Cardamom, apple & nut cake

When I first started to bake, the recipe was everything. I had to have each stipulated ingredient, I had to adhere to every step of the process and the oven time couldn’t be a minute more or less than what was stated on the page. But things are different now

Partially it’s down to experience, you get to know tips and tricks which can be used as shortcuts, whatever the dish you’re making. Primarily though, I think it’s down to practicality, the realisation that every cooking or baking session doesn’t have to be preceded by a shopping expedition. Doesn’t have to incur extra expense. Just accept the fact that as long as you have a hallway decent stock of kitchen staples, a selection of spices, and a bit of imagination, most recipes can be adapted to what you have available on the day. The finished item may not match what first caught your attention in the cookbook, but the upside is you’ve created something personal.

All of which leads me to cardamom, apple and nut cake.

I based this on a recipe I found in A Good Day To Bake by Benjamina Ebuehi. If you like baking I cannot recommend Benjamina’s recipes highly enough. As well as publishing two books, she writes regularly in the Guardian. I’ve lost track of the number of her recipes I’ve made, and without exception, they’ve tasted wonderful. I particularly like the way she includes fresh herbs, both in sweet and savoury bakes. The standout example of this is tarragon & white chocolate blondies. 

In the book, this recipe is for a cardamom, pear and pistachio cake. But I had no pears and only half of the pistachios required.

So after a hunt around the kitchen, these are the ingredients I came up with and this is how I made it.

Ingredients

• 180gm unsalted butter – melted in a saucepan
• 120gm nuts – Benjamina uses all pistachios. I used 60gm each of pistachios & hazelnuts
• Seeds from 8 green cardamom pods. I added a couple of extra pods as I love the flavour of cardamom.
• 3 eggs
• 180g caster sugar
• 2tsp vanilla paste
• 180g plain flour
• 1.5 tsp baking powder
• 0.25 tsp salt
• 2 dessert apples – I used Jazz Apples but any sweet dessert variety would work.
• 2 tsp demerara sugar

Method

• Preheat the oven to 160c fan, 180c gas or 350f electric. 
• Grease and line a cake tin – the one I used was 18cm
• Blitz the nuts as finely as you can in a chopper or food processor. Grind the cardamom seeds and then mix them into the blitzed nuts.
• In a large bowl whisk together the caster sugar, eggs and vanilla paste. Then add the flour, baking powder, salt and mixed nuts and seeds. Gently stir until you have a smooth cake batter. Then pour in the melted butter and stir again until combined. Finally, pour the finished batter into your lined cake tin.
• Cut the apples in half, leaving the skin on. Remove the core and then thinly slice the apple. 
• Arrange the slices on top of the cake, don’t worry if they overlap or if you start a second layer. Once complete sprinkle the demerara sugar over the top
• Bake the cake for about 50 to 55 minutes. A sharp knife inserted into the middle of the cake should come out clean. If it doesn’t bake for a bit longer.

In her recipe Benjamina says to bake the cake for 40 to 45 minutes, but I found this wasn’t long enough. A bonus from the extra time in the oven is that the apple slices on top get some additional caramelisation.

As an extra treat, this cake works wonderfully with the addition of some custard.