Rustic Apple Cake

After baking Blueberry Cheesecake, I had half a tub of sour cream left. And 5 apples in the fridge, 4 red and 1 green. A few days before that, Wendy posted her Rustic Apple Cake which she adapted from Simply Anne's. I thought the cake looked lovely and I just had to bake it.

There is no butter in the batter but a mere 3 tablespoons of olive oil. Wendy mentioned that you could substitute that with 4 tablespoons of butter. Though I felt that the fat content in the cake is too low, I went with 4 tablespoons of grapeseed oil. I was pretty sure that the sour cream and diced apples would more than make up for the moisture content of the cake.

MamaFaMi, PH pun nak tayang PH punya NICE PLATE.

While mixing the batter, I noted that it was on the dry side and I added 2 tablespoons of buttermilk just because I had some in the fridge. It was much better but the batter is kind of thick and sticky. I may have added too much diced apples (1 green and 1 red apple) and my mixture appeared to have more "liew" than batter. It was a case of apple overkill.

Oh, I added some raisins too because my better half loves raisins. Anything with raisins tastes good to him and this is added insurance so that he will eat the cake :) 

I checked the cake after 45 minutes (this is what I usually do for all my cakes) and it was still raw, so I baked it for 1 hour. I guess I was impatient and I should have tested the cake again when the hour was up. When the cake was sufficiently cool, I sliced it and discovered that a small part at the center of the cake was still raw :( So I just cut it away. 

After taking a bite, I am sorry to say that I found the cake to be on the dry side. It tasted good, I mean apples and cinnamon with raisins is a combination that I love a lot. The sliced apples still retained some bite and I am not sure if that is a good thing or not. If I bake this cake again, I will use a butter cake recipe. Yup, my full 250g of butter as opposed to 4 tablespoons of oil. This cake is possibly meant to be a healthy cake with minimum fats but you know me, I love my butter.

Rustic Apple Cake

Adapted from : Table for Two.....or More

Ingredients :

- 200g self-raising flour

- 100g caster sugar

- 1 tsp ground cinnamon

- 2 eggs

- 125g sour cream

- 4 tbsp grapeseed oil

- extra butter to scatter on top of cake

- 5 apples (4 New Zealand Royal Gala and 1 Granny smith)(Wendy's recipe uses 300g apples and I may have overdone it)

- 1 cup raisins

Method :

1. Grease and flour an 8" springform pan. Set aside.

2. Mix caster sugar and ground cinnamon. Reserve two tablespoons for sprinkling on top of cake and set aside.

3. Peel apples. Dice two and slice the other 3. Set aside.

4. In a mixing bowl, beat eggs and sugar until light and creamy.

5. Beat in sour cream and oil. 

6. Add flour and mix until just moistened.

7. Fold in diced apples and raisins.

8. Scrape batter into the cake pan and level using a spatula.

9. Arrange sliced apple on top of the cake and scatter with pats of butter. Then sprinkle with the reserved 2 tablespoons of cinnamon sugar.

10. Bake at 160C for 1 hour or until skewer inserted into the center comes out clean.