Strawberry and Apple Skillet Cornbread/Cake

Tuesday February 28th, 2023Wednesday March 1st, 2023 aglaia Leave a comment

I was inspired by a Food and Wine recipe for Strawberry-Rhubarb Cornmeal Skillet Cake, by baker and food writer Jocelyn Delk Adams. Strawbwrries, from the mainland greenhouses, are lovely this time of year. But as I have probably said before we have no rhubarb in Greece, so I decided to add apples instead.

I didn’t make the very intriguing rosemary whipped cream Adam suggests, which I will probably try another time, but opted for ice cream instead.

Since both Costas and I love the caramel base of the Apple and Quince Crumble I make often, I decided to repeat something similar here.

Needless to say, that I substituted again light olive oil for the butter in the original recipe, as I do all the time, and the result was absolutely great! Note that this cornbread/cake, unlike most other cakes, is best slightly warm, the day it is baked.

Serves 8: a 10-inch (26cm) skillet.

THE APPLE BASE:

2/3 cup sugar

2 tablespoons water

1/3 cup light olive oil, canola or sunflower oil

2 Apples halved, cored, and thinly sliced; I used Fuji.

FOR THE CORNBREAD/CAKE

1 cup All-Purpose flour

1/2 cup yellow cornmeal

½ teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

3 large eggs

1 cup sugar, plus 2-3 tablespoons Turbinado or any light brown sugar for sprinkling

2/3 cup light olive oil, canola or sunflower oil

2/3 cup full-fat yogurt

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

1 ½ cup coarsely chopped fresh strawberries

Vanilla Ice Cream for serving (optional)

Place the skillet over medium-high heat and add the sugar and water. Swirl the skillet as it bubbles and gradually starts to color. When it is light amber add the olive oil, swirl the pan and spread the apple slices carefully, as they may splatter. Press with a wooden spoon and lower the heat. Simmer and don’t mind if some hard sugary pieces form; they will dissolve later as the cake bakes in the oven. When the apple slices have soften, after about 4-5 minutes, remove the skillet from the heat.

Preheat the oven to 350 F (180 C).

Make the cornbread/cake: Whisk together flour, cornmeal, salt and baking powder in a small bowl until combined and set aside.

In the bowl of a standing mixer, add the sugar and the eggs and work in slow to start with and increase the speed after 2 minutes; keep beating until light and creamy, about 5 minutes. Alternatively, you can use a hand-held mixer.

In a small bowl whisk the oil with the yogurt and add it to the egg mixture working on medium. Add the vanilla and gradually add the flours, continuing to beat in low, until completely incorporated. You will probably need to stop and scrape the sides of the bowl with a flexible spatula to make sure all flour is mixed in.

Pour the batter over the apples and carefully spread it with the spatula. Scatter the strawberries on the batter and sprinkle with the light brown sugar.

Bake for about 40 minutes or more, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool for 20 minutes before cutting to serve, accompanying with ice cream, if you like.

This cornbread/cake, unlike most other cakes, is best slightly warm, the day it is baked, but you can wrap the leftover in kitchen film and enjoy it the next day as well.

Apple and Quince Crumble with Caramel

Monday January 16th, 2023Monday January 16th, 2023 aglaia Leave a comment

I used apples, or apples together with quince instead of the pears Samantha Seneviratne suggests in NYT Cooking to make this quite wonderful crumble that has a caramel base enriched with cottage cheese, instead of cream. I omitted half of the flour, added breadcrumbs, olive oil and orange juice and the results were delicious, both with just apples, or adding some quince for texture.

Served with or without ice cream, this is a seriously addictive dessert.

SERVES 8 – 10 (more…)

Damson and Pear Upside-down Cake

Wednesday October 5th, 2022Saturday October 8th, 2022 aglaia Leave a comment

This is my latest fall dessert: an upside-down cake I baked using the wonderful, local damson plums and the very last local pears I got from the farmstand.

The fruit don’t look like much, but they taste wonderful. I wish we had more…

You can use plums instead of the damsons, but choose small, not large an juicy because they would collapse in the sugar.

This cake is basically another riff on the Apple or Quince Charlotka, the light and easy fruit cake both Costas and I love! As I posted this recipe I received the Newsletter from Dorie Greenspan with the recipe for a Parisian upside-down plum cake. Maybe you would like to try that one too…

For a 10-inch round cake –or equivalent square (more…)

Dried Fruit, Pistachio, and Orange Olive Oil Cake

Sunday October 2nd, 2022Monday October 24th, 2022 aglaia Leave a comment

A moist, fragrant, and barely sweet vegan cake that can be a treat with tea or coffee, or enjoyed as a snack any time of day. It should be made a day in advance, and it keeps for at least a week, getting better each day if stored in an airtight container at cool room temperature.

My mother used to bake a cake similar to this during Lent. We were not so religious as to follow the rules of the Church, which prohibited eating any food derived from animals during the forty days before Christmas and before Easter (and on many other occasions). We were simply continuing a family tradition which dictated that various foods or sweets should be made at a particular time of year.

The caramelized ginger, my recent addition to the recipe, enhances the rich flavor of this cake that has a dense texture, somewhat like an English fruitcake.

Makes one 12 X 5 inch (30 X 12cm) cake (more…)

The Seedy Grapes from our old Vines

Friday August 12th, 2022Friday August 12th, 2022 aglaia Leave a comment

Most of the grapes our vines produce hardly manage to ripen; wasps and all kinds of insects attack them as soon as they start to blush.

This year, though, we managed to harvest quite a few bunches to fill two large baskets. But our grapes are what the locals call ‘krasostafyla’ (wine-grapes), sweet but filled with seeds and quite difficult to swallow.

Early this August, as we finished harvesting the almonds, we noticed quite a few nice bunches of grapes hanging from the old, robust vines that engulf the southern fence of our property, behind the lemon trees. From these vines we mainly gather the tender grape leaves early in May, to stuff and make our trademark dolmades.

Usually the grapes our vines produce hardly manage to ripen; wasps and all kinds of insects attack them as soon as they start to blush. Come harvest time, we just find a few bunches of rotten, half-eaten grapes which are sweet but filled with seeds and difficult to swallow.

These vines are probably a remnant of the old vineyards our little valley was famous for; the dark grapes used to produce quite good wine in the old days, as I discovered researching the paper I wrote for the 2017 Oxford Symposium: (more…)