Recipe
🍳 BREAKFAST
Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese
Golden, slightly sweet fried dumplings split open around a wedge of sharp cheese, a simple, filling Antiguan breakfast.
Antiguan · easy · serves 4
prep 20 min · cook 15 min
~669 cal · 19g protein · 67g carbs · 36g fat · 2g fiber · 7g sugars · 16g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Fried dumplings with cheese are a simple, filling breakfast staple in Antigua and Barbuda, an everyday morning food found on tables and at roadside stands across the islands. It is humble comfort at its most straightforward.
The dumplings are made from a lightly sweetened dough shaped into rounds and fried until deep golden, with a crisp shell and a soft, bready inside. Split open while hot, they are filled with a wedge of sharp cheese that softens against the warm dough.
Cheap, satisfying, and quick, they are the sort of breakfast that fuels a working morning. Fried dumplings with cheese are a small, honest pleasure of the Antiguan table, the everyday bread that generations have grown up eating.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally vegetarian and nut-, egg- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 4
2.5 cups all-purpose flour
2 tbsp sugar
2 tsp baking powder
3 tbsp butter
3/4 cup warm water
6 oz sharp cheddar, to serve
3 cups , for frying
1/2 tsp salt
Instructions
1
Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt, rub in the butter until sandy, then add water to make a firm, smooth dough.
2
Knead briefly, cover, and rest 15 minutes, then divide and roll into smooth balls, slightly flattened.
3
Fry in oil over medium heat, turning, until deep gold and cooked through, about 8 minutes.
4
Drain, split each hot dumpling, and tuck in a wedge of cheese to soften before eating.
Antiguan home breakfast.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
St. John's. St. John's pairs fungee, a cornmeal and okra mash, with pepperpot stew as Antigua and Barbuda's national plate. Its Creole kitchen leans on saltfish, ducana sweet potato dumplings, and plenty of thyme, scallion, and hot pepper.
🗺️
Antigua and Barbuda. Fungee is cornmeal cooked with okra, not a mushroom, and it is turned with a wooden stick until it is smooth enough to shape into a ball. Antiguan pepperpot is not the Guyanese one: no cassareep here, but a thick stew of salted meat, spinach or other greens, okra, aubergine and pumpkin, cooked down together.
🌍
North America. Almost every regional cooking here records who arrived and on what terms. Enslaved West Africans brought rice, okra, black-eyed peas and the techniques behind Lowcountry and Creole food; Chinese railway labour and later Italian, Jewish, Mexican and Vietnamese arrivals built the way the cities eat; and Indigenous foodways sit underneath all of it.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Antigua and Barbuda
Fungee and PepperpotAntigua's national dish: cornmeal fungee dumpling served with a thick stewed pepperpot of greens and meat.
Antiguan Chop-UpSpinach, okra, and eggplant boiled and chopped smooth with saltfish, an Antiguan everyday plate often eaten with fungee.
DucanaSweet grated sweet potato and coconut spiced and steamed in banana leaves, a traditional Antiguan treat.
Browse all Antigua and Barbuda recipes →
Good to know
You’ll need: Rolling pin.
Storing it: Fried food is best eaten fresh while crisp. Re-crisp leftovers in a hot oven or air fryer; the microwave makes them soft.
Make it a Antigua and Barbuda meal
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DucanaDessert
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Cuisine
Diet
Frequently asked questions
What is Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese?
Golden, slightly sweet fried dumplings split open around a wedge of sharp cheese, a simple, filling Antiguan breakfast.
Where does Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese come from?
Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese is a Antiguan dish from St. John's, Antigua and Barbuda.
Can Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions, including several at once such as gluten-free and dairy-free together. Treat them as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Antiguan Fried Dumplings with Cheese take to make?
About 35 minutes total (20 minutes prep, 15 minutes cooking), serving 4.
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