The wonderful aroma of apple pie, tender, airy, with a ruddy crispy crust – this is not only sweet memories of summer tea drinking, but also a very real reason to spend half an hour and cook charlotte. Of course, the best apples for charlotte are large and ripe Antonovka, with a noticeable sourness, dense and juicy pulp. But the absence of seasonal apples should not be a reason to refuse charlotte. Almost any apples are suitable for a pie, if the peel is hard, then it must be removed, and if it is thin, then it is quite possible to leave it. Only soft, loose apples, more like potatoes than like a paradise fruit, are not suitable for charlotte.
Each housewife has her own signature charlotte recipe, someone separately whips the whites from the yolks, some mix the dough with apples, others pour coarsely chopped apples with batter, some adore cinnamon, others – the smell of vanilla. All these secrets are organic in the case of charlotte, and nevertheless, the classic recipe for charlotte with apples practically does not change over the years.
Charlotte with apples – the main recipe
Ingredients:
- Apples – 700 gr.
- Wheat flour – 200 gr.
- Sugar – 200 gr.
- Eggs – 4 pieces.
- Semolina – 10 gr.
- Butter or sunflower oil for greasing the mold.
Cut the apples into thin slices and set aside. Beat eggs and sugar thoroughly so that it completely dissolves, and the foam turns out to be light and dense. Sift flour into the egg mass, mix gently. Grease the form with butter, sprinkle well with semolina and lay out the apples. If you wish, sprinkle apples with cinnamon or add vanilla sugar to the dough, but charlotte is a self-sufficient dish, the apple flavor is so good that you don’t always want to change it. Gently pour the dough over the apples, trying to fill in all the voids. Send the cake to the oven preheated to 180-190 degrees for 25 minutes and forget about it. The less the oven is opened, the higher the charlotte will turn out. Sprinkle the finished charlotte on top with icing sugar and serve with ice cream or vanilla sauce.
Charlotte with sour cream
Ingredients:
- Apples – 600 gr.
- Wheat flour – 300 gr.
- Potato starch – 100 gr.
- Sugar – 200 gr.
- Eggs – 4 pieces.
- Sour cream – 150 gr.
- Butter – 150 gr.
- Baking powder / soda – 2 gr.
- Semolina, crackers or flour for sprinkling the mold
- Sunflower oil for greasing the mold.
Melt and cool the butter, grind the eggs well with sugar, add sour cream and butter to them. Gradually adding sifted flour, baking powder and starch, knead the dough. The consistency should be viscous, not quite liquid. Grease the mold with butter, sprinkle with breadcrumbs, semolina or flour as desired, put out a third of the dough. Coarsely chop the apples and place on the dough, pour over the rest of the dough. Bake for 30-35 minutes at 180 degrees.
Kefir dough charlotte
Ingredients:
- Apples – 800 gr.
- Wheat flour – 300 gr.
- Sugar – 250 gr.
- Brown sugar – 10 gr.
- Eggs – 3 pieces.
- Kefir – 400 gr.
- Soda – 5 gr.
- Cover – 5 g.
- Semolina – 10 gr.
- Butter or sunflower oil for greasing the mold.
Beat eggs with sugar, pour in kefir mixed with soda, mix. Add sifted flour in small portions, stir thoroughly. Grease the bottom of the mold or frying pan with butter, sprinkle with semolina and lay out the chopped apples – leave one thing. Pour in dough, level. Top with thinly sliced apple slices, sprinkle with cinnamon and dark sugar. Send to an oven preheated to 180 degrees for half an hour.
In any of the options for charlotte with apples, you can add raisins, plums, peaches, cherries, raspberries or bananas, walnuts. And try to replace some of the apples with fresh rhubarb – you will lick your fingers! You just need to slightly reduce the amount of sugar if the fruits are sweet, so that the charlotte does not turn out sugary. The classic apple / cinnamon pairing can be improved a little by adding cardamom or nutmeg, but in minimal amounts.
Silicone bakeware does not need to be sprinkled with flour or semolina, which is convenient, but the crispy semolina crust is painfully delicious. If you add saffron or cocoa powder to the dough, the dough will acquire an interesting color and unusual taste. But, as a rule, such small “tricks” are needed in winter and spring, when a real Antonovka is no longer available, and when there are sour juicy apples – everything else will wait!