Sunday, 6th September – This recipe started when a work colleague decided to spend a few weeks in Bolivia with the none who raised her when she was a little girl, 30 years ago. This none is now heading an orphanage in Bolivia. So she shyly decided to call on our generosity, and organised a “cake for Bolivia” morning. I could not miss out this opportunity. However, two obstacles crossed my way: the lack of time I could spend in my kitchen the night before (that’s what’s happen when you want to complete thousands of tasks per day) and the request of not including chocolate in the recipe (too hard). After giving it some thoughts, I decided to bake a cake with apples. After 12 minutes preparation and 40 minutes baking, I got a softy, moisty, light, not too sweet – not too bitter, apple flavor cake.

INGREDIENTS

• 194g fine sugar
• 5g vanilla sugar
• 3 eggs
• 11g baking powder
• 125g flour
• 10cL sunflower oil
• 2 middle size gala apples

PREPARATION

1. Preheat the oven at 160°C
2. If you have a mixer, add the fine sugar, vanilla sugar, eggs, baking powder, flour and sunflower oil in the bowl and mix on low / medium speed.

If you do not have a mixer, add the fine sugar, vanilla sugar, eggs, baking powder, flour and sunflower oil in a bowl and stir in until you obtain a smooth and homogeneous preparation.

3. Peal the apples and cut them in medium size cubes, and stir them in the preparation.
4. Once the mix is smooth, transfer the preparation in a springform pan, that you previously greased with a little bit of oil (and kitchen roll).
5. Bake it for about 40 minutes or until a long wooden toothpick comes out dry or just humid.
6. Let it cool 5 minutes in the pan, then on a wire rack / plate.
7. For the final touch, you can cut little cakes with a cookie cutter.

The Sweet Sunday Baker Tips & Tricks

1. Which apples? When I arrived at the supermarket, I did not know what to take. My instinct was telling me Golden Apple, but they looked so not mature that I did not want to take them. So I finally went for the only one sort I know: Gala.
2. How much sugar? The original recipe is with 220 grams sugar (for 125 grams flour). At the moment I was baking, I was finishing my sugar bag and I had 194 grams on the scale: “25 grams less can only be good”. Plus, you add vanilla sugar so there was already enough sugar.
3. How much oil? What is 1/2 glass? I do not know how it looks like in your cupboards at home, but I have glasses of different size. So I finally went for a well-known Swedish brand tea mug, which contains 20 cL. So half of this mug is 10 cL.
4. Which baking tin? I really like the springform pan as you can take off the cake of it really easily.