Apples, apples, apples, well, you know! The neverending story of this autumn. My Mother is making apple puree and apple varenye and I’m baking apples raw or in cakes, muffins and scones because my teeth just wouldn’t take it anymore. =)
Before sharing with you yet another apple recipe, here are some more shots from that misty-morning-turning-into-a-sunny-day. When I walk past all these colourful leaves I want to seize the moment and get this decadent beauty on my camera but it just wouldn’t work. It’s all about this fleeting autumnal light:
And now on to apples and walnuts. There was a jar of leftover apple jam gone-not-the-way-it-was-planned on the table so I had to use it in baking. There was also a bowl of freshly made apple puree and lots of raw apples. Plus some toasted walnuts were waiting for their turn… I’ve decided to use them with the jam and the puree so my choice fell on this recipe:
A year ago – Cinnamon-Roll Pull-Apart Loaf with Apples
Two years ago – Autumn Colours and Karelia (with another misty picture)
Three years ago – Creamy Peach Tart and Kitchen Reborn
Applesauce Walnut Cake adapted from heatherchristo.com will suddenly make a full-fledged layered cake, super-soft and super-walnut-fragrant! Follow the link for the recipe.
My changes to ingredients: As I had that super-sweet apple jam (with apple bits) instead of applesauce I actually did not add any sugar to the batter at all. I mixed in some white rice flour and used considerably less nutmeg for sure. Instead of buttermilk I mixed some milk with sour cream. I used apple puree to fill and top the cake.
My changes to procedure: The recipe will actually make two cakes. So when I ended up with two round cakes they were just asking to get turned into a nice layered cake. With all the apple puree that we have (we’re running low on glass jars, who would believe that?), that was just the most appropriate idea – to cut each cake in two and then fill and glaze the cake with lots of apple puree. I also decorated the cake with walnut pieces.
I had to bake the cakes longer than 30 minutes.
Remarks: If you don’t like the taste of walnuts or would rather have it less distinct, add some other nuts cause WALNUTS! is what every bit of the cake is screaming : ) I don’t know how this recipe will work with other sorts of filling / glazing, I just find this apple puree a perfect filling for lots of cakes (see some of them here).
Result: The walnuts are chewy and the cake is soft. Cool! A very fragrant cake even if you leave it as it is, without building up the layers. The author suggests dusting the tops with powdered sugar. And yes, the fact that my cake had no sugar added to its batter and still was sweet proves that you can use the leftover apple jam in baking alright!
Will soon get back to my Greece shots and memories.
G.
hep-i-book'a 