious dumplings. The story of origin was told to the reader in an article. And now, who has gotten an appetite, go make dumplings!