eat make read

A while ago I received an email from reader Winter Owl Vann, a Cherokee Indian living in Texas. With a name like that I had to know more. We exchanged a few emails which resulted in him giving me this recipe for blackberry dumplings. It sounded so delicious I could hardly wait to try it out. But of course life gets in the way and it took me a while to give it a go.

I had to do a little hunting to find the perfect recipe for dumplings because Mr. Vann uses a local doughnut maker’s flour mixture (lucky!) as a base, but I figured out a a pretty good solution, even improvising a bit by adding a little cinnamon to sweeten them up. I experimented a bit with the shape of my dumplings. Mr. Vann likes to form little balls but the elders like strips of dough. I tried both options plus a larger ball version. I certainly had enough dough to try them all out.

Dumplings make me happy, but it was the blackberry sauce that I couldn’t wait for. I was even lucky enough to find some frozen blackberries at the greenmarket. The sauce is a mixture of grape juice and blackberries plus a few other spices. It immediately smelled like heaven and was the most amazing color. Happiness!

I let the dumplings simmer a while longer than the recipe called for because I had other things going on, but I figured it probably didn’t hurt. The dumplings had soaked up the blackberry mixture and looked like little gems. I scooped a few servings out for Aaron and I and we sat down with anticipation.

Oh man! That sauce is so full of flavor! Although the sauce never really thickens, it remains juicy therefore almost making this a dessert soup. The dumplings were just slightly sweet, I think the cinnamon added a nice little flavor note to them. We decided the small ball shaped dumplings worked best because they were bite size and you didn’t have to fiddle with them. The blackberries added great flavor and a nice texture to the whole ensemble.

Thanks Winter Owl Vann! What a great recipe!

Blackberry Dumplings
makes a whole lot

dumplings:
Mr. Vann uses doughnut mix from a local baker, but you can also use your favorite dumpling recipe or something like this.
3 3/4 cups pastry flour
2 T + 1 t baking powder
1 1/2 t salt
1 t cinnamon
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup water with 1 pkg dry yeast dissolved in it

blackberry sauce
2 cups Blackberries – fresh or frozen
1 qt grape juice
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt

1
Pour doughnut mix (or dry ingredients) in mixing bowl. Make a well in center of mix.
2
Mix buttermilk and yeast water together and slowly add to mixing bowl while stirring in the flour. Add liquid slowly, because too much liquid is worse than not enough. When dough is thoroughly mixed and slightly tacky, cover and let rise for 30 minutes.
3
Turn out onto floured waxed paper and knead and press into a ball until firm.
4
Sprinkle waxed paper with sugar. Take a ball of dough about the size of an egg and roll out to 1/4″ thick. Then either cut into small strips or pinch off in small balls and drop into boiling blackberry and grape juice mixture. After all is in, reduce heat to simmer and cook for about 15 minutes.