I visited Memphis last week (see previous post), and when we had dinner at the Blues City Cafe, people were buying their apple dumplings like crazy.  Our table was near the counter, and so I was able to watch the cook/chef put the dish together several times.  This is how he did it:

Apple Dumplings - Blues City Cafe Style

(1) Take a small cast iron skillet (one-serving size), place it in the oven until it is piping hot.

(2) Toss a scoop of butter in the skillet (probably a tablespoon) - it will sizzle and melt.

(3) Take an apple dumpling (They had them pre-made and packaged individually on a small paper plate covered with plastic wrap) and heat it in the microwave.  Then dump the dumpling in the skillet.

(4) Place a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of the dumpling.

(5)  Drizzle caramel syrup all over it.

(6) Enjoy

They’d bring the apple dumplings to the table in the skillet with a little potholder fitted on the handle. They had a small wooden tray under the skillet.  They were selling like hotcakes. 

Two of the teachers in our group of ten order the dumplings and passed them around for everyone to taste.  I declined - don’t ask me why.  Everyone raved on and on about how delicious it was!  Even the next day some of them were still talking about it.  I was sorry I didn’t taste it myself.

The question now is:  How did they make the apple dumplings?  I don’t know their recipe, but here’s how I’ve made them in the past:

Cut up some apples - very thin slices, sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon or apple pie spice.  Wrap a pie crust (or a flattened, uncooked canned biscuit) around about 1/4 cup of apple slices.  Crimp the edges to seal it.  Use a knife to make a couple vents in the top.  Dot with butter.   Make however many apple dumplings you want.  One per serving.  Bake at 350 until golden brown.

Once they’re cooked you can add ice cream, caramel sauce - whatever sounds good.  I remember once I made apple dumplings with whole apples - coring them, filling the center with brown sugar and nuts, wrapping pastry around them and baking them.  They were good - but much too big for a single serving.

My niece has a recipe that is super easy for apple dumplings, although I’m not sure how you could change this around so it can be cooked in little cast iron skillets.  However, maybe you don’t want to change it around.  Here’s her recipe:

Lisette’s Apple Dumplings

2 large apples

2 cans (10-ounce) crescent rolls

1 stick butter

1 cup sugar

1 tsp cinnamon (or to taste)

1 12-ounce can Mountain Dew

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Spray a 9×13 inch baking dish with Pam.

Cut each apple into 8 wedges and set aside (cut out the seeds, of course).

Separate the crescent roll dough into triangles. Roll each apple wedge in crescent roll dough starting at the smallest end. Pinch to seal and place in the baking dish.

Melt the butter in a small saucepan and stir in the sugar and cinnamon. Pour over the apple dumplings. Then pour the Mountain Dew over them.  Bake for 35 to 45 minutes in the oven until golden brown.

Nothing’s better than warm apple pie with ice cream, and I’m already searching stores for some of those little skillets.  I intend to serve apple dumplings in them the next time I have company.

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 10th, 2006 at 7:30 am and is filed under Recipes, That's My Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.