I N TH E M A I L
Apple Squares STORY AND PHOTOGRAPH BY LINDA GARSON
W
e occasionally receive letters from you in the mail, and of course we love the complimentary ones. We were very happy to receive this letter with a recipe too! To Culinaire Magazine, “Your magazine is a great source of reading and very helpful for good recipes... We have to support local markets and local people who make great food in Alberta. I have a garden and fruit trees, and I am sending you a good recipe for Apple Squares, it’s easy to make it. This is a very old Polish recipe. If one doesn’t have apples, you can use two cups of applesauce, but only homemade.” Eva C, Edmonton We just had to try it for ourselves as Eva had gone to the trouble of writing it out by hand and mailing it to us, and she’s right - it is easy to make, and delicious. It would be lovely with a scoop of good vanilla ice cream too.
8 Culinaire | June 2021
Apple Squares - Szarlotka Makes around 18 squares
1½ cups flour ¼ tsp salt 1 tsp baking powder 4 Tbs icing sugar, plus more to top squares 1/3 cup cold butter 3 egg yolks 2 Tbs (30 mL) sour cream 4 large apples or 2 cups (500 mL) homemade applesauce Preheat oven to 350º F. 1. Sift the flour and add salt, baking powder, and icing sugar. 2. Add cold butter and cut in fine pieces with a knife. 3. Add egg yolks and sour cream, and work into a stiff dough. 4. Grease a 20 x 30 cm glass dish and add 2/3 of the dough, rolled out to fit. Bake 10 minutes. Put the remaining 1/3 of the dough in the freezer to harden for 30 minutes.
5. Grate 4 large apples and spread over cooked pastry base. 6. Remove dough from freezer and coarsely grate over apples. Bake for 40 minutes. 7. When cool sprinkle with icing sugar.
