Why shortcake? Well.. why not?

After another week of slacking around, it's time to get back into the Edmonds book again. There wasn't a particular recipe I wanted to do, so I quite arbitrarily decided to make apple shortcake squares (p60). It's pretty much the standard apple shortcake you see in bakeries everywhere: a layer of apple sandwiched between two layers of buttery cake.

I peeled and sliced three Granny Smiths and got them in a saucepan with a little sugar and water. Once that was sorted, I went to make the shortcake.. and was brought up short by the fact that I didn't have any flour. Stupid really, since I'd actually made a special trip to the supermarket for the butter. Didn't occur to me that I might need flour as well!


I nearly postponed my shortcake-making, thinking I would just cook up the apples and do the rest when I'd had a chance to grab some flour. That was, until I realised that I did have some self-raising flour. Leave out the baking powder, use self-raising instead, and I'm back in business!


The apples were ready by the time I'd made this decision, so I immediately got down to making the shortcake, rubbing butter into the flour, then mixing in sugar and beaten egg with a little milk. This made a stiff dough which I halved, rolling each half out to the approximate size and shape of the tin I was using.

The recipe specified a 22cm tin, something I don't have, so I made a few calculations, and set my adjustable tin in a rectangle that would roughly approximate the same surface area as a 22cm square. Well, that was the plan, at least: my maths skills are not terribly reliable, but it seemed to work this time!


I placed the first layer of pastry in the tin - I hadn't got the size and shape absolutely right, but a little surreptitious patchwork had the gaps filled in no time. The next layer to go in was the apple: a nice thick layer smoothed over the top of the pastry. Then I topped the apple with the second layer of pastry. Patchwork wasn't as easy without a solid base to work against, but I got it looking pretty tidy.

After 25 minutes in the oven, the shortcake came out looking golden and tasty. I took it out of the tin to cool (so the bottom didn't go soggy) but I waited until it was completely cold before cutting it.


I was surprised at the texture of the shortcake - used to dense, soggy bakery apple shortcake, I was quite delighted to find that mine had a light, almost crisp texture. The flavour wasn't as sweet as I'd expected; maybe I would think about adding a little more sugar to the shortcake next time. But overall: Pretty good shortcake, I reckon.