The Not So Ugly Apple Honey Cake

It's time for reflection, apples, and honey.

It is Rosh Hashanah 5784, the first full day of the Jewish New Year - the year 5784 on our religious calendar.  This time is both festive and serious, as we undergo our annual review from Above and reflect on our behavior of the past year/seek forgiveness from those we have wronged/plan for how we can improve and better the world in the coming year.

As far as food, we celebrate with sweet and symbolic dishes.  Apples and honey are prominent in many households.  Last night, my spouse cooked a brisket with apple juice, potatoes and carrots.  For dessert, we had apple honey cake.

It's been a long journey.

When I was young, my Mom served a honey cake for Rosh Hashana that I did not like.  When I was an older teen and became interested in baking, I embarked on an odyssey to find a recipe for a honey cake I liked.

One of the challenges was that so many of the recipes made two loaves of honey cake.  By then, my Mom had passed away and it was just my father and me.  My Dad was diabetic and couldn't eat cake (that was back in the 1960's, when diabetic diets were different) so it was just me.  I put my quest on the back burner for years.

In my later adult years, I returned to the quest.  Although it's a large cake for one or two, I finally found the honey cake of my dreams.

Each year I make an apple honey cake, from a recipe I adapted from the excellent recipe published years ago by Tory Avery.  My cake most likely isn't as good as hers, because I cut down on the oil (thanks to Weight Watchers, which I've been a member of since 2012 with one short break).  Also, I don't put icing on it - I've never been a fan of icing.

It's a joint effort - my spouse shreds the apples and also takes care of removing the cake from the oven.

Getting the apples we wanted was a journey.  We live in an apple growing area and like to use a locally grown baking apple (at this time of year, our plan was Cortland apples).  But the apple crop failed this year due to a late frost- one local grower lost 80% of his crop.  We ended up using supermarket Ginger Gold apples.

The cake's top fell apart when spouse tried to remove it from the pan.  

This definitely isn't a baking blog picture.  To you, it may be an ugly apple honey cake.  I disagree.

To me, it is beautiful personal tradition. 

None of us is perfect.  We can strive for a better coming year.  

May life for you in the coming year be as sweet as this slice of cake.

To my blog readers of the Jewish faith, Shanah tova (good year).