Today I’m joining in the Favourite Family Recipe blog hop with some of my blogging friends to bring you a selection of favourite family recipes. These are all recipes that are tried and tested!

For my contribution I’m sharing my nan’s apple cake recipe.

This is the only recipe I have that is written out by hand in my nan’s handwriting. Isn’t it funny how we don’t value those handwritten recipes until the person who gave them to us is gone. I’ve typed up lots of recipes I’ve been given over the years, it makes them easy to print out and pass on but actually there’s nothing quite like that hand written recipe. I wish now that I’d kept more.

I tweaked this recipe a little using slightly less sugar and omitting the flaked almonds (just because I didn’t have any to hand and I’m not keen on them!) Just in case you are struggling with my nan’s copperplate handwriting I’ll translate, including my tweaks.

Do you all know what Bramley apples are? I’m not sure if they are something internationally known or just a UK specific thing. They are large cooking apples, the kind you would use for baked apples.

The recipe calls for a 8” loose bottom round cake tin. I don’t have one of these so I used a 8” square tin instead. This made a slightly flatter cake that cooked just a little quicker.

There’s a quick, easy print, basic version of the recipe here

Apple Cake Recipe

5oz (140g - 5/8 cup) margarine melted (this works just as well with butter)
2 large eggs
7oz (200g - 1 cup) caster sugar
Teaspoon almond essence
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon mixed spice
8oz (225g - 1 3/4 cups) Self Raising Flour
12oz Bramley apple, peeled and thinly sliced. This is the equivalent of one large or 2 small cooking apples.

Oven temp 160 c, 320 f, Gas 3

Grease and line the tin with baking parchment or greaseproof paper.

Peel and thinly slice the apple/s, cover them with water to stop them going too brown.

Mix together the melted margarine, eggs, sugar, flour, baking powder, almond essence and mixed spice. This makes quite a stiff cake mix, much firmer than the normal cake mix I make anyway.

Spread half of the mixture in the tin. Drain and dry the apple slices and then lay them on the cake mix, reserving a handful for the top.

Cover the apple layer with the remaining mix.

Arrange the reserved apple slices on the top.

Bake the cake in the centre of the oven for 1hr & 15 minutes. (my nan’s recipe said an hour and a half but mine was done before that, this is most likely because my tin was larger and therefore my cake was thinner)

This cake is good on the day you make it but even better the next day, perfect with a cup of tea as cake or as a dessert with ice cream or even custard.

This is the handwritten recipe that I used a few years back to make some art for our kitchen.