Apple Cake
This is a very straight forward cake to make with no fancy ingredients or kitchen gadgets. The trickiest thing is probably slicing the apples thinly but to be honest, it’s pretty forgiving if your slices aren’t even. First time I made this cake, I tried laying the apple slices flat and overlapping but found it very frustrating when slicing the cake. It made sense to me for the apple slices to be put in vertically – it makes it much easier to divide the cake up to serve.
INGREDIENTS
½ cup Greek yoghurt (125g)
3 large eggs
¾ cup caster sugar (165g)
1 ½ cups plain flour (188g)
2 ¾ tsp baking powder
½ tsp cinnamon
¼ tsp salt
½ cup extra virgin olive oil (114g)
2 Granny Smith apples (3rd apple is optional)
1/2 tbsp raw sugar, to sprinkle on top
Note: All measuring cup sizes are based on Australian measurements
METHOD
Prepare the two apples by peeling them. Cut into four wedges, remove the core and then slice each piece into thin wedges. If you want to, you can add apple into the actual batter – peel and core the third apple and dice into 1cm cubes or you could even grate it.
Preheat a conventional oven to 180 degrees celsius. Grease a 23cm springform cake tin and line the base with non-stick baking paper. You don’t have to use a springform cake tin but if you use a round tin, make sure you grease it really well on the sides.
Mix the yoghurt, eggs and sugar in a large mixing bowl. In another bowl whisk together the flour, cinnamon, baking powder and salt. Add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and gently whisk together. Add the olive oil and whisk until everything is just incorporated. If you were adding apple to the batter, gently fold it through but don’t overwork the batter.
Pour the batter into the cake tin and smooth the surface. Place the thin apple wedges all around the cake. Depending on the size of the apples used, you might not use all the slices. I gently press the wedges into the batter so it’s mostly submerged in. Sprinkle some raw sugar over the apple slices.
Bake in the oven for 45 minutes but start checking the cake for doneness around the 35-40 minute mark by inserting a toothpick in the centre.
Remove the cake from the oven and allow to sit for 5 minutes before releasing it from the springform tin or turn it out of the round cake tin. Allow to cool on a baking rack, dust with icing sugar and serve slices of the cake with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream.