Apple, Plum and Almond Crumble Cake

My colleague brought in a huge basket of plums to work from her garden. We ate some of it but there was so many left I decided I'd take some home and bake something with it. I started thinking about flavour combinations and in the end decided on this apple, plum and almond crumble cake. The cake was declared one of the best bakes of the year. 

The cake is lightly spiced with chunks of apple which added a lovely freshness to the cake. The crumble topping added a lovely layer of texture and flavour with the ground almonds and oats. The plums were tart but still retained their shape and moisture after baking and paired well with the toasted almond flakes. The cake is delicious on its own but would go well with some custard or cream. 

I'm entering this to several blogging challenges this month. Firstly to the Rix Aga Inspired Recipe Competition where the theme is plums. 

Simple and in Season hosted this month by Elizabeth from Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary for Ren from RenBehan.com. It's definitely plum season as these came fresh from my colleague's garden.

Shop Local hosted by Elizabeth from Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary. This challenge was created to highlight produce from local sources. The plums in this recipe came from a colleague's garden. 

The No Waste Food Challenge which is run by Elizabeth from Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary. This month, it's guest hosted by Laura from I'd Much Rather Bake Than... The plums were bountiful and would have gone to waste otherwise.

Update 19th January 2015

This recipe has been published in House of Fraser's 'The Blogger's Recipe Book'  I was pleased to have been invited by the team at House of Fraser Home Department to participate in this project. They've compiled an assortment of recipes from bloggers and it features both sweet and savoury recipes. There are lots of familiar bloggers in there and a few new ones that I've not come across on my blog travels. I'm not sure if the book itself will be for general sale but once I know I will update this post again. 

 The recipe book 

 My bio 

 My recipe

 adding chunks of apple to the batter 

 place the cake batter in the tin 

 top with the crumble 

 arrange the sliced plums on top 

 after baking for about 40 minutes - the middle will still be wobbly 

 add a sprinkle of almond flakes and continue baking until brown 

 fresh from the oven 

 you can see the chunks of apple at the bottom of the cake on the right side 

 

An original recipe by bakingaddict

For the cake

4 eggs = 259g (use the same amount of butter, flour and sugar) 

259g butter

259g caster sugar

259g self raising flour

2 red apples - peeled, cored and chopped

1.5 teaspoons ground cinnamon

0.5 teaspoon ground nutmeg

For the crumble topping

90g butter

90g plain flour

90g light brown sugar

50g ground almonds

60g oats

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

For the topping

Handful of plums - cored and sliced

approximately 35g almond flakes

• Preheat the oven to 180C.
• Cream the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.
• Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well between each addition.
• Sift in the flour and mix well.
• Stir in the apple chunks by hand and pour into a 23cm round cake tin which has been lined. 
• Make the crumble topping by rubbing the butter and flour together with your fingertips until it resembles breadcrumbs. 
• Stir in the sugar, ground almonds, oats and ground cinnamon.
• Pour the crumble topping on top of the cake batter and smooth the top with a spatula.
• Arrange the plum slices on top of the cake.
• Bake for approximately 40 minutes then remove from the oven - the middle will still be wobbly at this point but the outside of the cake should be cooked.
• Sprinkle the flaked almonds on top of the cake and bake for another 15 - 20 minutes or until the almonds are toasted and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. 
• If the almonds brown quickly, cover with foil and continue cooking until the cake is cooked. 

SRC: Healthy Raspberry Bars

It's the 4th Monday of the month which can only mean one thing.... It's Secret Recipe Club Group D Reveal day! I love the Secret Recipe Club and look forward to reveal day every month. The concept is simple - each blog is assigned another blog in secret and the idea is that you choose a recipe to make from your secret blog and reveal it on the same day. It's a great way to discover new blogs and exciting recipes. 

This month my assignment is Without Adornment written by Bean. Her favourite hobbies are baking/cooking and photography, both of which she showcases on her blog. She is gluten intolerant and loves to experiment with vegan baking so her blog is a treasure trove of gluten free/dairy free/vegan recipes. I know more and more people with gluten intolerance and food allergies so this was a good opportunity to experiment with recipes and to bake outside my comfort zone. 

I had a real nosey round her blog and I do encourage you to pop over and say hi. She writes a beautiful blog with lovely accompanying pictures. I shortlisted a few recipes to try and in the end went with this raspberry bar as it sounded good and I had some fresh raspberries to hand. Her recipe is a gluten and refined sugar free vegan bar. I've made some adjustments as I did not have all the ingredients to hand so mine is not quite gluten free but it's dairy free with minimal refined sugar. I was really pleased that mine turned out almost exactly the same as Bean's. It tastes like a crumble and the sweetened, spiced tart raspberries are the perfect filling. These would be great for lunch boxes or picnics.

Other recipes I shortlisted to try are banana coconut cream pie, Vegan GF strawberry banana loaf with walnuts, Health(ier) Peanut (Not Quite) Brittle and Vegan Polenta Pizza. 

 flour and oat mix 

 adding coconut oil 

 looks like a crumble mixture 

 mix the raspberries with honey and spices 

 press more than half of the flour mixture onto a traybake tin 

 add a layer of raspberries 

 top with the remaining flour mixture 

 delicious!

Recipe adapted from Without Adornment

55g ground almonds

80 g brown rice flour

100g oats

55g wholemeal flour

100g spelt flour

1 teaspoon baking powder 

50g dark brown sugar

100g coconut oil

450g fresh raspberries

4 - 5 tablespoons honey (adjust to taste) 

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

• Preheat the oven to 180C. 
• In a large bowl, mix the ground almonds, brown rice flour, oats, wholemeal flour, spelt flour, sugar and baking powder.
• Add the coconut oil and rub into the flour mixture with your fingers until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.
• In a separate bowl, mix the honey, spices and raspberries together. 
• Spray a traybake tin with non stick spray. Press more than half the flour mixture into the tin and smooth out the top with a spatula.
• Spoon the raspberry layer on top and finish with the remaining crumble mix.
• Bake for approximately 30 - 40 minutes or until golden brown.
• Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely before slicing into squares.

An InLinkz Link-up

Cherry and Almond Cake

Recently, I was sent a lovely selection of products from Opies to review.  I looked on their website for recipes and came across this cherry and almond cake. It's a classic combination and one that I knew would be a crowd pleaser. It's a simple recipe but I managed to burn it as I didn't keep a close eye on my temperamental oven! Fortunately, the cake still tasted fine. It has a lovely texture and the juicy cherries in the middle are particularly delightful. The cocktail cherries would also be lovely in a cocktail!  

 small range of Opies products - look out for more recipes in the future 

 

 coat cherries in a tablespoon of flour 

 adding the cherries to the cake 

Recipe from Opies website 

Disclaimer: I was sent a selection of Opies products for review purposes. I was not required to write a positive review and all opinions expressed are my own. 

Raspberry and Basil financiers

Recently I was invited to a French Glace Cherries Masterclass in London where Cindy from Food For Thoughts showed us how to make French glacé cherries Jelly Cakes and French glace cherry and pistachio financiers. We also got to sample some lovely treats made with glacé cherries which Cindy prepared for us to sample throughout the afternoon. 

The inspiration for this recipe came from the financiers we made. I had a lot of leftover egg whites after making custard for my custard crumble cake so I decided to make financiers. As it's nearing Valentine's, I chose to make raspberry and basil financiers after seeing it on BBC Good Food.  

This is a slightly unusual combination of flavours but I thought it worked really well. It was definitely not to everyone's taste though particularly the basil. The cake itself is light and nutty and the tart raspberries paired well with the basil. The heart shapes look cute and are perfect for a delicious Valentine treat. 

I'm sending this to a few challenges this month. 

Made with Love Mondays hosted by Javelin Warrior where the idea is to make everything from scratch.

Cooking with Herbs hosted by Karen from Lavender and Lovage. The theme this month is Chinese and Romantic Inspired Recipes with Herbs. 

Treat Petite hosted by Stuart from Cakeyboi and Kat from the Baking Explorer. The theme this month is Loved Ones. 

Calendar Cakes hosted by Rachel from Dolly Bakes and Laura from Laura Loves Cakes. The theme this month is Oh L'Amour!

Four Seasons Food hosted by Anneli from Delicieux and Louisa from Eat Your Veg. The theme this month is 'Food from the Heart' 

A new challenge called Love Cake hosted by Jibber Jabber UK. The theme this month is Baking with Passion. 

Let's Cook Sweet Treats for Valentine hosted by Nayna from Simply Food. 

 cooking browned butter

 adding basil

 add raspberries before baking

Recipe is from BBC Good Food