It’s snowing outside but, as the saying goes, every cloud has a silver lining and I have just figured out mine: I’ll bake an apple strudel. I adore it and I have found a way to make it gluten free, so I’ll make a variation of the recipe that Frau Waltraud gave me many years ago during a vacation in the beautiful Pusterthal, a valley in the Italian Alps.
I had made strudel before, following my mother’s recipe, but its filling lacked that particular texture that is a delicate combination between the softness of the cooked apples and the brittleness of the rest of the stuffing.
One summer night at her hotel in Toblach, Frau Waltraud – a stern widow in her sixties, always picture-perfectly dressed in the traditional costume of South Tyrol – delighted us guests with a feast of different kinds of strudel: peach strudel, cherry strudel, apricot strudel, blueberry strudel, and the classic apple strudel.
The following day I tried to get the recipe from Frau Waltraud, but she answered with such a firm “Nein!” – I must explain that in that part of Northern Italy the first language is German because it used to be Austrian – that I didn’t dare to insist. A few days later, though, I saw her casting the stitches for a knitting project and I asked her if she wanted me to show her an easier way to do it. My technique turned out to be so much easier than hers that she decided to surrender the secret of her unforgettable dessert. That same evening Frau Waltraud simply put in my hand a folded piece of paper with the apple strudel recipe and, since austere people often feel uncomfortable with their own kindness, warned me that I would never be able to equal her strudel anyway because what made the crust so smooth and delicate was the butter from a certain farm nearby.
She was right: my strudel is but a faint resemblance of hers, but I’m still so satisfied with my modest result that I think it’s worth passing on this strudel recipe.
Ingredients: V B Gf
(for 6 people)
- 4 organic apples, preferably golden delicious
- 1 sheet of gluten-free puff pastry
- ½ cup golden raisins, soaked in water
- 1 tsp. of ground cinnamon
- 1 Tbsp. butter + more for greasing
- 1 Tbsp. organic sugar
- ½ cup almonds, ground
- ½ cup of gluten-free bread crumbs
- 1 Tbsp. confectioner sugar for dusting
- 1 cup of heavy cream, whipped.
Preheat the oven at 380 F.
Soak the raisins in a small bowl filled with warm water.
Peel and core the apples, and cut them into small cubes. Soak them in a bowl filled with water and lemon juice, so that they won’t discolor.
Grind the almonds, not too small. Melt 1 Tbsp. of butter in a non-stick frying pan, add the sugar, the ground almonds and the bread crumbs. Toast this mix until golden brown, stirring constantly, about 7 to 10 minutes.
Transfer this toasted mix into a bowl, add the drained apples, the drained raisins, the cinnamon, and toss well.
With a rolling pin, roll the dough as evenly as possible, trying to make an rectangle about 20” by 14”. Transfer the dough onto a big towel dusted with gluten-free flour. The towel will help you roll the strudel without breaking it. Spread the filling on the dough, leaving a border of uncovered dough – about 2 inches wide – all around the filling.
Fold the shorter border over the filling first. With a small brush, wet this folded border with water. This way, when you roll the strudel the wet dough will adhere to the rest of the dough, preventing the filling from spilling out.
Form the strudel by raising the longer side of the towel and pushing with your hands, until you obtain a roll. With the brush, wet the inside of the last border of dough to seal the strudel. Flatten the top with your hands.
Grease a baking pan with some butter and dust it with gluten-free flour. Carefully transfer the strudel on the baking pan.
Cook at 380 F for 15 minutes, than lower the temperature to 360 F and cook for 45 more minutes or until golden/brown.
While the strudel is cooking, whip the heavy cream and keep it in the fridge until ready to serve the dessert.
Let the strudel cool down, dust with the confectioner sugar and serve at room temperature with a dollop of whipped cream.