Apples are Looking Good this week in our garden.
Bramley apples are usually picked and sold when green. We don’t pick ours until we need them. They are ready to use from about September onwards so that’s when we start to pick and use them in the kitchen. We like apple pies, apple crumble and today we had Apple Cake.
We like to see our apples ripen on the tree. We don’t harvest and store the fruit all in one go. If you leave them where they are they will turn from bright green to a deep shiny red. The apples on the outside of the tree in the sun ripen and change colour first. The fruit in the centre of the tree or on the shady side take longer to turn red. That’s great for us… we can just pick a few fruits when we need them.
Some years they end up looking like baubles on a Christmas Tree!
Our Bramley’s Seedling Apple Tree produces firm sharp fruit that’s perfect for baking. If you have ripe apples that you would like to use now then here’s our delicious easy recipe for apple cake for you to try.
Apple Cake Recipe
This recipe for Apple Cake is filled with fruit. It is quick to make and delicious to eat. The sponge is fluffy and moist and the sugar topping creates a light crunch. You can eat it warm straight from the oven (like a pudding with cream or ice cream) or serve it cold with a cup of coffee. I make this in two loaf tins and each cake will cut into 10 generous slices.
Ingredients
- Juice of ½ an orange
- 200g sultanas
- 2 large cooking apples Bramleys
- Juice of ½ a lemon and grated zest of 1 lemon
- 250g caster sugar, plus Demerara for sprinkling over the top
- 250g unsalted butter, softened
- 350g self-raising flour, sifted
- 6 medium sized eggs
- 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
- Cream or ice cream to serve
Method
- Soak the sultanas in orange juice whilst you prepare the cake mixture.
- Heat the oven to 170°C or Gas mark 3 and butter two loaf tins or one large cake tin.
- Peel, core and quarter your apples then slice into a small bowl with the lemon juice.
- In your mixing bowl beat the sugar and butter until light and fluffy. Add flour, eggs, lemon zest and vanilla extract. Finally drain away any excess orange juice from the sultanas and add the fruit to the mixture.
- Spoon the half the mixture into your cake tin then add a layer of apple slices. Spoon in the rest of the mixture and press the in remaining apple slices so that they are barely visible. Sprinkle a little Demerara sugar over the top.
- Place a piece of greaseproof paper over the top of the cake to prevent it browning too quickly. Bake in the middle of the oven for 1 hour if using one large cake tin or about 40 minutes for two loaf tins. Use a skewer to check that the centre of the cake is cooked through.
- The cake will shrink away from the sides of the cake tin slightly when cooked. Allow to cool for a few minutes in the tin then turn out onto a serving plate. Slice and serve hot with cream/ice cream or cold with your favourite coffee.
Are you picking fruit from your garden this autumn?
What’s looking good in your garden this week?
Just click the photo below to read the guidelines to joining in with Looking Good.
Welcome to Looking Good
This is week 3 of my Friday Blogging event. We would love to see what’s looking good in your garden or neighbourhood.
How to Add your Post:
- Write your post as normal and please include a link to this post.
- Click the Frog to add your Url/web address for your post and link your post.
- Please leave a comment at the bottom of this page.
- To welcome other time zones the link is open all day Friday and Saturday until 10 pm (London/British Summer Time)
Thanks very much for joining in with Looking Good! Gillian 🙂
Aren’t you lucky to have your very own apple tree!
We are indeed Lulu! We planted some trees when we first moved here… the children were little and someone told us it would help them settle if we got them involved with the garden. They chose the fruit trees which were nothing more then whips at the time. (3 feet saplings) They are turning into lovely characterful country trees now with lichen growing on the branches and beautiful blossom every spring too.
Your apples are beautiful! We don’t spray ours so they generally have worms and a black surface mold that is harmless, but looks less than pleasing. I guess that’s why orchardists have to spray. We’re having a great apple harvest this year.
Your cake looks so good!
We don’t spray either Eliza. We have lived here for 12 years and never used any chemicals on the garden. I just don’t believe that something that kills one living thing won’t hurt another. Somehow nature finds a way and we always have lovely fruit. The leaves are less than perfect but I don’t mind that. Yes, the cake is lovely!
Your apples look so good! And I loved the winter photo of them too. How lovely to see the apples turn red too. The cake looks fab, I could just eat a slice!
Sorry for my absence…I have been renovating my old sash windows ( the house was built in 1886). It has been mind blowingly tedious and I have missed so many posts…but I hope to catch up now.
Thanks for your comment Karen. Renovating homes can be hard work. I admire you for throwing yourself in and getting it all sorted out.
Thank you so much Gillian. I live alone…but when it comes to house renovations, having several husbands would be quite useful!!!
Thank you for the delicious recipe, I love apple cake. Such a timely post, I was just picking a few Bramleys yesterday and thinking how you never see their ripened colour in shop bought ones. The garden was once part of a cider farm, so we have lots (too many this year) especially this year … I’m always on the look out to pass them on to friends, those with pigs take most including the windfalls.
It’s a big cake and is good using up your apples and for sharing. The apples in the shops around here are always much bigger and much greener than ours. I wonder if they are from trees specially bred for commercial production?
Looking forward to giving that recipe an outing in our kitchen. Just managed to get my contribution to Looking Good In The Garden in on time.
It’s good to try something that someone else suggests isn’t it? We’ve found some lovely recipes that way… as well as those handed down through the family of course!
I could kill for some of that apple cake right now! I love your looking good series btw, really look forward to it. And that picture of the apples in the snow was quite something xx
I know how you feel about cake Ella! I’m feeling the same but it’s back to cottage cheese for lunch for me today. Think I over did it a bit with the Apple Cake… so scrummy.
What beautiful apples, Gillian. Your cake looks so good I may give it a try later today. We picked up some beautiful apples this past week. It is such fun to grow one’s own fruit, and have a raft of recipes at the ready to enjoy it all. Our special autumn flowers are looking good this week after abundant rain last week to pump them up: https://forestgardenblog.wordpress.com/2015/10/09/looking-good-autumn-favorites/ Best wishes, WG
Your flowers are indeed looking beautiful Forest Gnome. I love Pineapple Sage.
Isn’t it fun to watch it bloom with those huge, red spikes right at the end of the season? Thank you, Gillian <3
Your apple trees look delicious!….and so very beautiful. I will be trying out your recipe too, as I planned to bake apple muffins this weekend anyway. I think I’ll try your apple cake instead. 🙂
The Apple Cake is very good! Feel free to pass the recipe around to your friends if you enjoy the cake.