Take large fine juicy apples. Pare them, and extract the cores
without dividing the apple. Fill each hole with brown sugar, and
some chips of lemon peel. Also squeeze in some lemon juice. Or you
may fill the cavities with raspberry jam, or with any sort of
marmalade. Have ready a paste, made in the proportion of a pound
of suet, chopped as fine as possible, to two pounds and a half of
sifted flour, well mixed, and wetted with as little water as
possible. Roll out the paste to a moderate thickness, and cut it
into circular pieces, allowing two pieces to each dumpling. Lay
your apple on one piece, and put another piece on the top, closing
the paste round the sides with your fingers, so as to cover the
apple entirely. This is a better way than gathering up the paste
at one end, as the dumpling is less liable to burst. Boil each
dumpling in a small coarse cloth, which has first been dipped in
hot water. There should always be a set of cloths kept for the
purpose. Tie them tightly, leaving a small space for the dumpling
to swell. Plaster a little flour on the inside of each tying place
to prevent the water from getting in. Have ready a pot of boiling
water. Put in the dumplings and boil them from three quarters to
an hour. Send them to table hot in a covered dish. Do not take
them up till a moment before they are wanted.
Eat them with cream and sugar, or with butter and sugar.
You may make the paste with butter instead of suet, allowing a
pound of butter to two pounds and a quarter of flour. But when
paste is to be boiled, suet will make it much lighter and finer
than butter.
Apple dumplings may be made in a very plain manner with potato
paste, and boiled without cloths, dredging the outside of each
dumpling with flour. They should boil about three quarters of an
hour when without cloths.
The apples for dumplings should always be whole, (except the
cores;) for if quartered, the pieces will separate in boiling and
break through the crust. The apples should never be sweet ones.