Apple Cake with Caramel Sauce

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French Apple Cake with Caramel Sauce

My mom makes a great apple cake.  It’s baked in a tube pan, loaded with cinnamon, and drizzled with a brown sugar glaze.  Anytime I go over for dinner in the fall, it’s the dessert I expect/demand.  She’s made it all my life and it tastes like home.

But it’s her cake and I’m grown; it’s time I find my own apple cake.  An apple cake that tastes like my home.

So I’m on the prowl for apple cake recipes.  I’m looking for unfussy, rustic cakes, that can be pulled together in a moment’s notice.  I’m looking for the kind of cake you can quickly mix up when you get a “is it alright if I stop by in an hour?” call.  The kind of cake you can have in the oven 10 minutes after that call, its aroma filling your house with everything good about fall as you race around, shoving unmentionables under the bed and attempting to eliminate the dog hair tumbleweeds from every corner.  

My first contender is a (slight) adaptation of a French apple cake that I found on David Lebovitz’s website but is actually from one of Dorie Greenspan’s cookbooks.  It’s a dead simple apple cake that is made with ingredients you will most likely already have on hand.  I chose to serve it with caramel sauce this time around, but I think it would be just as nice plain with your morning coffee or an afternoon cup of tea.

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Apple Pie & Sharp Cheddar Biscuits

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Apple & Cheddar Double Decker Biscuits

These biscuits are a throw-back to what I would consider my finest culinary creation circa 1989.  Only then I called them mini-apple breakfast pizzas.  And I’m not sure I can call them my “creation” as I think I ripped off the idea from a fellow first-grader’s mommy at snack time.

Way back when, these little delights were made with biscuits out of a tube, a can of apple pie filling, and shredded cheddar.  People were so impressed with with my talent in the kitchen.

Unfortunately, I grew up and my apple breakfast pizzas had to grow up, too.  You just can’t wow people with tube-biscuits the way you could when you were six.  Which is unfortunate because I love opening those biscuit tubes with the back of a spoon.  So satisfying.  Oh, well, c’est la vie.

apples

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Shaved Fennel & Apple Salad with Blue Cheese

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I hesitate to post a salad like this because it is more a list of ingredients than an actual recipe, but I’m going to anyway because it is just that tasty.  Plus, if you’ve been looking for a reason to buy a mandoline, this salad is the perfect excuse.

This simple salad is as welcome on your table as an easy weeknight dinner with a simple piece of fish or chicken breast as it is a side or starter when entertaining.  Recently, I served this raw fennel slaw after a dinner of braised short ribs.  It was perfect as a crisp refreshing end to a somewhat heavy (but super delicious) meal.  It’s like having a salad, cheese course, and dessert all on one plate.

Let’s put it together.  Four proud ingredients: Fennel, Apple, Red Onion, Buttermilk Blue Cheese.

There’s nothing to making this salad.  We’re just going to shave the apple, fennel, and onion.  You can use a knife, a box grater, or a mandoline.

It only took me five minutes to prep the ingredients with my handy mandy.  Best gift, ever!

Throw your shaved vegetables in a big bowl, season them up, toss with wispy fennel fronds.

Transfer to pretty serving plate, mound it up nicely, and sprinkle with blue cheese.  That’s it.  Five minutes.  Simple and tasty.  Pretty, crisp and flavorful.  You’re done.  You’re amazing.


Shaved Fennel, Apple & Red Onion Salad with Blue Cheese
 
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This salad is great with a simple fillet of salmon or chicken breast for a light dinner or wonderful as a refreshing side with a heavier main course. All ingredient amounts are approximate, add and subtract to suit your taste.
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Serves: 4-6
Ingredients
  • 1 large bulb Fresh Fennel, fennel fronds reserved
  • ¼ large Red Onion
  • 1 medium Honeycrisp Apple
  • Fresh Lemon Juice
  • Olive Oil
  • White Wine Vinegar
  • Salt & Coarse Ground Black Pepper
  • ¼ c. Buttermilk Blue Cheese, crumbled
Instructions
  1. Shave fennel, onion, and apple on mandoline. If you don't have a mandoline, just slice ingredients as thin as you can. Sprinkle apples with lemon juice to prevent discoloration.
  2. Toss shaved vegetables and apples in large bowl, along with the feathery greens from the top of the fennel. Season with salt and pepper, dress with olive oil and vinegar.
  3. Transfer to a serving plate and top with crumbled blue cheese.

 

Autumn Harvest Quinoa Muffins

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I’ll admit it.  On occasion, after eating what is essentially dessert for breakfast five days straight, I feel a tiny twinge of guilt.

But what’s a girl to do?  A girl’s gotta eat.  And this girl has got to bake!

Solution: a healthy, hearty, grainy, good-for-your-body muffin.  No delicate, dainty muffin here.  This is a muffin that wakes up, steps into steel-toed boots, fastens its toolbelt, and gets to work.  And it works hard.  It’s going to get you out of bed, out the door, and carry you all the way through ’til lunch.  This muffin is not going to flake out on you.  How many other muffins can you count on to do the same?

Building blocks:  quinoa (it’s a super-food, you know), squash, apples, raisins, nuts.

