An Apple Yogurt Cake

Back in October, Tina of Traveling Mama, raved about a swedish apple cake that a friend of hers made during the prime of apple season here in Denmark. She was so smitten with the cake that she went out and found a recipe to share so that everyone could try this yummy, rustic beauty. 

And I did. And it was good. Very good. 

At the time, though, I was reading Bringing Up Bébé by Pamela Druckerman and completely obsessed with putting yogurt in all my baking. I looked at the ingredients and thought, "Hey, this could work."

And it did. And it was good. Very, very good. 

Apple Yogurt Cake

adapted from epicurious.com

Ingredients: American

1¼ sticks (½ cup plus 2 tablespoons) butter

1¼ cups sugar

3 eggs
1½ cups sifted flour *
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup vanilla yogurt or plain yogurt + 1 tsp vanilla extract
2 to 3 cooking apples (Jonathan, Rome, Granny Smith, etc.)
½ cup sugar, for apple slices
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Slivered almonds (optional)
Powdered sugar sprinkled on top (also optional)

Ingredients: English
115 g butter
250 g sugar
3 eggs
200 g sifted flour * (You might wanna double check me on that one, though. I don't speak Metric very well.)
1 teaspoon baking powder
245 g vanilla yogurt or plain yogurt + 1 tsp vanilla extract
2 to 3 cooking apples (Jonathan, Rome, Granny Smith, etc.)
95 g sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Silvered almonds (optional)
Powdered sugar sprinkled on top (optional)

Preparation
Preheat oven to 350° F. Grease and flour pan, preferably an 8½-inch or 9-inch spring form pan. Sift together flour and baking powder. Set aside.In a medium-sized mixing bowl beat butter until light. Gradually beat in sugar until fluffy. Beat in first egg, then second egg. Beat in ¼ cup of flour mixture, then third egg. Slowly mix in remaining flour mixture, alternating with the ¼ cup of milk or water.Pour into prepared pan and smooth top. Peel apples; core and cut each into 6 to 8 wedges. Mix the ½ cup sugar with cinnamon. Roll apple wedges in cinnamon sugar and press wedges into cake batter all over the entire cake. Sprinkle any remaining cinnamon sugar over the top of the cake, and if desired strew a few slivered almonds over the top (optional). Bake approximately 1 – 1¼ hours, more or less, depending on pan size, until cake tests done when a cake tester is inserted in the center of the cake. Cool briefly, then remove from pan. Sprinkle with powdered sugar (optional). 

* You don't have to sift the flour, but it does make the texture of the cake nice and light. Also, if you don't sift the flour your apples will sit on the top. If you do sift the flour they will sink through the cake and come out on the bottom. At least mine did the one time I tried sifting. Maybe I pressed them in just a little too much? Anyway, you can imagine my surprise.  :)