dumpling
Americannoun
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a rounded mass of steamed and seasoned dough, often served in soup or with stewed meat.
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a dessert consisting of a wrapping of dough enclosing sliced apples or other fruit, boiled or baked.
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a short or stout person.
noun
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a small ball of dough cooked and served with stew
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a pudding consisting of a round pastry case filled with fruit
apple dumpling
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informal a short plump person
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of dumpling
1590–1600; dump (of uncertain origin) + -ling 1
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Explanation
A dumpling is a delicious, bite-sized food that's made of savory ingredients wrapped in dough and cooked. Chinese dumplings can be steamed, boiled, or fried. If you order dumplings in a Chinese restaurant, you'll get a filling made with vegetables, meat, or fish — it might be a wonton, cooked in a soup, or a potsticker, steamed and then lightly fried. Most cultures have some version of a savory dumpling, and many have sweet dumplings as well, like apple dumplings, which have a fruit filling wrapped in pastry.
Vocabulary lists containing dumpling
Out of the Dust
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Foods from Asia
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This Week in Words: Current Events Vocab for November 10–November 16, 2024
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In the Slate Plus segment, what exactly is the Soup Dumpling Index?
From Slate • Aug. 3, 2024
In a corner banquette seat at Long Xing Ji Juicy Dumpling in San Gabriel, Greg Nelson and Naama Haviv are reminiscing about the Christmas celebrations of their youth.
From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 21, 2023
Dumpling Daughter is also more than a cookbook: Spellman also has various Dumpling Daughter locations throughout Massachusetts, as well as an online store stocked with dumplings, buns, sauces and more.
From Salon • Jun. 13, 2023
This particular bear, on top of Dumpling Mountain in Katmai National Park in Alaska, however, was not exactly an imminent threat.
From New York Times • Oct. 6, 2022
Poor Dumpling needs the servants to wait upon him.
From Shireen and her Friends Pages from the Life of a Persian Cat by Stables, Gordon
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
