Books Bygone

Thursday, October 9, 2014

Recipe: Fruit Dumplings

Cherry Dumplings topped with cinnamon sugar
Before we go to the recipe, I'd like to say a word or two about 'Dumpling Culture'. Dumpling Culture refers to the crappy old times in which folks ate a lot of dumplings-- usually with sauce or gravy. I will not say that those were simpler times because making dumplings is complicated business. But they were good times because dumplings are yummy. 

We used cherries rather than plums.

FRUIT DUMPLINGS

3/4 C milk
1/2 tsp salt
2 Tbsp butter
1 1/2 C flour (or more)
2 eggs
plums cut into pieces
cinnamon sugar

Combine milk, salt and butter in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Add flour and stir constantly until mixture is stiff and doesn't stick to spatula or pan. Remove from heat, let cool slightly. Add eggs. Roll out on a lightly floured surface. Cut into squares. Wrap each square around a plum piece. Spoon dumplings into rapidly boiling water and boil for about 5 minutes. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.


3 comments:

  1. When we lived in Germany, my neighbor's mother visited and prepared _something_ dumplingy. I've wondered just exactly what it was, but haven't ever found a recipe that seemed to describe it. She used mashed potatoes, other stuff, and then using a stoned apricot for the center, built a ball out of the potato mix which she then dropped into boiling water. I don't know how long or what she did with them after that. Were they for a main dish? dessert? coffee? (that was, in Germany, an afternoon ritual similar - I think - to the British Tea, Coffee was served, with a sweet of some sort) served hot? cold? I don't know. I just know it intrigued me and I've never run across anything that satisfied my curiosity about them.

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    1. I will relay this to John. He may have come across something in his Big Food travels. Sounds interesting!

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  2. I thought about it a bit...she started with a half apricot.! As I recall, she would spoon some of the mashed potato mix into her hand, then add the half apricot, then add more potato mix and make it into a ball. Then she'd drop it into boiling water and then ... ?????? I never saw them eat them!

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