Poured apple cake: no dough to make, three dry layers and frozen butter grated on top
An apple cake with no dough to make at all. Flour, semolina, sugar and baking powder are stirred together dry and layered alternately with grated apple, then a frozen block of butter is grated over the top. In the oven the apple juice hydrates the dry layers from below, the butter soaks them from above, and after an hour the powder has become cake. Half an hour of work, mostly grating apples, for a tray of sixteen squares.
Your own work in that: 35 min.
- Dry mix 5 min
- Apples 20 min
- Layers 10 min
- Baking 60 min
- Cooling 30 min
Step by step
0 / 6 doneMix the dry layers
The butter needs at least 2 hours in the freezer beforehand, so put it in well ahead, ideally the day before. Heat the oven to 180 °C and line the tin with paper. In a large bowl whisk the flour, semolina, sugar, baking powder and salt until uniform and sandy. Divide it mentally into three equal parts.
Ingredients: 200 g plain flour · 200 g semolina · 200 g sugar · 2 tsp baking powder · 1 pinch salt
TipThe semolina is not a filler: it is what drinks the juice that would otherwise soak the base. Flour alone would absorb it into paste, while semolina swells and stays granular, which is what holds the layers together.
Flour, semolina, sugar, baking powder: even sandGrate the apples
Peel and core the apples and grate on the coarse holes. Splash with lemon juice and mix with the cinnamon. Don't squeeze them hard — pour off only the juice that has collected in the bottom of the bowl, and only if there is more than half a cup.
Ingredients: 1500 g tart apples · 2 tsp cinnamon · ½ pcs lemon, juice
TipApple juice is the only liquid in this cake: it is what hydrates the dry layers from below. Squeezed apples give a dry, floury cake in which raw semolina grits between the teeth.
Coarse holes, lemon, cinnamon, keep the juiceBuild the layers
Scatter the first third of the dry mix over the base of the tin and spread it level, but don't press it down. Cover with half the apples. Then the second third of the dry mix, the rest of the apples, and the last third on top. Smooth each layer with the back of a spoon only.
TipA compacted layer lets neither steam nor juice through, and its middle stays raw. The dry mix has to lie loose; the gaps between the grains are the road the moisture travels upward.
Dry, apple, dry, apple, dryGrate the frozen butter
Grate the frozen block on the coarse holes directly over the tin, so the shreds cover the whole surface evenly. Don't spread them with your fingers.
Ingredients: 200 g butter · 2 tbsp icing sugar
TipThe butter must be frozen for two reasons: only then does it leave the grater as separate shreds instead of smearing into a paste, and only then does it melt slowly, trickling down through the whole bake. Soft butter would set into a crust on top and leave dry flour underneath.
Separate shreds, evenly over the surfaceBake for an hour
Bake 60 minutes at 180 °C, until the top is golden and juice bubbles in the gaps at the edge. If the top is already dark after 40 minutes, cover the tin with foil and finish baking.
An hour, a golden top, juice bubbling at the edgesCool before cutting
Leave 30 minutes, ideally until completely cold. Warm, this cake collapses as you lift it, because the semolina goes on swelling while it cools and only then binds the layers. Cold, cut it into squares and dust with icing sugar.
Cold, it cuts into clean squares
Before you start
With plums or rhubarb
Instead of apples, 1.2 kg halved damsons or chopped rhubarb tossed with 3 spoons of sugar. Both are juicier, so add 2 more spoons of semolina to the dry mix.
With nuts on top
Add 50 g chopped walnuts and a teaspoon of cinnamon to the last dry layer. The top comes out darker and crunchier.
Dry streaks inside
Too little juice, or layers pressed down too hard. Use tart, juicy apples rather than sweet dessert ones, and only smooth each layer with a spoon, never compact it.
