chocolate cake with apples and rum

This is a lovely cake for an afternoon tea-party, rich in taste, full of tender apple pieces and delightfully boozy; but for adults only! The cake is very easy and quick to prepare and if you don’t like the taste of rum, it is also excellent with some Brandy or Calvados or even apple juice instead of rum.

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Preparation for a 20 cm cake pan

Preheat the oven to 175° C and lightly grease the cake pan.

• 125 g butter, at room temperature
• 125 g brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 60 g ground almonds
• 25 g cacao powder
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 125 g flour
• 2 apples
• 2 tablespoon rum

Peel, quarter and core the apples and cut them in slices. Place the apple slices in a bowl, add the rum, cover the bowl and set it aside until needed.

Put the soft butter, the sugar, the eggs and the vanilla extract in a bowl and beat until well mixed.

Add the ground almonds, the cacao powder the flour and the baking powder and gently fold in the sliced apples.

Spoon the filling in the prepared cake pan and bake the cake on the middle rack of the oven for about 30 minutes and a toothpick, inserted in the center of the cake, comes out clean.

Transfer the cake to a wire rack and let cool completely.

Sprinkle the cake with confectioners powder.

Happy baking!