Torta di Mele, Italy's favorite Apple Cake

This time of the year when the mountains are decked out with the autumnal color change of the trees, we are in the thick of apple season. I imagine that most of you in the northern hemisphere are as well.   Not a bad time of the year at all. The colors on our hills are really going all out now that the larch have kicked in for the upping of the yellow ante.

I've been making a wide variety of apple delights with our apple abundance and thought I must share an apple recipe as I haven't posted any type of recipe in awhile.  This weekend nearby the commune of Cavour kicks off it's 10 day apple festival. Piedmont has 52 varieties according to our friend Dario of Frutto Permesso, (the permitted fruit), the organic growers not so far from us that produce some delicious pear and apple juices.  To get into the spirit I thought I would share one of Italy's favorite recipes, Torta di Mela. This much loved cake has a number of vatiations as I have seen and tasted over the years. I grew up in apple country in southern Illinois and we had our fair share of apple festivals, apple cakes and of course the al time favorite apple pie. My mother use to made a simple apple snacking cake that was similar to the more simple versions of this Italian apple cake. Today, I'm sharing a slighty more sophisticated version, but it does come together quite easily enough, especially if you don't bother with the decorative sweep of the thinly sliced apples. It will taste just great and look more rustic.

Torta di Mele

8-10 servings -- 26cm/10" cake round

or 22 cm/9" cake round is the same servings

Ingredients:

2 large eggs, room temperature for more volume

150g (5 oz / 3/4c) sugar, I like brown grezzo sugar

185g (6.5 oz / 1 7/8c) flour, sifted with

1 tsp baking powder

120ml (4fl oz / 1/2c) milk

zest of 1/2 lemon

50g (3.5T) butter, use for greasing your pan and cut the rest up into small pieces to sprinkle over the top of the cake before baking 

23g (3T) bread crumbs, plain and stale, not too fine

1kg (2.2lb)** apples, peeled and thinly sliced, medium to sweet apples for a soft, sweet cake*

24g (2T) coarse brown  or white sugar, for sprinkling on top. 

**Update: I find that I have been making this cake in a 22 cm/ 9" pan with 500g / 5 cups or 1.1 pound apples and it seems to bake through more evenly. I like a slightly tart apple, rennet and grigia di toriani. 

Macintosh, pink lady, Braeburn, Jonathons  in the US, to name just a few. 

Cooks notes: I found this online about fuji apples 

"Three medium-sized Fuji apples weigh approximately one pound.

One pound of apples, cored and sliced, measures about 4 1/2 cups."

Recent version - the 22cm size with 500g/ 5 cups apple 

Method:

Preheat your oven to 180*C (350*F) and prepare you cake pan.

Prepare your pan. I use a spring form pan as I find it helpful for easy removal. You might consider lining your cake pan with parchment paper if using a regular round cake tin, to ensure your cake removes easily. I your spring form pan ring doesn't fit tight around the bottom pan, you might line it with paper.

Lightly butter your 26 cm (10 inch) pan with some of the measured butter. Cut up the remainder into small pieces and set aside.

Dust your tin with your bread crumbs and tip any excess amount out for use at some other time. 

Set aside.

Usually I peel, quarter and thinly slice my apples at this point. I try to keep the quarters intact as I thinly slice them on the cutting board, to make it easy to fan the slices out decoratively.

Beat your eggs with a mixer until frothy and light colored. 

Gradually begin to add the sugar to the eggs.

Add half of you milk to the egg and sugar mix.

Then I hand whisk in the flour, zest and baking powder.

Add the rest of the milk, handling as little as possible, yet fully incorporating the dry ingredients. 

Your mixture will be fairly runny.

Pour your batter into the pan.

Arrange your thin apple slices  around the perimeter of the pan, filling the center in as needed.

Sprinkle the coarse 2T sugar on top of the apples and dot the butter around the top.

Becasue my oven runs hot, I cover my cake with aluminum foil for the first 20- 25 minutes to keep the apple from getting too brown.

