What to do with a bumper harvest of apples?

Well other than stewing them and freezing them for use later, I hunted around on on the blogsite Jam and Clotted Cream (who got it from Sweet and Simple Bakes) I found a recipe for Vanilla Apple Cake.

After getting the essential ingredients in a shop from our nearest supermarket, actually I went for a baking dish rather than cake ingredients, I warmed up the oven and set to.

This really was a very simple recipe :

Ingredients:
250g/9oz unsalted butter, softened, plus extra for greasing
250g/9oz golden caster sugar (or normal caster sugar)
4 eggs, beaten
250g/9oz self-raising flour
1 vanilla pod, split, seeds removed and reserved (or 1 tsp vanilla extract)
3 small Bramley apples, peeled, cored and cut into wedges (or any other type of cooking apple, if not apple of your choice)
2 tbsp Demerera sugar
¼ tsp ground cinnamon

Method:
Step 1: Heat the oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Butter a 20cm/8inch springform tin, then line the base with baking paper.
Step 2: Beat the caster sugar and butter together until the mixture turns pale and fluffy. Add the eggs, flour and vanilla seeds, then beat together quickly to make a smooth batter.
Step 3: Tip into the prepared tin, then lay the apple wedges on top, poking them halfway into the mix. Don’t worry if the apples appear crowded – they’ll shrink as they cook. Sprinkle with the Demerera and cinnamon, then bake for 1 hour 5 mins, or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean and the sponge is risen and golden.
Step 4: Leave to cool for a few mins, then release the tin and cool the cake completely on a wire rack.

(c) Sweet and Simple Bakes

I used a silicone cake dish, so left the cake to cool in that on top of a cake rack and it seemed to work well.

SOH had been working hard all day Saturday and after chicken pie, we had the cake warm, with clotted cream for dessert and then tomorrow will have it cold with vanilla ice-cream.

Definitely a success and will make it to the recipe blog.