Nectarine Pandowdy

          

         After our quilt club meeting yesterday Patty and I drove out to McConnell’s Fruit Farm, hoping they would still have some of their wonderful peaches for sale.  We were not too late.  Patty bought a half peck of peaches, but I decided to get a basket of nectarines instead.  Now what?  My husband and I could not possibly eat all that delicious, ripe fruit, and I didn’t want any of it to go to waste.  Obviously I would have to bake something.  

       Nectarine Pandowdy, I decided, would be just the thing.  A pandowdy is an old fashioned, fruit pie-like dessert, which probably originated in New England in the early 1800's.  It can be baked in a deep dish pie plate, a cake pan, or an oven proof skillet.  Most cooks agree that a pandowdy has a very juicy fruit filling, which is then covered with some kind of pastry.  After baking, the pandowdy is usually broken up with a knife and fork.  As the dessert cools the liquid fruit filling is absorbed by the crust, and the result is a cross between a pie and an pudding.

            Many people assume that the name “pandowdy” or (“pan dowdy”) comes from the way it looks.  The King Arthur Flour Baker’s Companion suggests that “Some have the origin of the word stemming from the dish’s humble, ‘dowdy’, appearance.”  This cookbook refers to the process of “dowdy-ing” the crust after baking.    But when I looked up “pandowdy” in the American Heritage Dictionary - Fifth Edition, here is what I found- [Perhaps < obsolete dialectal pandoule, custard: pan + dialectal dowl, to mix dough in a hurry (probably variant of dough).]  I seems to me that the term pandowdy may have had one meaning in the early 1800’s, and as time went on people’s understanding of the word changed.  

            There is even less agreement over the recipe for a pandowdy.  Some cooks use a biscuit crust; I consider that to be a “cobbler”.  Others recommend a cake batter topping, which I would call a “buckle”.  For a pandowdy, I prefer a pie crust both on the the top and the bottom.  Then why not just make a pie?  That’s a good question, to which I have an answer.  A pie is served by cutting a wedge and lifting it onto a plate.  Ideally the wedge should remain fairly intact while it is being served.  You don’t want the crust to fall apart or the filling to run all over the place.  

            Also, some fruits lend themselves to pie filling very well.  Apple is probably the best, and even a blueberry pie will stay together once it has been allowed to cool.  Other fruits, such as peaches and nectarines, are very juicy and produce a very delicious but very soupy filling.  And then there is the matter of crust.  Crisco shortening, butter or lard will all make a beautiful pie crust, but all these are loaded with saturated fats and/or trans-fats.  They are also not suitable for a vegan diet.  Spectrum Organic Shortening solves both problems and is a good, tasty alternative, but the dough made from this product tends to be softer and therefor more difficult to handle.  Likewise, the addition of whole wheat flour to the crust will make it healthier, but the dough be more fragile and will not hold together as well.  So if you want a juicy fruit filling with a falling apart crust,  obviously what you need is a pandowdy!  

            I decided to create a pandowdy that was as healthy as possible, with farm fresh nectarines and a whole wheat crust with Spectrum shortening.  And I replaced half the sugar with agave nectar, which has three benefits: it has a lower glycemic index, it adds liquid to the filling, and it’s trendy.  If you don’t have agave nectar you could substitute molasses; you will still have a very tasty dessert but you will sacrifice some trendiness.  

Here is my recipe-

Nectarine Pandowdy

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Refer to my previous blog for information about equipment you will need.  I baked my pandowdy in a vintage Corning Ware 8 inch cake pan.  Any deep dish pan of about the same size will work fine.

Filling-

9 large nectarine (or peaches)

1/3 cup sugar

1 Tbs. corn starch or flour

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. ginger

1/3 cup agave nectar (or molasses, preferably light)

Cut up and peel the nectarines.  Place them in a large mixing bowl.  In a small bowl, combine the sugar, corn starch and spices.  Pour this over the peaches and stir.  Then mix in the agave nectar.  Set this filling aside.

Crust-

1 1/4 cup unbleached white flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup Spectrum shortening

1/4 cup water 

Consult my previous blog post for crust making instructions, with one difference.  A crust made with Spectrum shortening will require less water, so be careful with this step.  Add just enough water to make the dough hold together.

Assemble the pandowdy-

            Be sure to use plenty of flour on your rolling cloth and pin!  Roll out the bottom crust just as for a pie, except that if you are using a square pan you will want to roll out the crust into more of a square shape.  

Also, if you have used the crust recipe above, do not try to fold it.  A crust made with whole wheat flour will fall apart easily.  Instead, get both hands under it and carefully lift it into the pan.  Don’t worry if it falls apart a little; just patch it up the best you can.  Spoon the filling into the bottom crust.  Then roll out the top crust, making sure to add more flour to the cloth first.  Place the top crust over the filling.  Again, do not worry if it falls apart.  As you can see, my top crust came apart as I was lifting it, so I patched it together.  Luckily this is a pandowdy, not a pie.  

            Before baking I dabbed some cold water around the edges to prevent them from burning.  I also sprinkled the whole top crust with a little sugar.

Bake for about 40 minutes. 

Check after 30 minutes or so.  If the crust is getting too dark at the edges, you can turn the oven down as needed.

Remove the pandowdy from the oven and let it cool for about 20 minutes.  Then use a fork and knife to mess it up a little.  Now it won’t matter that your crust fell apart somewhat during the assembly.

Note-  I recently saw a pandowdy recipe from a well know domestic diva.   She recommends flattening the dough in plastic wrap, folding it, chilling it for 30 minutes, rolling it out to 1/4 inch, cutting it into 2.5 inch squares, which you then wrap and chill again before arranging the squares on the fruit filling.  Of course the dessert is shown baked in a rustic looking skillet, just as a pioneer woman may have done.  Good grief!  I hardly think a pioneer woman would have gone to such a lot of trouble to achieve the “dowdy” crust effect, especially without a refrigerator.