45-Minutesish

Earlier this year, Denise & I took a cooking class through Hip Cooks, a fun, down-to-earth group of gals with a casual approach (See "45-minutesish" below) to food preparation. If you happen to live in the area, I highly recommend them! It would be fun to get a group together to do it sometime too. There are typically 10 to a class.

In their most recent email newsletter was this recipe that sounded so tasty & celebratory of the coming fall season, I thought I'd share. Enjoy!


(NOTE: Photo is not of this dessert, but a random photo I borrowed (stole) because it looked tasty and how I sort-of envision this looks but will have to make to confirm.)

• Recipe of the month: Apple for the Teacher?

Strolling the Farmer's markets in the coming month your start to see APPLES, Hooray! Do you know that there are over 60 varieties available to us in LA? From the sweet (like Honeycrisp, Gala and Fugi) to my favorite, the tart (Melrose, Pink Lady, Jonathan). This Irish Apple Cake is the bomb - a mix between a cake and a pie. Easy and lovely.

3 cups flour
1 t baking powder
1 stick (4 oz) butter, cubed and cold
2/3 cup sugar
1 egg, beaten + 1 for glazing
4 tablespoons milk
2 apples of your choice, cored and sliced. I leave the peel on 'cos I like it. You do what you want. Then toss the apples in any or all of these things: a few cloves, ground cardamom, cinnamon, lemon zest, grated nutmeg, vanilla paste

Butter a 9 1/2 inch tart tin with a remivable base.
Sift flour and baking powder into a bowl, and then rub the butter in with yoru fingertips until crumbly.
Stir in sugar, egg, and enough milk to make a soft dough. (If you need more milk, go ahead)
(For you smarty pants out there, I just gave you a basic scone-dough recipe)

Between plastic wrap, roll about half of this dough into a round slightly bigger than the tart tin, so it comes up the edges. If your dough is too wet and sticky to roll, don't fret. Simply spread half of it over the base of the tin. Arrange the apples on top, with whatever spices you chose. Roll (or spread) the rest of the dough on top. Score the dough with a knife in a pretty criss-cross pattern. If some apples pop through, good! It is prettiest this way. Give the top a brush of beaten egg and pop into the oven and bake for 45 minutesish at 350. Serve with a dollop of whipped cream or ice cream.