Notes from my Kitchen - Honey and Apple Spice Cake

My son is coming home from his first weekend at boarding school and I am making his favourite treats. Fish and chips, homemade caramel ice-cream (made with caramel sauce made from scratch), and this cake are on the menu for today. His school is in the countryside and I am sure after all the activities and fresh air he will bring home a healthy appetite, as well as his laundry bag!

This is a recipe I am working on for my teatime treats book, so it fits in perfectly as both a family treat and with my work. I use plain homemade yoghurt, but you can replace this with cream for a decadent treat.
Cream the butter, honey and sugar, sift all the dry ingredients, line your tin and then prepare the apples so that they do not discolour.

Preheat the oven to 170C.
Grease a 20cm spring form cake tin and line the bottom with baking paper. I use the base of the cake tin to trace out the size and then cut it out.

To prepare the apples, remove the core and peel them. Then slice one apple thinly to place on the bottom of your baking tin. When you take the cake out and invert it, these apple slices with make up the decoration of the top of your cake.

2T honey
1 apple, peeled, core removed and sliced
125g butter
155g brown sugar
60ml honey
3 eggs
1t vanilla extract
170g cake flour
2t baking powder
1T ground cinnamon
1T ground ginger
1/3 cup sour cream or yoghurt
1 apple peeled and cut into cubes

Cream the butter, sugar and 60ml honey until pale and thick. Sift the dry ingredients. Lightly beat the eggs and vanilla extract, and add to the butter mixture, together with 1T of the dry ingredients. Gradually add the remaining dry ingredients. Add the apple cubes and cream and mix lightly.
Place the 2T honey onto the baking paper at the bottom of your cake tin. Spread it out evenly with the back of a spoon. Place the apple slices on top of the honey in a decorative pattern.
Pour over the cake batter and smooth with a spatula. Bake at 170C for 50-60 minutes or until a cake skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Serve with double cream or own its own. Have a great weekend!