Caramel Apple Upside-Down Cake

Today officially is Mothers Day, so why not bake a cake for your mum!

As I mentioned in my post last week, delicious magazine included 7 delicious sounding cakes to bake for your mum on Mothers Day, including this one – Caramel Apple Upside-Down Cake

This is a lighter version of their cake, where I have replaced butter with oil, used egg whites only and much less sugar.  The original cake contains dulche de leche, which is a thick caramel imported from South America that you can get from gourmet food shops or delis.  I used leatherwood honey in place to give the cake a lovely flavour.  We bought our leatherwood honey whilst in Tasmania last year and it is delicious.  It is high in antioxidants and is also currently being tested to see if can match some of the health properties of manuka honey.

This is a light, tasty cake that we ate while it was still warm and it was just lovely as is, but could also be served with a little custard.  YUM!

Caramel Apple Upside-Down Cake

Serves 10

• ¼ cup brown sugar, plus ¼ cup extra
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice
• 3-4 apples, cored and sliced
• 1 cup soft wholemeal plain flour (soft flour is lower in gluten which is perfect for making cakes)
• ½ cup soft white plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon bicarb soda
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• ¼ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/3 cup olive or canola oil
• 1/3 cup honey (I used leatherwood)
• 2 large egg whites
• 1/3 cup low fat milk
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 175° C.  Grease and line the base of a 9 inch/22cm round cake tin with baking paper.
2. Place ¼ cup brown sugar and butter in a small frypan.  Heat over medium-low heat, stirring with wooden spoon until sugar melts.
3. Add the orange juice and stir until caramel starts to bubble.
4. Immediately pour caramel into prepared cake tin and spread over the base.
5. Arrange apple slices over caramel, overlapping slices slightly and set aside.
6. Sift together both flours, baking powder, bicarb soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger.
7. In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine oil, the extra 1/4 cup of sugar, honey, egg whites, milk and vanilla. Whisk lightly to combine.
8. Add flour mixture and mix on low speed until blended. The batter will be runny.
9. Pour batter evenly over the apple slices in the pan.
10. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until cake tester in the centre comes out clean.
11. Cool cake in pan on a wire rack for 3-4 minutes.
12. Top the cake tin with a large serving plate and invert.

Per Serve:  1052kJ or  250 calories; P 4g Fat 9.5g SFat 2g CHO 37g Fibre 3g