My mother short-cutted her dumplings by rolling out canned biscuits and cutting into strips, rather than making from scratch. I don't know where she learned the trick, but my grandmother was horrified until she tried them.
Wasn't long until she and other cooks in the family adopted the "wop biscuit" dumplings... so called because you "wopped" the biscuits on the counter to open them. Faster, easier, and no impact to the quality of chicken and dumplings... the secret's in the broth, not the dumpling.
Yeap, do the same with beef stew. Not much difference as I can tell.