Recipe: Apple Sharlotka

                                                                                            

Last autumn, we had a bumper crop of apples in England.  I remember seeing the branches of the apple trees in the neighbouring gardens where my mum lives in London absolutely weighed down with masses of red fruit.  Even the pathetic specimen that lives on the boundary of my property looked pleased with itself for displaying a few somewhat sour apples.  This bounty must have had an effect on prices, because since the autumn, apples have been cheaper.  I was looking at them in the supermarket last week whilst wondering what I could bake for this week’s Labyrinthus recipe, and I picked up three bags of three different varieties, thinking, ‘I’ll make something with apples.  Everyone keeps saying it’s good to cook with things that are in season.’  So here I am, and after a little online research, I decided to make an ‘Apple Sharlotka’.  It’s a fatless Russian apple cake, and I sourced the recipe from Smitten Kitten.  Here’s what happened...

Ingredients:

6 large tart apples (e.g. Granny Smith’s)

3 large eggs

200g granulated sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

125g self-raising flour

Butter to grease the cake tin (9” springform – I only had an 8”, but it worked)

Ground cinnamon to finish

Icing sugar to finish

Method:

Preheat oven to 180̊ C, 350̊ F or Gas Mark 4.

Line the bottom of the baking tin with baking parchment.  Butter the paper and sides of the tin.

Peel, core and chop the apples into medium sized chunks, and put them all in the tin.

 

 

 

In a large bowl, mix up the cake batter: Beat the eggs and sugar together with an electric whisk until the mixture thickens.  Beat in the vanilla extract, and then stir in the flour to make a thick batter.  

 

 

Pour this over the apples in the tin, making sure all the apples are covered.  Press the batter down into the apples.

Bake in a preheated oven for 55-60 minutes or until testing prong comes out clean.  Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes on a rack, then flip out onto another rack.  Peel off the baking parchment, then flip back on to a serving plate.  Dust with cinnamon and icing sugar to finish.

Result:

You might be able to see from the photos that my Sharlotka isn’t as pretty as Smitten Kitten’s, so no ten out of tens for presentation, BUT it tasted AMAZING!  The family vote this time was 9 out of 10, and I was told I could definitely cook this one again!!!  We ate half on the day I baked it, and the other half, reheated in the oven under some foil, the next night.  I’d say it tasted better on the day it was baked, but we all enjoyed it.  Another Hall of Fame candidate, I think...