Homemade Dumplings (for Chicken Soup)

I made my stock a couple of weeks ago so took it out of the freezer and made chicken soup.  I saw these dumplings on food t.v. so decided to give them a try.  For the soup I used rotisserie chicken, fresh herbs from my garden (thyme, dill, parsley & sage), carrots, celery and sweet onions.  For the dumplings:

• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup water
• 1 & 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour 
• 1 & 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt 
• 1 & 1/2 teaspoons sugar 
• A few fresh grinds whole nutmeg 
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
• 3 large organic eggs 

In a small saucepan, bring the butter and 3/4 cup water to a boil. Remove from the heat and stir in the flour. Let cool for a few minutes so it’s not so hot that it will cook the eggs, then whisk in the salt, sugar, nutmeg, thyme and the eggs, one at a time, until incorporated into a slightly lumpy thick batter. (It’ll take a little work to whisk in the eggs.  In fact, I couldn't use a whisk as the dough wouldn't come out of the middle of it!  I had to bang the hell out of it to get most of it back in the pot.  Then I had to use a large spoon and even then it was tough to get the job done!!!)

Drop heaping teaspoons of the dumpling mixture into the simmering soup (I used a cookie scoop coated with cooking spray).  Cover and cook until the dumplings are cooked through; begin checking for doneness at 15 minutes.  Mine took 20 minutes and I was shocked when I took the lid off to check on them.  😄  They were floaters, not sinkers, that's for sure.  I used the small cookie scoop like she did, but wow, my dumplings were humungous compared to hers!  

All was delicious.  Exactly the comfort and warmth a great chicken soup brings.  The thyme in the dumplings was perfect for me and went well with the broth.