Inspiration, the best kind, comes unexpectedly.
Last week I got lost on a winding YouTube trail that started out with me looking for clips from that nutty BBC auto show “Top Gear” and eventually led me to a clip of Dinah Shore belting out “Shoo Fly Pie and Apple Pan Dowdy,” a big 1946 hit. You know the tune: “Makes your eyes light up/ Your tummy say howdy!”
Don’t ask me how I got from A to B, but such is the nature of (some would say the beauty of) YouTube.
Being very suggestible, the song inspired me to try to make my very first apple pandowdy. Surprisingly, having been a lifelong fan of crisps, crumbles, bettys, grunts, slumps, cobblers, tilts, and every other manner of baked fruit dessert, I had never made one before.
A pandowdy — essentially lightly spiced apples under a sweet spongy batter — is closer to a cobbler than a crumble, and perhaps more like an upside-down cake, even, than that. It’s also a little bit pudding-y. Only it’s kind of biscuity. Like a giant soft cookie. Kind of. Anyway it’s not a pie.
First, I needed a recipe.
I remembered seeing the late, great Jennifer Paterson whip one together on an episode of “Two Fat Ladies,” — an English cooking show from the 1990s that is one of the two or three best of all time in my opinion. It is now being rerun on the Cooking Channel (number 278 on my lineup), and after a few clicks I found her recipe on the Cooking Channel website.
Here is her recipe, which served as my starting point. (Remember, Paterson was British — hence the UK-style ingredients and measurements.):
Apple Pandowdy
Recipe by Jennifer Paterson
Ingredients
2 pounds cooking apples
2 tablespoons golden syrup
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
6 ounces plain flour (all-purpose)
Good pinch salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
4 ounces sugar
4 ounces unsalted butter, melted
Generous 1/4 pint (1/2 cup) milk
Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Peel, quarter and core the apples, then thinly slice them into a bowl. Add the syrup, cinnamon and nutmeg, and toss gently to coat the apple slices evenly. Spoon the mixture into a buttered 2-pint (1 quart) ovenproof, deep-sided dish.
Sift the flour, salt and baking powder into a bowl, and stir in the sugar. Make a well in the center and add the melted butter and the milk. Stir to make a smooth batter, then spread it evenly over the apple slices.
Bake in the oven for 40 to 45 minutes or until the sponge topping has risen and is browned. To serve, you can invert the pudding onto a dish or serve from the baking dish. It is, of course, highly improved with cream in generous dollops.
The recipe looked good. Easy. So I made it exactly (or nearly, albeit using cup measurements instead of ounce measurements, and substituting light molasses for the golden syrup, simply because, given pandowdy’s New England roots, I figured this was acceptable, and besides I couldn’t find golden syrup at the grocery store).
The pandowdy wasn’t bad. But it wasn’t great. It kind of collapsed, I think because there was a smidge too much baking powder for Denver’s altitude — the batter rose too fast and fell too hard.
And it was bland. More of a breakfast pudding than dessert. (Maybe the apples I used — Jonathans — weren’t sweet enough, or maybe the molasses was a mistake.) In other words, my eyes didn’t exactly light up, and my tummy, rather than “howdy,” gave a more tepid response. “Hi,” maybe. Or, “hey.”
Disappointment being the mother of tenacity, I was determined to get a prettier, sweeter result — without adding more white sugar. I’m too old to do that. After 40, the last thing anyone needs is more time on the flipping treadmill, and processed sugar, I’m convinced, is my particular nemesis when it comes to the battle of the spare-tire.
So, I adjusted. I swapped the molasses out for maple syrup (which, while not actually any sweeter, somehow tastes sweeter). I increased the cinnamon to a full teaspoon (and made certain that it was freshly ground, which makes a huge difference with cinnamon). And I added a squeeze of lemon juice for some zing.
As to the batter, I lessened the leavening by about half for a slower rise, and I added a teaspoon of vanilla to the mix, because the scent and flavor of vanilla makes things taste, if not exactly sweeter, then at least more dessert-like. Finally, just before baking, I sprinkled a teaspoon of raw (natural) sugar over the top for a slight crunch and direct contact between tongue and sugar crystals, a trick which always makes simple sweets taste fancier.
It was a minor, pantry-based series of adjustments (I didn’t have to shop to make them) but it worked. I scored with a rich, moist pandowdy, with a crispy-sweet top and homey apple flavor inside. It wasn’t the prettiest dessert (the : “dowdy” part rings true), but it had a certain home-spun elegance — just like Dinah Shore did.
Here is my adjusted recipe.
Apple Pandowdy with Maple
Inspired by a recipe by Jennifer Paterson. Works at Denver’s altitude.
Ingredients
2 pounds cooking apples (Choose Jonathan, Golden Delicious or Macintosh; Bramley or Northern Spies would be nice too, Gravensteins if you can get ’em. Mix and match if you like.)
2 generous tablespoons maple syrup (choose grade B for the best flavor)
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
A few generous gratings of fresh nutmeg
Squeeze of lemon juice (about 1 teaspoon)
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch salt
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter, melted and cooled
1/2 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon raw sugar
Directions
Peel, quarter and core the apples, then thinly slice them into a bowl. Add the maple syrup, cinnamon and nutmeg, and toss to coat the apple slices evenly. Spritz with lemon juice, and toss again. Let sit at least 30 minutes, or up to 2 hours. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spoon the apples into a buttered 1-quart ovenproof, deep-sided dish.
Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl, and stir in the sugar. Make a well in the center and add the melted butter, milk and vanilla. Stir to make a smooth batter. Smooth the batter over the apple slices and sprinkle 1 teaspoon of raw sugar over the top. Bang the dish on the counter a couple of times to help it settle. Bake on the center rack for 40 to 45 minutes or until the sponge topping has risen and is browned. Cool in the ovenproof dish, then serve with a spoon into warmed bowls. Spoon whipped cream over the top if you like.
Turns out, Ms. Shore — and Ella Fitzgerald, who also covered the Guy Wood/Sammy Gallop tune — were just right when they promised that you’d “never get enough of that wonderful stuff.” Particularly when served with cream in generous dollops.
If you’re looking for an unexpected (and unexpectedly simple) Thanksgiving dessert (which is also excellent as leftovers), put this one on your shortlist.
Got a favorite recipe you’d like me to re-think? Email dining@denverpost.com.
