About happiness and therapeutic baking sessions- Tahini hazelnut apple cake

 

Hey there!

 

How are you? Well I am very well, in case you’re wondering. I actually haven’t been this well in ages. I haven’t enjoyed my life as much in the longest time. I am not saying I had a terrible life for the past year, yet it is sort of difficult to enjoy your life to the fullest when you have to go to a school you don’t really enjoy. This doesn’t mean that my high school was terrible or that I did not enjoy it at all. I also do not want you to think that there weren’t any great people at my school. There were a few and those few were probably the only reason why I kept going there. My classes were fine yet mostly pretty boring and to be honest I hardly ever caught myself thinking that I had actually learnt something after a day had gone by. Kind of sad, right? However, since I have started university I realised that you can actually look forward to studying. I realised that you can actually learn something significant in most lectures and seminars. I actually feel like I learnt something when I leave the classroom and I even look forward to Monday while I am enjoying my Sunday off. Of course, there were some classes at high school which made me feel the same, however, there were a few, in which I questioned every minute spent on such nonsense. And just so you know, one of those classes was the one subject I am actually studying at uni right now. So I do, indeed, not just refer to subjects I wasn’t interested in.

 

Anyways, so I guess you all got it, I am enjoying life. Not just uni life though, life in general. Enjoying life for me is spending time with good people, having fun, singing, dancing, moving, eating good food and of course also enjoying a piece of delicious cake once in while. This brings me to the main point of this blogpost: a delicious tahini hazelnut apple cake with a delicious crumble topping. If you’ve read my post about my tahini porridge you’d probably already know of my discovery of using tahini in sweet dishes. This is probably no news to most of you, yet I just hadn’t ventured out to using tahini in other dishes than hummus or other savoury dishes, until a few weeks ago.

Well, this was how my tahini hazelnut apple cake was created. And oh my! It turned out soooooo damn tasty! (Excuse my language…)

 

 

 

 

For a small cake:

 

• 1-2 apples, sliced
• 150g spelt flour, sieved
• 1tbs locus gum
• 1tbs chia seeds
• 1cup sparkling water
• 60g ground hazelnuts
• 100ml chickpea liquid
• 50g tahini
• 150g rice syrup ( you could sub with agave, honey or maple)
• ½ tsp cinnamon
• 1tbs baking powder

 

crumble:

• 2 tbs rice syrup
• ¼ tsp cinnamon
• 25g oats
• 15g hazelnuts, roughly chopped

 

1. Preheat your oven to 180°C.
2. Prepare your crumble topping. Stir together the rice syrup, hazelnuts, cinnamon and oats. Put aside for later.
3. Add your chia seeds to the sparkling water, let them soak until for about ten minutes.
4. Mix the spelt flour, ground hazelnuts, locus gum, cinnamon and baking powder into a large mixing bowl.
5. Whisk the chickpea water until it forms stiff peaks. (chickpea water reacts like eggwhites when you whisk it)
6. Pour the rice syrup, chia seed mixture and tahini to the dry ingredients and mix until just combined.
7. Fold the whipped chickpea water under the rest of the dough.
8. Pour your batter into a lined cake tin and evenly distribute the apple slices on top. Finish off with your previously prepared crumble topping.
9. Bake for approximately 30-35 minutes or until a tooth pick stuck in the middle comes out clean. I suggest you to cover your cake with aluminium foil after about 20 minutes to prevent it from developing too much colour.
10. Let it cool down for about 30 minutes until you remove it form the tin. Then transfer your cake to a cake rack and let it cool completely.

 

Voila that is how I like to use tahini in a sweet recipe. That is how I contribute to living a happy life. That is what I do when I get back home and feel a little stressed out. I actually don’t only love baking for the sake of being able to stuff ones face with cake afterwards. Which, of course, I don’t do, ever. I sit there like a lady and enjoy my tiny little piece of cake with a cup of tea on the side, just like in the movies, so graceful and not at all like I’ve been standing in front of the oven, waiting for the cake to finally be done. Though I do always share. Imagine I would eat all the cakes I make by myself, I would probably look like Violet from “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” after she ate that strange chewing gum…

Anyways back to why I love baking, not only does it bring the joy of a delicious afternoon treat, yet it also somehow really calms me down. Baking is basically my own little therapy session I allow myself to have at least once a week. It clears my mind, my thoughts get organised and last but not least I get to enjoy some kind of yummilicious treat afterwards.

 

I’m off now. I gotta get ready to go out, as I said enjoying life is important.

 

Bisous