I can’t begin to tell you how sick I’ve been the entire week.  Get­ting read­justed to the North­ern Chill has been quite the expe­ri­ence for this for­merly stuck in Florida gal.  So, the gift guides will resume tomor­row and over the week­end – just in time for you to hurry for that last minute shopping…

How­ever, I wanted to put this recipe on your radar.  I adore the mag­a­zine House Beau­ti­ful – after all, Ina Garten does write for it.  Besides get­ting design inspi­ra­tion for my new abode, the great recipes that are fea­tured are always killer.  They did a quick arti­cle on Mar­cus Samuelsson’s new cook­book New Amer­i­can Table and there was this recipe for Apple Cake that I had to try.  All the ingre­di­ents were already in my pantry and since I’m work­ing through my bak­ing pho­bia, I fig­ured why not try it.

First of all, I’m get­ting this cook­book ASAP.  I saw Mar­cus do a demo at SOBE last year and that man can cook.  Sec­ondly, this bak­ing thing – well, I’m start­ing to real­ize that it’s not so bad after all.  This recipe is one that you can keep in your reper­toire and your guests will be thrilled.

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APPLE CAKE

Recipe adapted from House Beau­ti­ful & Mar­cus Samuelsson

Ingre­di­ents:

2 table­spoons unsea­soned bread crumbs
1/2 cup gran­u­lated sugar
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
2 Granny Smith apples (Dis­claimer – I used 3)
1 tea­spoon ground cin­na­mon
1 tea­spoon nut­meg (my addi­tion)
4 table­spoons (1/2 stick) unsalted but­ter, room tem­per­a­ture plus more for greas­ing pan
1 large egg
1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
2 tea­spoons bak­ing pow­der
2/3 cup half-and-half
2 tea­spoons con­fec­tion­ers’ sugar

Direc­tions:

1. Pre­heat oven to 350 degrees. But­ter a 9 inch spring­form pan and coat with the bread­crumbs.
2. Toss together the gran­u­lated sugar and brown sugar. Set aside.
3. Peel and core the apples then slice one apple into 16 wedges. Com­bine the cin­na­mon and 1/3 cup of the sugar mix­ture in a medium bowl. Add the apple wedges and toss to coat. Roughly dice the remain­ing apple.
4. In the bowl of an elec­tronic mixer fit­ted with a pad­dle attach­ment, beat together the but­ter and the remain­ing sugar mix­ture on medium speed until light, fluffy, and lemon-colored, about 2 min­utes. Add the egg and mix until com­bined. Reduce the speed to low and add the flour and bak­ing pow­der. Slowly add the half-and-half and mix until com­bined. Fold the diced apple into the bat­ter.
5. Pour the bat­ter into the pre­pared pan and spread evenly. Arrange 14 of the apple wedges fanned along the outer wedge of the pan and place the two remain­ing wedges in the cen­ter. Bake for 35 to 40 min­utes, or until the cen­ter is golden brown.
6. Remove from the oven to a wire rack to cool com­pletely. Run a small off­set spat­ula around the edges to release the cake from the pan and remove the spring­form. Sprin­kle with con­fec­tion­ers’ sugar, then cut into 12 wedges.