Mary Berry's [Yummy] very best apple dessert cake

"I've been doing this special and remarkably easy recipe for years. The apples can be windfalls or even shrivelled ones left in the fruit bowl. Serve warm with ice cream or crème fraîche as a dessert, or with coffee in the morning as one would a Danish pastry, again warm, dusted with icing sugar."

SERVES 6

TOTAL TIME

1 hour 45 minutes

INGREDIENTS

• 225g (8 oz) self-raising flour
• 1 level teaspoon baking powder
• 225g (8 oz) caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• ½ teaspoon almond extract
• 150g (5 oz) butter, melted
• 350g (12 oz) cooking apples, peeled and cored
• 25g (1 oz) flaked almonds

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 160ºC/Fan 140ºC/Gas 3.

Lightly grease a deep 20cm (8in) loose-bottomed cake tin.

Measure the flour, baking powder, sugar, eggs, almond extract and melted butter into a bowl. Mix well until blended, then beat for a minute.

Spread half this mixture into the prepared tin. Thickly slice the apples and lay on top of the mixture in the tin, piling mostly towards the centre. Using 2 dessertspoons, roughly spoon the remaining mixture over the apples.

This is an awkward thing to do, but just make sure that the mixture covers the centre well as it will spread out in the oven. Sprinkle with the flaked almonds.

Bake in the preheated oven for 1¼–1½ hours until golden and coming away from the sides of the tin.

Made this for Carin and Bernie last week and I loved it. So even if you don't, I'll have it here for future reference!! 

Gluten free Chocolate Cake

This is so easy and too delicious for words, so don't talk about it - get eating!!

Serves: 12  (midgets)

• 250g plain chocolate, chopped (preferably fine Belgian)
• 1 1/2 (400g) tins chickpeas, rinsed and drained
• 4 eggs
• 150g caster sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon gluten free baking powder (surely all baking powder is gluten free?)
• 1 tablespoon icing sugar

Method
Prep:15min  ›  Cook:40min  ›  Extra time:15min  ›  Ready in:1hr10min  

1. Preheat the oven to 180º C / Gas mark 4. Grease a 23cm round cake tin, line with parchment and then grease again.
2. Place the chocolate into a microwave-safe bowl. Cook in the microwave for about 2 minutes, stirring every 20 seconds after the first minute, until chocolate is melted and smooth. If you have a powerful microwave, reduce the power to 50 percent.
3. Combine the beans and eggs in the bowl of a food processor. Process until smooth. Add the sugar and the baking powder, and pulse to blend. Pour in the melted chocolate and blend until smooth, scraping down the corners to make sure chocolate is completely mixed. Transfer the batter to the prepared cake tin.
4. Bake for 40 minutes in the preheated oven, or until a knife inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. Cool in the tin on a wire rack for 10 to 15 minutes before turning out onto a serving plate. Dust with icing sugar just before serving.
   

Oma Ferguson's Pound Cake

Basic Pound Cake Recipe as taught to me by Oma Ferguson:
Ingredients:
150 gr sugar
150 gr butter
150 gr flour (I use self-raising for everything)
3 eggs

plus a packet of vanille-suiker which they don't sell here so I usually use vanilla extract; however I didn't have any this time so used almond extract instead - just as lekker!

Combine sugar and butter and beat 'til creamy.
Add vanilla extract.
Beat eggs one by one into the mixture.
On a lower speed, add flour so as not to knock the 'wind' out of the mixture.

I couldn't remember at what temperature to bake it, so I consulted Irma Thingey's Joy of Cooking whose own "Basic Pound Cake" is anything but, including all kinds of spices and peels. But the temperature she gave was 325ºF  (which is officially 162.78ºC!! so say 170) for 1 hr - 1 hr 10 mns. One hour was enough. I did make sure not to place the tin too high in the oven.

Looks o.k. doesn't it? Tastes quite o.k. too. And you can do so much with this 'basic' recipe: add anything you like, I should think, as long as say, the fruit you add isn't too wet. 
I'm serving it as a base to pop 'ice cream' on top of.
Good luck!!

Lemon coconut cake YUMMMMM

Even Eva who doesnt like coconut (?!!) loved this. The only drawback to this cake is that it is so lekker you just want to eat it all in one go, so make sure you have plenty people to share it with!! The coconut milk keeps it really moist.

175g soft butter

200g witte basterdsuiker (hmm... No idea what this is outside of NL... Maybe use v fine granulated sugar?)

3 eggs

1,5 limes

50g dried coconut

200g flour

Baking powder

100ml coconut milk

Glazing:

50g soft butter

180g powder sugar

1 lime

Garnish with raspberries or edible flowers (or nothing)

Whip butter and sugar until crystals have completely disappeared (about 10 mins). Add eggs one at a time, keep whipping. Add dried coconut, coconut milk, pinch of salt and juice of 1,5 lime (i also added the zest). Fold in flour and baking powder. 

Butter and flour baking tray, pref. a square one of about 25cm (but a regular one works too). Add cake mix, put in 170 degree C pre-heated oven for about 30 mins (10 mins longer if it is a round tin). Cool down cake, then gently remove, flipping it upside down. 

For the glaze, mix powder sugar, juice of 1/6 lime (???!!! I did 1/2 lime and it was tasty) and 50g soft butter with a mixer. Spread out over the cake and let it harden. Cut into nice squares and garnish if you have anything, and if not just eat it up!!!! Super tasty.