This week Ben suggested we make taco salad for supper. I readily agreed because its preparation includes little more than washing and chopping vegetables and browning some ground beef. I thought I had gotten off easy.
When I came home from work, there was a pan of apple dumplings on the back porch. When Laura and Ben got home I asked her if she knew anything about them and she said that her boss had dropped them off for her. She had gotten them for employees and clients, and apparently Ben had already had some earlier in the day. As you can imagine, once Ben had tasted the splendor of apple dumplings, we had no option but to make them for dessert.
Ben: Let’s make dumplings!
Me: Ben, dumplings are a lot of work.
Ben: Oh, come on. They’re easy.
Me: No, you have to make pie crust, and core the apples, and make pie crust. There’s a sauce, and you know you have to make pie crust!
Ben: I’ll do it.
Me: You don’t know how.
Ben: Well, you will teach me.
Bingo. Ben knows his audience. Most of me knew how it would end up. I would explain the process and try to engage him in it. He would offer minimal effort but maximum interest in the outcome. But still, the little teacher part of me that never gives up agreed to make apple dumplings with Ben.
While my mom and Phil’s can make a pie quick as a cat can wink an eye, I somehow feel in my advancing years that I should take half a day off work for it. Since that ship had sailed and I had already worked quite a full day, we just hunkered down and made the crust from scratch and prepped the apples. The pie crust recipe can be found in the recipe index under “Rhubarb Custard Pie.” For the sauce we just dissolved and cooked down a cup of brown sugar with half a cup of water. We rolled out the crust, folded it around the prepped apples, and backed them with the sauce at the bottom of the pan at 350 for 40 minutes.
Decades ago (maybe even before we moved to Pennsylvania), I fell prey to a Pampered Chef contraption that peels, cores, and slices apples. I only wanted them peeled and cored this time, but that isn’t a combo this do-hickey offers, so we sliced them into spirals too. I figured they would bake more quickly that way.
Sure, I got lured by the the notorious apple dumpling gang into making apple dumplings on a weeknight, but when they taste that good, I can overlook the chicanery, skulduggery and tomfoolery.
They look delicious Mama you are also an inspiration