Apparently the original recipe for this apple cake was so good the cake was presented to the Pope. I can totally attest to its deliciousness, since I’ve made it five times and everyone who comes over my house loves it. After a while though, you just get the itch to do something different, so I did what I do. I made it with… bum ba da bum… polenta! I also used maple syrup instead of sugar and swapped out the citrus zest for a sprig of chopped rosemary. I’ve been growing my own herbs this year. My dining room table, the one that gets the best sunlight, is swamped. The rosemary has taken on a life of its own. Ahhhhh, run!
Just keeding. Okay, so here we go. We want to chop up a few apples in the food processor first. The original recipe tells us to use Red Delicious apples, but I’ve used all types of apples and they’re all great. I used Fuji apples this time. Then we mix it up with polenta, cornmeal, extra virgin olive oil, maple syrup, and frothy whipped eggs. To avoid any bits of uncooked polenta, cover your cake pan tightly with aluminum foil for the first 45 minutes of baking, then remove the foil to brown the top. This cake is juicy in apple flavor and crumbly like cornbread, but wonderfully lighter. You’ll see 🙂
And, as Fabio would say, MANGIA!
adapted from Fabio's Apple Cake
Ingredients
Directions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a 9 inch round springform pan.
- Peel, core, and chop your apples in a food processor, but be careful not to puree them. Mix 3 cups of chopped apples with the polenta, cornmeal, maple syrup, olive oil, chopped rosemary, and almond extract if using.
- Whip the eggs until they're frothy, then fold into the batter. Pour the batter into the springform pan and sprinkle turbinado sugar over the surface.
- Wrap the plan tightly in aluminum foil, then bake for 45 minutes. Remove the aluminum foil, rotate the pan, and bake for another 15 minutes.
- Let cool in pan for 10-15 minutes, then remove to serve.
- Refrigerate any leftover cake.
6 comments
I did something really wrong. It spewed over in my oven. The middle didn’t cook and it still seems so oily. I love the ingredients but can’t figure out where I went wrong!
Oh no, I’m sorry! Maybe lower the oven temperature. If it spewed over it probably came to a near boil and didn’t have enough time to soak up liquid from the apples, which may have made it seem oily. Juicy apples that break down fast in the oven also work best. Hope that helps!
This cake is wonderful! I was making it for a friend who is very strict about sugar, so I replaced the maple syrup with soaked, pureed dates, and it was delightful–very moist and full of flavor. I bet it’d be good with all sorts of different spice combinations!
Was delicious –
I left out the rosemary (as not a big fan) but added some lemon. Was so quick and easy to make- will definitely make it again
What a gorgeous cake! Can’t wait to try this recipe and I bet it smelled delicious while baking.
Thanks Kelly! It smelled like sweet rosemary. I hope you try it out. Feel free to share any tweaks 🙂