Tangy Apple and Blackberry Muffins

I’ve been feeling a bit overwhelmed by the volume of apples currently smiling up at me from our dining room table. Perhaps it’s a bit of forager’s guilt... 

Did we collect too many? More than we can eat? How many apples do two people really need?

So today I made another effort to use up our collection of wind-fallen apples, by making apple and blackberry muffins. Our local blackberry bramble is still ripening, so we pop over every couple of days to collect another lot. We never seem to have too many blackberries.   

Back to the muffins. A quick search online indicated that recipes for twelve muffins often contain a cup of vegetable oil. I’m just not interested in consuming vegetable oil. So the following recipe is a melange of several I found online substituting ingredients in and out. 

The result, a sweet muffin offset by the tangy apples and blackberries. Delicious warm or cold! 

Recipe

300grams plain flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 egg

Pinch of salt

190grams brown sugar

230ml butter milk

100grams melted butter

250grams bramley apples (chopped into 1cm chunks)

150grams blackberries

Step 1: Preheat the oven to 180C. Sift the flour and baking powder into a mixing bowl. Stir in the sugar and salt.

Step 2: Beat the egg, butter milk, butter.

Step 3: Stir the wet mixture into the flour mixture with a big wooden spoon. Drag it round slowly, making sure the ingredients are well mixed. Then drop in the apple pieces and blackberries and stir again.The mixture will change colour from cream to purple. Very satisfying.

Step 4: Spoon mixture into a muffin tray, lined with baking paper, or paper cases. 

Step 5: Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the tops are golden brown.Let them cool for a few minutes and eat the first one warm!

Four Step Rustic Apple Tarte Tatin

In our household we remain slightly over-crowded by apples collected during last weekend’s forage. I’ve been stewing them throughout the week. Today I noticed a roll of short-crust pastry in the fridge that needed to be used, and opted instead for a rustic tarte tatin.

For this recipe I skipped the fancy possible addition of frangipane, delicious as it is. As the apples are flavoursome and fresh, I concluded they should stand on their own. I also omitted the apricot jam glazed used in most French recipes for tarte tatin, sticking instead with fresh ground cinnamon and dark muscavado sugar, to flavour and slightly sweeten the apples.

This tart was constructed in less than 15 minutes, and has just four very simple steps.

The result, according to Kristoph, was "very tasty." A perfect dish to serve with afternoon tea, or as a quick dinner party dessert. It will serve 6 people.  

Recipe

5 green sour apples, peeled, cored and sliced thinly

1 pack 375gram shortcrust pastry

1 Cinnamon stick, ground

1 lemon

3 tablespoons dark muscavado sugar

Flour (for rolling the pastry)

Step 1. Start by rolling the pastry into the shape of your baking tray (I used a tray approximately 30cm x 20cm). Cover the tray in baking paper, and lay the pastry on top.

Step 2.  Slice the apples and soak then in the lemon juice. Once soaked add two tablespoons of the sugar and mix thoroughly through, with your hands.

Step 3. Arrange the apples. Start in the centre and work out in a circular shape. Most French tarts look perfect, but we’re making a rustic tart, so don’t be too precious. Then sprinkle the cinnamon over the top, together with the remaining sugar.

Step 4. Cook the tart at 180C. It will likely take between 20-25 minutes, depending on your oven. You’ll know it’s ready when the pastry is golden, and your kitchen is smelling of delicious cinnamon and baked apple.  

If you make this, please do write and tell me what you think, how you change it, and how it turns out!

A Sunday forage and competitive bake off

Chris (my husband) and I spent the weekend with friends, and their four kids, at their place in the country. It was a perfect weekend, collecting fallen fruits from the damson, Victoria plum, and apple trees in the backyard.


We then headed out on country amble and an afternoon forage. We collected blackberries, sloes, elderberries and hawthorn berries from the hedgerows. Being before the first frost, it’s strictly a little early to pick sloes. However given my enthusiasm for making sloe gin, and the potential to use a freezer to act as the all important frost, we picked them anyway.

 
Dragging our haul of foraged goods back to Randolph and Lalu’s house, we quickly agreed to a “crumble off,” with Randolph and I as the two competitors and everyone else as judges. Randolph pleased the crowds with his mother’s crumble recipe, complete with rich and buttery crumble, and blackberries and apples infused with cinnamon. I managed to surprise the judges with my flippant inclusion of elderberries, together with the blackberries, apples, and plums.

The judges awarded first prize to Randolph, which was fair, because the crumble was superior, but sad for me, as it was my first experience of competitive baking!  

Apple and Ginger Chutney

Home grown seems to be catching on in our neighbourhood, with our household fast becoming the place to deliver any overflow. A couple of days ago my friend Jen brought over a bag of cooking apples. They weren’t from her tree, she’s got pears, but from a photographer named John, whom Jen was working with on a shoot.

I gratefully accepted the fruit and got to thinking about making a robust and tangy apple chutney. In our house, on nights we don’t cook, or eat out, we often enjoy a Ploughman’s. Our version includes a chunk of mature cheddar, some home grown lettuce, tomatoes and beetroot, and perhaps some hummus and whole wheat pitta bread. If we have any in the house, we’ll add chutney. We serve it on one big board, as opposed to individual plates, and dive in.

For an extra kick, I infused the apples and onions with freshly grated ginger. The spicy, peppery, slightly sweet, but pungent taste plays well against the apples. Instead of using sugar, as called for in most chutney recipes, I sweetened this one with a local apple juice.

Recipe
5 cooking apples (preferably from a friend, or a friend of a friend), peeled and chopped into small cubes
2 brown onions, peeled and roughly chopped
2 table spoons fresh chopped ginger
1 lemon
1 cup apple cider vinegar
1 cup apple juice
4 cloves
2 sterilized jars

Sautee the onions and ginger for a few minutes. In a bowl, squeeze the lemon over the apple cubes. Then add the apple to the onions and ginger. Stir occasionally on a medium heat, until the apples soften. Then add the apple cider vinegar and the apple juice. Drop in the cloves.

Simmer until the liquid has significantly reduced. This will likely take around 25mins. Check the chutney is at the correct consistency by dragging a wooden spoon through the mixture. If it runs back together, the chutney requires more reduction, if not, it’s done.

Remove from heat and cool. Once cooled, remove the cloves, and place the mixture in the jars and seal.

Try and leave for two weeks before consuming. And remember, chutney's and preserves make excellent homemade gifts. Given this recipe makes two jars - go on, share the love!

I’m always on the lookout for new ideas and recipes. Do you have a favourite chutney recipe? If so, I’d love to read it.