Spiced Bramley Apple Cake

News, fresh from the press: Morecambe Football Club is British Pie Awards Supreme Champion 2014 with their Bramley Apple Pie. The awards were launched in 2009 by the Melton Mowbray Pork Pie Association to celebrate achieving PGI status for the Melton Mowbray Pork Pie.

While on the subject of Bramley Apples........

                                                          Spiced Bramley Apple Cake

When I first arrived in London, a job as a librarian seemed out of reach so I took what ever was on offer. In doing so, the bowels of Guy's hospital in London became my working environment for a few months.

 

Filing assistants are people behind the scene or rather below the scene, as they mostly operate from basements. In Guy's, they get medical records in and out of gigantic shelves operated by enormous wheels, bring them on rickety trolleys via long poorly lit and often damp corridors to a sorting room, from where they are dispatched.

 

It's an indifferent job which leave a lot of time for confabulations, simmering resentment and malicious gossip. Soon after I started, a long serving member of the filing team stood tall over my desk and declared loudly,

-"Do you know, why English women are better than, you, French?", puzzled by a seemingly out of the blue aggression, I shook my head.

-"Well you wouldn't, would you? then let me tell you" she add, "That's 'cause we cook with Bramleys, none of that crap golden delicious". 

With that, she went back to her station.

 

For years, I refused to buy Bramleys. I avoided to cook recipes with Bramley apples, the same way I had kept well away from that person, averting my eyes and pretending, they didn't exist.

 

Then for no reason, I baked Spice Bramley Apple Cake. And it plainly became clear that they are just perfect for the job and the firm filling they provide when cooked is unique. What that ignorant character didn't know is, that Bramleys are protected under EU regulations therefore no chance to buy them outside the UK.

 

Local apples found in French gardens are often use to bake pies, Braeburn and Reinettes grises du Canada are the commercial kinds which "French" tend to use for cooking. Does that make English women better? I'll reserve judgment on that one. 

 

Spiced Bramley Apple Cake

 

Ingredients

For the cake
Preheat the oven to 180C, gas 4 and you'll need a loose bottom round cake tin, preferably lined with baking paper 

• 225g 8 oz Butter (unsalted) softened
• 180g 6½ oz Unrefined light muscovado sugar
• 4 Egg(s) (free range) medium
• 300g Plain white flour 
• 2tsp Baking powder       
• ½tsp Salt 
• 2 Bramley apple(s) peeled, cored and cubed
• 1tsp Cinnamon 
• 1tsp Nutmeg (ground) 
• 1tsp Cardamon (ground)
• 200ml 6⅞ fl oz Crème fraîche

For the topping

1  Bramley apple(s) peeled, cored and diced

2tbsp Lemon juice 

2tbsp Unrefined golden caster sugar 

2tbsp Orange marmalade (smooth and warmed up)

Method
In a large bowl beat together butter and sugar, when fluffy add the eggs

Then stir in all the dry ingredients leaving flour and creme for the next step
now add the flour and the cream alternatively

Pour the apples in and transfer to the cake tin

Cut the apple for the toppin and mix it the sugar and the lemon juice
top the cake with the apple

Bake for about 1 hour  at that stage check if the cake is cook by inserting a skewer or a knife in the middle it might need another 15 minutes.

Remove from the oven and leave it to cool for 10 mins
When cold enough brush the warm marmalade on the top