That’s grated butternut squash, not cheddar cheese.  Hmm…cheddar might not be a bad idea…next time.

Combine dry ingredients, brown a bit of butter, whisk egg with buttermilk, toss the quinoa and other tasty touches together in a bowl.

butternut squash, golden, raisins, pecans, apple, brown butter, cinnamon

Bring it all together.  Into a muffin tin and into your oven.

butternut squash, quinoa, muffin, golden raisins, pecans, nuts, apples, cinnamon, hearty, healthy, whole grain, whole-wheat

Golden & toasty, a little crunchy, a lot healthy, super satisfying.  I call middle-right, you can have top-left.

squash, apple, raisin, quinoa, muffin, fall, hearty, healthy

You are going to love these wholesome, nutty muffins.  They’re so good you might not even want to go back to your more decadent breakfasts next week.  You may even make another batch, try another variation, other whole grains, different secret vegetal add-ins.

healthy, whole grain, squash, apple, pecan, raisins

Or maybe you’ll rediscover the jar of nutella.

5.0 from 1 reviews
Autumn Harvest Quinoa Muffins
 
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These muffins are wholesome, flavorful, and moist with just enough crunch. Customize them with your nuts and favorite dried fruits.
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Serves: 12
Ingredients
  • 1½ c. All Purpose Flour
  • 1 c. Whole Wheat Flour
  • 1 tsp. Baking Soda
  • 1 tsp. Baking Powder
  • ½ tsp. Salt
  • 1 tsp. Cinnamon
  • ½ c. Dark Brown Sugar
  • 1½ c. Buttermilk
  • 1 Egg
  • ¼ c. Unsalted Butter, melted and browned
  • 1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
  • 1 c. Cooked Quinoa
  • 1 c. Grated Apple (1 medium apple)
  • ½ c. Grated Butternut Squash
  • ½ c. Golden Raisins
  • ½ c. Pecans, chopped
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 375°. Butter or spray a 12 cup muffin tin.
  2. Combine flours, baking soda, baking powder, salt, brown sugar, and cinnamon in large bowl. Mix well.
  3. In medium bowl, whisk together egg, buttermilk, browned butter, and vanilla.
  4. In another medium bowl, combine quinoa, apple, squash, raisins, and pecans.
  5. Add wet ingredients to dry and mix until just combined.
  6. Fold quinoa mixture into muffin batter and scoop into prepared muffin cups.
  7. Bake until golden and tester comes out clean, about 30 minutes.

 

Kale, Radicchio & Wheat Berry Salad with Parmesan

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This is a salad that aims to please.  It’s hearty and healthy, grainy and nutty.  It’s easy to make, beautiful to admire.  It’s there when you need it and willing to cater to your whims.  This salad won’t let you down.

What  are we waiting for?  Let’s put it together.  Get the wheatberries simmering; this’ll take awhile.  Let them do their thing while you do yours.  Take out the trash , iron a shirt, water your houseplants.  We’ll meet back in forty-five.

Assemble your team.  Dark green kale meets garnet-colored radicchio, crisp apple, shallot, and walnuts.

Kale gets chopped, rinsed, and spun while radicchio is turned into ribbons.  Toast the nuts, turn the apple into matchsticks, and slice the shallot.

Treat your wheatberries to some zippy dijon, a glug of walnut oil, couple splashes of vinegar.  Grab the rest of the gang and toss in a big bowl.  Add curls and shards of Parmesan.

Congratulations, now you have a big tasty salad that’s going to see you through the week.  Put it in your lunchbox, eat it straight from the salad bowl at midnight, or serve it as a side.  You could saute it and serve it warm.  You could add some lentils or sweet potatoes.  Don’t like the idea of a vegetarian main course?  That’s fine, top it with a luscious, bone in, grilled, double cut pork chop.  This salad is not here to judge.  This salad works for you.


5.0 from 2 reviews
Kale, Radicchio & Wheat Berry Salad with Parmesan
 
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This versatile salad makes a satisfying, healthy lunch or a great side with pork for an autumnal or winter dinner.
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Serves: 6 as lunch, 8 or more as side dish
Ingredients
  • 1 c. Uncooked Wheat Berries, cooked according to package instructions
  • 1 bunch Dinosaur Kale, tough center stalk removed, leaves chopped
  • ½ head Radicchio, thinly sliced
  • 1 Honeycrisp Apple, julienned and sprinkled with lemon juice
  • 1 handful Walnut, toasted and chopped
  • 1 medium Shallot, thinly sliced
  • 1-2 T. Dijon Mustard
  • 1-2 T. Walnut or Olive Oil
  • 1-2 T. White Wine Vinegar.
  • Kosher Salt
  • Coarse Black Pepper
  • Parmesan (Sharp Cheddar would be good, too)
Instructions
  1. Place warm, cooked wheat berries in large salad bowl, add 1-2 T. dijon mustard (depending on how much bite you like) and toss to coat.
  2. Add oil and vinegar, season generously with salt and pepper.
  3. Add kale, radicchio, and shallot. Toss well, seaon with additional oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper as needed.
  4. Add nuts and apples, toss gently.
  5. Divide among plates and top with plenty of shaved Parmesan.