Apple and pine nut cake

I learned how to make this cake (or a variation of it) while I was living in Tuscany in my early twenties. Nothing was ever measured and somehow it came together every single time.

This cake is so delicious and simple to put together. It’s filled with apples, topped with pine nuts and so incredibly moist. It’s a cake that will happily sit on the kitchen bench for quite a few days as it’s slowly eaten. If you don’t have pine nuts, some flaked almonds or roughly chopped hazelnuts will do the trick just nicely too. Or leave the nuts out all together and scatter over some demerara sugar instead.

Serves 8 - 12

INGREDIENTS

3 eggs

250 g  raw caster sugar

200 ml extra virgin olive oil

250 ml full cream milk

1 tsp vanilla extract 

Finely grated zest of 1 lemon

250 g self-raising flour

3 granny smith apples, peeled, cored and sliced

40 g pine nuts 

Icing sugar, to dust

Crème fraîche, to serve

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 170C (190C conventional). Grease and line a round 21cm cake tin.

Whisk together the eggs and sugar in a large mixing bowl. Add the extra virgin olive oil and continue to whisk, followed by the milk, vanilla and lemon. 

Sift over the flour and gently whisk or stir until there are no lumps and batter is relatively smooth.

Stir through the apples and pour the mixture into the prepared tin. Scatter over the pine nuts. 

Bake in the preheated oven for 60 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean when tested. 

Cool in the tin for 20 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling. 

Dust the cake generously with icing sugar and serve with generous dollops of crème fraîche.