A small ball or pocket of dough, often filled with meat, vegetables, or fruit, that can be baked, steamed, or boiled.
From 'dump,' possibly from Dutch or Low German origins, combined with the diminutive '-ling.' The word appeared in English cookbooks in the 1600s.
Dumplings are perhaps the world's most universal comfort food—nearly every culture from China to Poland to Peru has its own version, suggesting humans naturally arrive at the same idea of 'dough wrapped around filling' independently.
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