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Grandma’s Bundt cake

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Who doesn’t have a Grandma’s Bundt cake to remember? I think nobody. Every family has a recipe to which their memories are attached. I have the memory of the huge Bundt cake that my grandmother used to make every week to sell in slices in the local coffee shop she owned when I was still very young.

And do you know what was the most popular way to consume it? In the morning in your cappuccino or in the evening after dinner dipped in a glass of sparkling Malvasia dei Colli di Parma.

The other special feature I remember about that cake was its baking, which was done in the Dutch oven, as the only other oven we had was the huge wood-burning oven that was only heated when bread was made for the week.

My version of Grandma’s Bundt cake is definitely lighter and in line with our needs, although my grandmother used corn and potato starch for this cake, but to these she added a lot of butter, which I replaced with seed oil and almond flour. See here how to prepare it.

I also like to use the doughnut as a dessert at the end of a meal, and if we don’t want to dunk it in wine as traditionally, I like to accompany it with a cream so that it doesn’t turn out too dry, for example a lemon-flavoured custard, some melted dark chocolate, or, since we are now expecting the warm weather, a scoop of ice cream for a little refreshment.

Grandma’s Bundt cake     

46.72g carbohydrates per 100g

Ingredients

  • 140g brown sugar and coconut sugar together
  • 125g rice cream*
  • 100g corn starch*
  • 100g potato starch*
  • 100g grapeseed oil
  • 100g ground almonds to make a flour
  • 3 eggs
  • 16g baking powder
  • 1 pinch of salt
  • stack spray*
  • grated lemon zest

*Ingredients whose labels must read “gluten-free” (or, in Italy, present on  Prontuario AIC)

Preparation

  1. Whip sugar with eggs in a planetary mixer until white and frothy.
  2. Gradually add the other ingredients while continuing to mix and in this order: flour, almonds, rice cream, seed oil, baking powder and salt. Season the mixture with grated lemon zest, or vanilla or cinnamon to taste.
  3. Spray the Bundt cake mould with suitable stack spray (or butter and flour the mould, using lactose-free butter if you are lactose intolerant) and pour the mixture into it, levelling out. As a variation, you can take a few spoonfuls of the dough and add cocoa that has been diluted in coconut or almond milk so that no lumps form, and drop the chocolate mixture randomly into the mould containing the white mixture to make a variegated cake.
  4. Bake in a static oven preheated to 170°C for 35 minutes.
  5. Take the doughnut out of the oven and let it cool. You can serve the doughnut as it is, dusted with just a pinch of icing sugar, or you can top it with a bit of melted dark chocolate, lemon icing or any other cream you like.

Version with gluten

The recipe is naturally gluten-free, so no adaptations are needed.

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Craving for something sweet? Try my gluten-free Apple pie

Gluten-free Apple pie is a must. Impossible to resist the scent of apples, their taste that blends sweet and ‘sharp’ flavours in a single bite, further enhanced by the many spices that can be used to create flavour variations.

And it is precisely apples the main ingredient in the dessert we are recommending today: a gluten-free Apple Pie that can be enjoyed at any time of the day, for breakfast, as a snack, to accompany tea, but also to finish dinner on a sweet note.

With this recipe, you can create a cake with a soft and enveloping heart, enclosed in a thin shell of fragrant puff pastry, a mouth-watering idea to pamper your palate. If you like apple cakes, also try my Soft apple and cinnamon cake.

Uno_Chef_per_Gaia_ricetta Apple Pie

Gluten-free Apple pie

19.30g carbohydrates per 100g

Ingredients for the brisè pastry

  • 300g gluten-free flour mix for bread, brand BiAglut**
  • 150g cold butter
  • 80g water
  • 1 pinch of salt
  • sweetener* or sugar

Ingredients for the filling

  • 1350g Granny Smith apples (weight of whole, unpeeled apples)
  • 2-3 tablespoons of water
  • 25g lemon juice
  • 25g almond flour*
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon powder
  • sweetener* or sugar

Ingredients for finishing

  • 1 whole eggs
  • 20g brown sugar

**Ingredients specific for celiacs

*Ingredients whose labels must read “gluten-free” (or, in Italy, present on  Prontuario AIC)

Preparation

  1. Start preparing the shortcrust pastry by mixing flour, butter cut into chunks, sugar/sweetener and a pinch of salt. The mixture will be grainy, so mix it until it becomes firm, wrap it in cling film and refrigerate whilst preparing the filling.
  2. And now the filling! Peel and cut the apples, put them in a non-stick pan with a few tablespoons of water and let them cook until soft. Then remove everything from the heat and let it cool down.
    At this point you can add the sugar/sweetener, lemon juice and cinnamon, stirring to combine all the flavours.
  3. Well, we have both the dough and its filling….let’s assemble.
  4. Roll out more than half of the brisè pastry on a sheet of baking paper and line a 24cm diameter mould. Sprinkle the base with almond flour, cover the bottom with the freshly prepared apple filling and close with another disc of brisè. It will be like a treasure chest of taste and scents.
  5. Make ray-like cuts on the surface and brush it with beaten egg and a sprinkling of sugar to taste. Finally, bake the cake in a convection oven preheated to 180°C for about 45 minutes.
L'Apple pie pronta per essere gustata

Apple pie ready to be enjoyed

  1. If it does not brown properly, set the oven to 200°C and continue baking for another 10-15 minutes. This fantastic Apple Pie can be served either warm or cold.

Version with gluten of Apple pie

Replace the gluten free BiAglut flour with an equal amount of wheat flour and possibly reduce the amount of water to be added to the crust.

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