Apple and Chestnut Cake

Since I had a lot of studying to do, I thought I'd bake a cake instead. Following past baking disasters, I think I've almost reached a state of bakery enlightenment...as the great philosophers say, "You bake, you learn". This is a wonderful autumn recipe (I'm only saying this because it's autumn now....but I'm sure I'll bake it in the other seasons as well).

Ingredients

- 100g wholemeal spelt flour

- 100g Maizena (maize/corn starch)

- 50g Chestnut flour

- 100g brown sugar

- a teaspoon of Cremor Tartar (or yeast equilivalent)

- 100g raisins

- 50g chopped walnuts

- 1 apple, peeled and cut into small pieces

- cinnamon and nutmeg (to your heart's desire)

- 3 tablespoons of maize/corn oil (or olive oil)

- roughly 230 ml water

Procedure

Preheat oven to 180C. Mix together all the dry ingredients, and then add the oil and water. Mix....the mixture should be runny enough to just be poured into the baking tray. Remember to grease the baking tray before-hand.

Bake for 50min-1hour without opening the oven, then check with a knife if the inside is cooked. Cooking times always vary, depending on the oven, how big your baking tray is...follow your instinct, listen to the voice inside your head. It's the baking angel talking.

If it is cooked, turn the oven off, leave the cake to rest for 10 minutes, and then pull it out to cool on a baking tray (take it out of the tray or it will "sweat" all the steam out and remain soggy on the bottom!).

Once cooled, have a taste, and if it's friends-worthy have a tea party!

Pumpkin and Chocolate Cake (Vegan)

This cake is even more of a fluke than the apple one, and the result even better.

Ingredients:

- 300 g of pumpkin

- 1 cup of flour

- half a cup of Manitoba flour

- 3/4 cup of cane sugar

- pinch of salt

- 2 teaspoons of cremor tartaro (or yeast equivalent)

- a sprinkle of cinnamon

- a tablespoon of maize oil

- half a cup of rice milk (more or less....I may have added more: as we say in italian "ad occhio" - you will have to judge for yourself whether it needs a bit more milk if the mixture is too thick).

- dark chocolate

Boil the pumpkin and then mash it with a fork, and let it cool. Preheat oven to 180 C. In a separate bowl, mix together the dry ingredients (passing them first through a sieve): flour, sugar, salt, cremor tartaro, cinnamon. Once the pumpkin has cooled, add the maize oil, and then add to the dry mixture. Also add the dark chocolate, which you will have cut up (the amount is up to you - depends how chocolaty you want it!) The pumpkin will mix with the flour - then start adding the rice milk and keep mixing with a wooden spoon. Add rice milk until the consistency is smooth (not too runny, but not stodgy either).

Place in an oiled tray and bake in oven for about 45 minutes (check with a knife or toothpick before pulling out). It will acquire a lovely toasty color on top...and the chocolate will melt inside...need I say more? Let it cool and then ENJOY!

Very Chocolate Vegan Cake

Cakes Cakes Cakes...does anyone out there understand the extent to which I am sacrificing myself to give you these recipes? I have already told you that the only other person in this house who could help me out in the consumption of these cakes is my mother...but she's intollerant to gluten!

Very Chocolate Vegan Cake (will post a photo of it next time I bake one, which will probably be soon...although some pumpkin has made its way into my fridge, so the Pumpkin and Chocolate cake may be next in line...). I found this simple recipe from the blog of Semplicemente Vera: here it is in English.

Ingredients:

- 2 cups of flour
- 1/2 cup of cocoa powder (Fairtrade is better)
- 2 teaspoons of yeast
- 1 cup of malt OR sugar
- 1 1/2 cups of rice/soya/almond milk (the almond milk goes quite well with the chocolate, but is more expensive than the other two types)
- 4 teaspoons of maize oil
- a pinch of salt
- AND (essential ingredient for me): dark chocolate: I like bitter dark chocolate (if you want to keep the cake vegan, that's the one you'll have to get. Check it doesn't have milk powder in it). Quantity? I use 3/4 of a bar of dark chocolate. You can either grate it or just cut it (cutting is easier and it comes out just as well, if not better, than if you grate it).

Mix all of the dry ingredients together: if you want to be fancy prancy, then sieve them first.
Mix all of the wet ingredients, and then guess! That's right! Mix the two mixtures together.
Preheat oven to 180 C, oil your baking tray, pour the mixture in....let the cake bake for about 40 minutes, but check it with a knife or tooth-pick before taking it out (to my bachelor friends: this means that if the knife is wet when you take it out of the cake, it's not ready...as if you'd bake a cake anyway!).

Enjoy! I think this recipe is also good if you want to make a sort of base cake to then cut in half horizontally and spread a nice home-made chocolate and hazelnut spread....I'm becoming more and more sinful by the day.

Fluke Apple Cake (Vegan)

I have never been particuarly talented with desserts...especially bakery. I used to make a cake which involved no baking whatsoever....it was called the Heaven Cake. It got its name after its divine taste, as well as how fast it was going to lead you to death because of its ginormous fat content.

But yesterday I baked my first spicy vegan apple cake - and I've called it a fluke because

a) I couldn't find the flour anywhere...it popped up in a forgotten corner of the fridge, and it wasn't the best flour for baking cakes (Manitoba flour)

b) my mum had hidden the baking tray

c) I mistook the nutmeg as cinnamon...oops...

BUT - lo and behold: it turned out fantastically! (Unlike this photo)So I want to share the recipe with you. I timidly presented it to my uncle today, who is THE official taster of the family, and the fact that he not only ate the slice assigned to him, but also took away half a tray nicely packed up in a bag...well, I would call that major success.

Ingredients:

- 1/2 cup of wholemeal or plain flour

- 1/2 cup of manitoba flour (if you only have plain flour, then just use 1 cup of plain flour for the whole thing, and call it a day!)

- 1 cup of rice/soya/almond milk

- 1 cup of brown sugar

- 2 tablespoons of maize oil

- 1 tablespoon of rice malt (optional...I just wanted to finish off my jar)

- 2 teaspoons of "cremor tartaro" (this is what I use in Italy....equivalent to yeast)

- 3 apples: peeled and chopped up into small pieces

- sesame seeds: I love them so I just pour them in...up to you.

- pinch of salt

- cinnamon powder (how much? You decide)

- nutmeg powder: one teaspoon? Nutmeg has heating qualities...so easy on it....I poured mine in thinking it was cinnamon. In fact, I was looking at it thinking "gosh, this cinnamon looks really dark". Yeah, because it's nutmeg!

Mix together the dry ingredients: flour, sugar, yeast, cinnamon powder and nutmeg powder, sesame seeds, salt. Add the other two ingredients: rice milk and apples. Mix it all together. If the mixture is very watery, add some flour. I left mine quite runny and once baked it had a nice soft consistency. Follow your instinct...what are the cake angels whispering into your ear?

May I suggest...nuts would go beautifully in this cake. A match made in heaven.

Preheat oven to 180 C, and pour mixture into an oiled baking tray....place in oven. It will take about 40 minutes to bake, if not a bit more...maybe an hour. Remember that the apples are very wet, so I'd leave it in a little longer rather than pulling it out too soon. When you see that it's turned a nice dark golden color on top, leave it in the oven for five minutes and then pull it out to cool.

Prepare some nice herbal infusion and have a tea party! I would love to have people over for cake...I had to drive 40 minutes to get the cake to my uncle (well, I wasn't going there just for that). My mum is intollerant to gluten, so that leaves me alone with one BIIIG cake to finish. Well, going up to talk to my new plants now....I'll post the Very Chocolate Vegan Cake recipe soon!