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Monday, October 24, 2011

Apple cake

My mother used to make an apple cake that we loved - it was a fairly thin, spiced cake base with a layer of cooked apples arranged prettily on top.  It wasn't a tarte tatin - something much more rustic and less sweet.  I remembered it the other day, and remembered trying to make it as a teenager and making a bit of a hash of it.  I think my baking skills have improved now, but I don't have the recipe any more.  I asked Grandma about it - she didn't know the cake but sent me another recipe (with grated apple, definitely different).  So, I set out to recreate Mum's apple cake (with some of the mass of apples we picked last week).  I made it for a friend's birthday and she keeps bees, so I also felt like the cake needed to have a bit of honey in it somewhere...

10 oz cooking apples (used Rome Beauty - pretty red skin)
juice of half a lemon
8oz plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
4 oz marg
4oz sugar
1 tbsp ground linseed mixed with 3 tbsp boiling water
fake milk (~3 tbsp)
~1 tbsp honey (or 1 tbsp demerara sugar)
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Heat oven to 350F/180C.  Line the base of a ~7in cake tin with baking paper.

Peel the apples (leaving little bits of peel if it is pretty), and core them. Chop 3/4 of the apple into small chunks.  Slice the remainder into pretty slices about 5mm thick at the peel side.  Mix the apples with lemon juice in a bowl to stop them going brown.

Put the flour and baking powder in a bowl and mix with a fork.  Add the marg and rub into the flour as if making crumble.  Mix in the sugar and cinnamon.  Add the linseed/water mix and the apple chunks and mix.  Add enough milk to make a good, stuck-together cake batter, then dollop it into the cake tin and smooth the top.

Arrange the apple slices on top.  Gently heat the honey and cinnamon in a small saucepan, then drizzle over the top (if using demerara just mix sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle over the top).

Bake for ~50 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean and the cake is nicely browned.  Allow to cool in the tin for 10-30 min before removing and cooling on a rack.


It came out quite nice - smelled wonderful, of cinnamon and apple and autumn, looked very pretty, and didn't last long (snapped one quick picture as we rushed out the door to the party at 2330).  The base was quite stodgy - I think the interspersed apples and honey/cinnamon-iness saved it from being too much stodge, but I might reduce the amount of cake mix and increase the amount of apples on top for the next iteration.
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