Croatian apple cake

Ingredients

Dough:

400g all-purpose flour

300g butter, very cold

50g Demerara sugar

2 egg yolks

2 tbs sour cream

1 tbs home-made brandy (plum or pear)

150g apricot jam

Filling:

1 kg apples, peeled, cleaned, quartered and sliced

60g Demerara brown sugar

½ tbs vanilla sugar

Cinnamon

80g raisins

Juice of ½ a lemon

Powder sugar for dusting

Preparation

Use your fingertips to rub the butter into the flour until you have a mixture that resembles coarse breadcrumbs with no large lumps of butter remaining.

Add sugar, egg yolks, cream and brandy, combine and bind the dough together.

Wrap the dough in cling film and chill for about 2 hours or overnight.

Meanwhile, prepare the filling: lightly cook apples, sugar, vanilla sugar, cinnamon, raisins, and lemon juice for about 10 minutes. Set aside to cool.

Divide the chilled dough into two equal pieces. Roll out the dough into two rectangles (about 40 x 25 cm)on a floured surface. Place one of the rectangles into a floured (or lined with parchment paper) baking tin (app. 40 x 25 cm) and bake in the oven at 200°C. When a pale crust develops on top (after 10 - 15 minutes), remove the tin from the oven.

Carefully smear the semi-baked crust with apricot jam. Cover it with evenly distributed filling. Place the second rectangle of dough on top and prick it with a fork.

Bake the pie at 200°C for 30 minutes, or until done.

Dust the still warm pie with powder sugar, cut into squares and serve.