dumpling
Americannoun
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a rounded mass of steamed and seasoned dough, often served in soup or with stewed meat.
-
a dessert consisting of a wrapping of dough enclosing sliced apples or other fruit, boiled or baked.
-
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
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.
But that has largely been the result of viewers dumpling cable, not actual growth in the market, data show.
From MarketWatch • Mar. 30, 2026
What’s funny is that if you tell someone you’re honing the perfect sourdough or carbonara or cacio e pepe or dumpling fold, they’ll clutch their pearls in shared devotion.
From Salon • Dec. 4, 2025
Din Tai Fung is a family business that sold its first dumpling in Taipei in 1972 and now numbers more than 165 locations worldwide.
From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 20, 2025
Mahan paused, his chopsticks hovering over a custard dumpling.
From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 19, 2025
I set to the dumpling on my plate while the rain fell steadily on the roof.
From "Dragonwings" by Laurence Yep
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.
