Life in the Overberg

When the Dutch came to South Africa a few centuries ago they took with them the ‘Potjie’ but seemingly forgot to take the recipe for apple pudding. A new generation did not forget and last night we re-introduced this delicious Winter desert with three South African friends here in Stanford in the Western Cape. And this is the basic recipe which you can alter (more or less of the different ingredients) just to make it to your own personal taste.

What you need and do (4 persons) is 6 apples of which you take the skin off and the crown out. Put these each on a teaspoon butter on an oven tray. Take per apple 1 spoon sugar/cinnamon mix (50/50) and fill up the crown. Top each crown off with another teaspoon of butter. Drip a bit of pure lemon juice on top of each apple. The tray goes into a pre-heated oven (180 degrees C or  356 degrees F) for approx. 40 minutes of which the last 5-10 minutes combined with the grill.

For the custart: 6 spoons of custard, six spoons sugar, one sachet vanilla suger and a small handfull of grated lemon skin plus 6 dl milk. Mix it and keep on stirring on the fire until it’s getting stiff.

The final touch: Pour the custart over the apples and serve. Within 5 minutes the tray and the plates are empty. Promise!!!

Enjoy.

NOTE: The Afrikaners may have forgotten the recipe for the apple-pudding but the Dutch forgot all about the ‘Potjie’