French Fridays with Dorie - Long and Slow Apples - Pommes Confites

Today the recipe for the French Fridays with Dorie group are “Long and Slow Apples” - “Pommes Confites”.

The “Pommes Confites” are based on an early-20th-century recipe from Edouard Nignon's "L'Heptaméron des Gourmets". The original recipe calls for a twenty-hour preparation. The first ten hours were designed for baking and the additional ten hours for chilling the thinly sliced apples to a compacted, almost-candied state.
However, many people prefer to eat these buttery, caramelized apples while they are warm. You might wish to refer to this dish as the “Long and Slow Apples”, as Dorie calls them.

The recipe is fairly easy. All you need for this dish are thinly sliced apples, ground ginger and cardamom and some melted unsalted butter. I opted for homemade vanilla sugar and some cinnamon instead of the ground ginger and coriander and for crisp Granny Smith instead of Gala or Fuji apples that Dorie´s recipe calls for. Granny Smith are quite easy to find in stores around here at this time of year and I do like them for baking. Stack the thinly sliced apples in oven proof ramekins or cups, brush with the melted butter and sprinkle with the sugar and spices.

You will need cooks' professional-grade plastic wrap for cooking the apples. You can find that online or at restaurant supply stores. But you can also use a layer of unbleached parchment paper, then cover with aluminium foil, which is what I did. Place an additional ramekin, cup or plate on top to weigh down the apples while baking and cooling.

While the recipe for the Long and Slow Apples - Pommes Confites in my edition of  Dorie´s book calls for a baking time of four hours, the same recipe can be found at Epicurious and calls for a two hour baking time – mine were done at exactly two hours and I let them rest for two hours in the warm oven (with the weights on) before unmolding them onto plates. This seems to have been a good decision based on the kinds of apples I used and the way they tasted and looked when I served them. Pure bliss on a dessert plate.

You can serve the Long and Slow Apples - Pommes Confites for dessert with a some whipped cream, with yogurt or ice cream or even with a dollop of decadent and rich Crème Double (Clotted Cream)…

…and some homemade Vanilla Sauce which is what I did.

Decided to add "a touch of spring" to my plates by placing a red and white striped tulip on some of the plates - my favorite flower shop had so many irrestible Dutch tulips on display, I just could not resist them.

This is a wonderful recipe and all the apple lovers in my life were pleasantly surprised and utterly delighted with this dessert. No doubt whatsoever, there will be numerous sequels

To see how the other members of the French Fridays with Dorie prepared their Long and Slow Apples -Pommes Confites, please click here.