Stuart's Soliloquy to the void

Apple medals

Sunday, February 8th, 2009 | Cooking | No Comments

In Denmark we have a range of cakes that are called something with ‘medal’ in them – these are typically shortcrust cake layers around… something. The most traditional ‘medals’ have whipped cream in a layer between two shortcrust layers and with icing on top of the top layer.

A few ‘medals’ are actually closed as in the two shortcrust layers are glued together, typically with egg, a bit like mini-cobblers. This blog post is about one of such ‘medals’, the apple ‘medal’ – I have been unable to find a traditional English name for these cakes, so if you know it, please let me know.

The apple filling in the apple medals are mashed apples that have been cooked for a while to remove the excess moisture. A small amount of this ‘cream’ is then added to each shortcrust bottom.

Using egg to weld each cake shut, a wash of egg is applied and nuts are drizzled on top – traditionally you use almonds, but we only had hazelnuts, so I used those instead.

After baking, the cake is a tad dry, as baked shortcrust often is, but the creaminess of the apple in the interior makes up for this… mostly. (They are still a tad too dry for my tastes).

To make up for the dryness, serve with a nice portion of whipped cream and a few berries.

Tags: baking, dessert, pastry