I uncover and finish baking the cake until the cake is set and golden brown, about 55 minutes, depending on your oven. 

Cool completely before removing from your pan. The spring form does allow you to be able to remove it while it is slight warm. 

I dust with a bit of confectioner sugar for a finishing touch, but not always.  

Serve at room temperature and enjoy, enjoy, enjoy.

Trust me, it won't last long. 

Everyone loves a baked apple...especially with a twist

We continue to be busy (like everyone else), in spite of this being the slow season for us. Catching up on all the things we couldn't get to or keep up with have now snowballed into a list too long to even mention. Oh well, keeps you young I suppose.
I thought I would share my latest favorite apple dessert, the perennial favorite, baked apple, with a small twist. I took the core out, peeled the whole apple halfway and filled the cavity with a small amount of butter, brown sugar and amaretti cookies. folks around here are fond of using amaretti cookies for a wide range of uses that you wouldn't ordinarily think of, like pumpkin and amaretti cookies as a filling for ravioli, but I digress.
It's apple season and we have many apples to use and experiment with, but right now I have been happily baking our stash off as fast as I can stuff them. We have finally gotten the pipe sorted out for our new wood fired oven and we are slowly tempering the oven with small fires and a few baked apples. A pizza party is coming soon, but in the mean time we're enjoying a bounty of baked apples, a variety of ways.


Mele Ripiena con Amaretti Al Forno
Yield 6

6 Apples, tart and firm
juice of one lemon,
and perhaps a little zest from the skin to add a bit of zip to the filling
cinnamon sugar to taste or color
6 soft macaroon type amaretti biscuits
Handful of hard amaretti biscotti (approximately 6 per apple)
1 Tb brown sugar
1- Tb Butter, softened
Walnut, almonds or pine nuts to garnish
Serve with whipped cream, ice cream or caramel sauce or warm out of the oven just on their own.

Preparation

• Wash apples

• Remove the core from the center of the apples if you have a handy corer. Other wise, carefully cut the center out in circular fashion carefully removing the core. Scoop out most of the apple, leaving enough to hold the apple intact
• Peel the apples top half only going round in a circular motion.
• Dip the top peeled part in the lemon juice or if not enough juice, spread the juice on with a brush.
• Dip the top into the cinnamon sugar, or generous coat.
• Crumble the biscuits/macaroons with the brown sugar and nuts.
• Press a spoonful of the mixture into the center, filling the cavity.
• Press a few pine nuts or almonds into the top.
• Place in a single layer in a paper lined baking dish and cook in a moderate oven for about 30 minutes depending on how large your apples are.
• Serve warm with your favorite garnish , like ice cream, cramel sauce, whipped cream or warm out of the oven starring themselves as they are!

Pepper time treat, "Peperoni Mediterranei"

I've been savoring the bounty of the late summer harvest and colorful peppers have been an important mainstay on that front. We're in the heart of bell pepper country and they grow em big up here. We're not all that far from Carmagnola who are famed for their giant tasty peppers. The link I put in is in Italian only, but there a few photos of the varieties of peppers on offer for their "sagra" or pepper festival that starts tomorrow, 29 August. One of Fabrizio's father's hunting buddies lives over there and grows them commercially, so we always look forward to a crate of these colorful giants. In the meantime there are plenty in the markets and we've been grilling them quite a lot lately. These tuna filled peppers are a nice change of pace and delicious hot or tepid on the table as a substantial starter or one of an array of antipasti to sustain you on a hot summers eve.
We were served this last summer by our friends Silvana and Pino, from over past Pinerolo. We met them, as we did a number of interesting people, in the run up to the Olympics, due to all the different circumstances that brought people together during that exciting time. We dined al fresco in the shade of their lovely yard with a spectacular view of the plains, spilling out from just under their feet. Along with the filled pepper halves, we enjoyed some creamy Tomini slices that had been submerged under "oh so virgin" olive oil and fresh herbs, before the poached fish made it's grand entrance. Silvana is an excellent cook and she very kindly shared her mothers recipe for these peppers. Silvana's mother came from down south, Puglia I believe, so these are more of a southern style dish, but perfectly at home, served up here in the north. Silvana shared another very interesting recipe for soup with viola flowers, recently, but I think that one may need to wait till I have a few more popping up again.
I must remember to ask for her mothers lemon cake recipe, it was divine!

