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Here's how I travel without going anywhere

Photo by Lynn Kessel

Apples in puff pastry can be served by themselves but are even yummier dusted with powdered sugar and drizzled with homemade caramel sauce. You'll think you're dining at a French cafe.

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By LYNN KESSEL

Tribune columnst

Published: October 21, 2009

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Lynn Kessel

I've had a more-than-ordinary itch to travel the past couple of weeks.

Several friends recently returned from faraway places, and their reports made me pea-green with envy. All I've gotten are stories and photos of things such as fried sardines and stuffed mussels prepared in Istanbul, Qingdao beer downed in China and sweet Digby scallops devoured in Nova Scotia.

Needing a tug out of my pity party, I thought about recipe roulette. It's a game I play on occasion, when I'm craving something adventurous for dinner. Sometimes it takes me to faraway places.

Here are the rules: I select three cookbooks. Eyes closed, I open each book and randomly open a page to choose a recipe, and then I prepare one of the three dishes.

For my travel-hungry journey, I singled out the Spain, Italy and France editions of my "Culinaria" collection of cookbooks.

My first stop was Spain. The page I turned to described stuffed pigeon with giblets. I think not. That might be just a bit too exotic for my taste.

France was my next destination.

I opened the book to a beautiful photo array of apple desserts.

"Despite, or rather because of, the lack of good eating apples, Normandy's apple desserts are second to none," the caption read.

I zeroed in on a recipe for Douillons aux pommes, which translates to apple in a nightdress. The recipe called for ingredients I had on hand.

"A definite possibility," I thought.

Then, moving on to Italy, I hit a recipe for Oxtail ragout.

Because I had just fixed Beanie Tichy's oxtail stew several weeks ago, I decided to pass. As delicious as his dish was, I'd had my fill of oxtail.

"Apples in PJs it is!" I exclaimed.

For cooking and baking apple desserts, it's better to use dry-textured apples, the kind that tend to be less desirable for eating.

Although the folks of Normandy are loyal to their local Boskoop or orange-red Reine de Reinettes apples, I used light-green Granny Smiths, a variety popular here and in parts of France.

I baked my puff pastry enveloping the tart, whole apples, in a cast-iron skillet. If you don't have one, you can also use a baking dish.

Douillons aux pommes easily can be served by themselves but are even better dusted with powdered sugar and drizzled with homemade caramel sauce. They'd also be yummy with ice cream.

Vive la France!

DILLIONS AUX POMMES, aka APPLE IN A NIGHTDRESS

4 apples

7 ounces puff pastry

5 tablespoons powdered sugar

4 tablespoons butter

Cinnamon

1 egg yolk

Caramel sauce, optional

Peel and core the apples. Thinly roll the puff pastry and cut into 4 large squares. Place an apple on each square of pastry. Add some powdered sugar and a tablespoon of butter to the apples, then dust with a pinch of cinnamon. Fold the edges of the pastry around the apple, moisten with water and press together well.

Preheat the oven to 355 degrees. Coat the apple pockets with egg yolk and bake for 45 minutes. Before serving, sprinkle with powdered sugar and drizzle with caramel sauce.

Source: Adapted from "Culinaria France" by H.F. Ullmann

Lynn Kessel can be reached at lkessel@mac.com. For more of her recipes, visit southshore.tbo.com and enter the search words Lynn Kessel or look for her blog at www.lynnkessel.blogspot.com.

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