Apple Tart for the Jewish New Year

Peacock

Green Pig and Yellow Ox

Apple Cake Suitable for All Occasions

These days I am into snacking cakes. Cakes suitable for all occasions, which is to say cakes that require no occasion at all. And that are accordingly quick and easy to put together. Cakes that are just good to have around the house and that freeze well in slices. This recipe for an Apple Cake I clipped from Bon Appetit back in November 1999, though it actually comes from my aunt in Washington, D.C. For some reason the recipe doesn't appear on the Epicurious website. So here's an actual recipe for a change. A keeper.

2 1/2 cups sugar
1 tbs cinnamon
3 cups all purpose flour
1 tbs baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup sour cream
4 large eggs
1/4 cup orange juice
2 tsp grated orange peel
2 tsp vanilla extract

4 cups diced granny smith or other tart and firm apples.
(A cup of walnuts mixed with the apples is also nice, though I prefer just the apples.)

Preheat oven to 350. Butter heavily a nonstick Bundt pan. Mix 1/2 cup sugar and cinnamon in small bowl and set aside. Mix flour, baking powder, and salt in medium bowl. In a large bowl whisk remaining 2 cups sugar, oil, sour cream, eggs, orange juice, orange peel, and vanilla. Sir in flour mixture.

Pour half batter in pan. Sprinkle half of cinnamon sugar mixture over batter and half of apples. Add rest of batter and top with remaining cinnamon sugar and then apples, pressing them lightly to just submerge in the batter.

Bake about 50 minutes to an hour, until top is starting to brown. Then cover loosely with nonstick or buttered foil and bake another 30 to 35 minutes. Let cool just a few minutes in pan, loosen all around the sides, and then turn carefully onto heatproof plate.

For company a dusting of powdered sugar spruces up appearances.

Witch and Broomstick

A Cookie in a Hurry

The other week I was needing a cookie in a hurry so I made the recipe on the back of a 12 oz. bag of Nestle chocolate chips. Beyond the quick fix I was thinking one more round of ice cream sandwiches to mark the end of summer. Chocolate chip and coffee ice cream sandwiches. I got 6 dozen cookies out of the batch, plenty for snacking and other projects, so no hurry I figured to make the ice cream, and then ten days or so later I was still thinking about the ice cream sandwiches when I realized I was down to the last cookie. Here it is.

 

Some Random Images Captured Labor Day in the Vicinity of Midway Airport

Key Lime Ice Cream Sandwiches

Eating one of these ice cream sandwiches is sort of like eating a slice of key lime pie in hand out of the freezer. The recipe for the Graham Crackers is from Nancy Silverton's Pastries From the La Brea Bakery. (I omitted the cinnamon sugar topping.) For the ice cream I used bottled Key West Lime Juice. The flavor is surprisingly strong. Strong enough to take on some very hot and muggy summer nights!