"Peperoni Mediterranei"

Mediterranean Peppers

Serves 4 (2 halves per person)

4 medium large bell peppers ( 2 yellow 2 red)
20 green olives
1 bunch parsley, smallish
1 garlic clove
1 T capers
3T parmigiana ( or a combo of Parmesan and pecorino, also know as romano in the US)
1 tin of tuna in oil, (7 oz or about 200 grams), drained
salt
bread crumbs
olive oil, extra virgin

• Wash the peppers
• Place the peppers in a warmed oven and roast until the skins begin to blister and they peel easily
• Peel and cut in half, cleaning out the stem and seeds.
  
• Remove the white membrane along the seams as well and set aside in a baking tray or pan.
• I like to line the pan with parchment paper to make it an easy clean up
  
• Remove the stems from the parsley and place on a cutting board with the olives and capers
• Chop fine, retaining some texture, add them into a small mixing bowl
  
• Grate your garlic into this mixture, or mince very fine and add to the other mixture
• Add your drained tuna and cheese (you can reserve 1 T of cheese and add it to the bread crumbs for the top if you like)
  
• Mix well.
• Season with a touch of salt
• Fill the peppers evenly distributing the mix
  
• Cover tops with bread crumbs
  
• Drizzle a little olive oil on top of each half and bake till heated through

Serve hot or room temperature

Fritelle di Mele for Festa di Sant'Antonio

Yesterday was Festa di Sant'Antonio. For Fabrizio it meant childhood memories of going to mass where the local priest gave his homily on blessing the beasts of burden. It seems to have now evolved into a general day of bleesing of all of the family animals or pets as well. At the end of this annual mass there was always a slice of some sort of sweet bread for everyone. That was and still is Fabrizio's favorite part of the mass. His parents went over to Grandubbione, which is the hamlet at the end of our road, for this special mass in our charming little church. They stayed afterwards and enjoyed their annual leisurely luncheon at our friends "baita". When they arrived back home late in the afternoon, Egle arrived with a chunk of the blessed sweet bread that she had tucked away for us, as she does every year.

Looking around the web, I found all sorts of Sant"Antonio festivals with a variety of customs and variations. It seems with many ancient feast and holy days there tends to be a blending and bending of the original festival. There seemed to be a fair amount of mixing it up with carnival as well, so I thought a finale of apple fritters would make a fitting dessert for the day. Fabrizio found that was his favorite part of the day too, the Fritelle di Mele.

The traditional local recipe for this treat is simple and tasty, if perhaps on the plain side, so I tried Mario Batali's recipe.
I found it traditional, light and not greasy when cooked. My batter only covered 4 apples. I did a little tweaking as I wanted just a bit more zip than how they are made here. I reccomend adding vanilla or orange or lemon zest to make the flavors pop out more.

Fritelle di Mele
Ingredients:

6 green apples, peeled and cored
oil for frying

2 large eggs
4 tablespoons milk
1 cup flour
4 tablespoons sugar
Orange or Lemon zest from 1/2-1 whole fruit.
2- 4 tablespoons orange liqeuer, amaretto, vanilla or a combination
Powdered sugar to dust

Directions

Slice apples into slightly less than 1/2-inch thick rounds and set aside.
Heat oil to 375 F. In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together eggs and milk. Slowly
add flour to the mixture, 3 tablespoons at a time, until all is incorporated. Stir
in sugar and kirsch. Allow to stand 10 minutes. Dip each slice into batter and
toss into hot oil, 3 or 4 at a time. Cook until golden brown, remove to plate
lined with paper towels and drain. Continue until all are done.
Sprinkle with powdered sugar or cinnamon sugar if you like and serve warm.
Here they are eaten plain, but they would go well with ice cream or a drizzle of maple syrup