Little House Fun

We recently started watching Little House On The Prairie season 1 and reading some of the "My Little House books". The girls have greatly enjoying learning about Laura, Mary and Carrie as the live in the little house on the prairie.

On one of the episodes that we watched they made apple fritters for dinner. The girls thought this looked like a lot of fun and so we check out the "Little House Cookbook"from the library so we could try and find the recipe. To our dismay there was not a recipe for apple fitters but we did find a recipe for Apple Turnovers. We decided to make the Apple Turnovers and have them for dessert. The girls had great fun making and eating them!

Apple Turnovers
from "The Little House Cookbook" pg. 122
Common Family Paste for Pies, double recipe (see below)
Tart apples, 3 to 4 (about 1 pound)
Brown sugar, 2/3 cup
Ground cinnamon or nutmeg, 1/4 teaspoon
Butter, 2 teaspoons
Powdered sugar, 6 teaspoons

Chopper and bowl; bowl, 2-quart; pastry board and rolling pin; baking sheets, 2, or skillet, 12-inch

Following the recipe for Common Family Paste, double the quantities and prepare two balls of dough. Chill both while you prepare the filling.

Peel, core, slice, and chop apples. Mix them in the 2-quart bowl with brown sugar and spice. Set aside to chill.

Roll the first dough ball to a rectangle 5 by 15 by 1/8 inches. Cut it into three 5-inch squares. Using a fork )so the juice stays in the bowl), place about 3 tablespoons of apples in the center of each square. Wet the edges of each square and fold over each pastry to enclose the apples in a triangular pocket. Seal edges by pressing with fork tines. Cook the first three while you use the remaining dough and apples to prepare the other turnovers.

To Bake The Turnovers:
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees as you butter the baking sheets. Transfer turnovers to sheets and bake 20 to 25 minutes, until nicely browned.

To Fry The Turnovers:
Melt half the butter in the skillet, add half the turnovers and cook on medium hight heat 10 minutes to a side. Repeat with remaining pastries.

Dust Warm turnovers with powdered sugar and let them cool before packing them in your lunch pail.

Common Family Paste For Pies
From "The Little House Cookbook" pg. 194
White flour, 1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose, plus extra for dusting
Salt, scant 1/2 teaspoon
Lard, 1/3 cup (5 tablespoons)
Butter, 1/2 teaspoon

Bowl, 2-quart; pastry surface and rolling pin; pie pan, 9-inch

Chill all ingredients and bowl on ice or in refrigerator. Rinse hands into cold water and dry them. Prepare a cup of ice water. In the bowl mix flour and salt. Spoon the lard into the flour and blend with fingers (not warm palms) until the mixture is uniformly coarse. Continue to toss as you add 3 tablespoons of ice water. Press the dough into a ball and chill it while you prepare the pie filling (in summer Ma Ingalls might have set the dough bowl in a pan of cold well water).

If your dough is a double recipe for making two crusts, divide it with a knife and work with one half while the other half cools.
(see cookbook for the rest of the recipe)