Rose Cantine

I don’t know what inspired me to bake today. It’s very warm here in Amsterdam and working in the kitchen is not the most logical thing to do. But I just felt like baking!

I used Granny Smith apples, although you can use Bramley apples as well (they’re even better). Use fine crystal sugar (also known as caster sugar) for the cake and for sprinkling on top before it goes in the oven, use dark muscovado sugar.

Before you do anything, pre-heat the oven to 160 degrees centigrade (fan oven) or 180 degrees centrigrade (gas oven). Get a springform cake pan and either line it with wax paper or grease it with butter and lightly sprinkle the sides and the bottom with flour. This will keep the cake from sticking. Now get to work.

Ingredients:

225g butter
450g Granny Smith or Bramley apples
Juice of 1 lemon and finely grated lemon zest
225g fine crystal sugar
3 eggs
225g self-raising flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
25g ground almonds
1 tablespoon dark muscovado sugar

Procedure:

1. Peel, core and cut the apples into 1 centimeter pieces. Squeeze the juice of one lemon over them and mix well. Set aside.

2. Using an electric hand whisk, cream together the fine crystal sugar, butter and lemon zest in a bowl until they are mixed very well and the mixture is soft. Slowly beat in the eggs, one at a time and add some flour after each egg. Mix well.

3. Sift the remaining flour and the baking powder into the butter-sugar-egg mixture and mix well. Fold in the almonds.

4. Drain the apple pieces well. You don’t want the cake to be too moist. Fold the apple pieces into the batter and mix well.

5. Spoon the batter into the cake pan and sprinkle the muscovado sugar on top before putting it into the oven. Bake for 1 hour.

6. To ensure the cake is done, insert a toothpick or skewer into the center of the cake. If it comes out clean, then the cake is ready to come out of the oven.

7. Let it cool for 10 minutes. Serve with either vanilla ice cream or creme fraiche on the side. Sprinkle cinnamon powder over the ice cream and cake right before serving.