Toffee Apple Cake Pops

I have been meaning to take part in the AlphaBakes challenge again for a while and when I saw that this months letter was 'T' I couldn't get toffee apples out of my head! I created a Toffee Apple cake last autumn but I wanted to make something a bit different this time so I cam up with a toffee apple version of the popular cake pops.

Alphabakes is a great challenge hosted by The More Than Occasional Baker and Caroline Makes it produces a wonderful variety of recipes. Ros is hosting this month so check out the entries at The More Than Occasional Baker.

Recipe:

6oz butter
5oz light brown sugar
1 tablespoon apple juice
2 eggs
8oz self-raising flour
2 apples, finely chopped

8oz icing sugar
2oz butter
1 tablespoon apple juice

7oz golden caster sugar
4 tablespoons of golden syrup (I used runny honey as I had no golden syrup and this worked ok)
1 teaspoon vinegar

round lolly sticks

To make the cake cream 9oz butter and the light brown sugar. Beat in the eggs and 1 tablespoon of apple juice. Fold in the sifted flour and mix in the apple. Bake in a lined and greased cake tin for about 20 mins at 160C or until cooked through. You will be breaking the cake up so don't worry about the shape of the tin and it's better to over than under bake.

Leave the cake to cool.

Cream the butter and icing sugar then beat in the apple juice to create buttercream. Once the cake has cooled completely break it into crumbs and add to the buttercream. Mix the cake and buttercream together. Leave the mixture in the fridge for about 15 minutes.

Line and grease a couple of large baking trays. Work the cake mixture ino balls as quickly as possible and place on the tray. Return the balls to the fridge.

Tip the caster sugar into a saucepan along with 100ml water. Heat for five minutes, until the sugar dissolves, then add the vinegar and golden syrup. Heat until the syrup reaches the 'hard crack' stage (if you drop a little into a bowl of cold water, it should harden instantly and you shouldn't be able to squish it)

Once the toffee is ready dip each of your lolly sticks in the caramel one at a time and stick them into a cake ball. using a teaspoon pour a tiny amount of the toffee in/round the whole thay the stick creates in the cake ball. Once you have domne this for all the cake pops, the first one will be ready to dip in the toffee. Make sure the cake ball and some of the stick are completely covered. Twist to get rid of any excess hot toffee and place back on the baking tray. - You will need to work quickly and will probably have to reheat the toffee mixture slightly.

Once all the cake pops are covered with the toffee, return the baking trays to the fridge to cool and harden.

These were definitely an experiment but worked quite well. You need to keep them in the fridge and eat them within a day or two. I was unsure about how desirable it is to snap through hard toffee for a moist cake but I actually found it enjoyable if a little unusual - I think it might be a marmite!

My main problem with the cake was that it wasn't 'apple-y' enough. Next time (I think they'll be a perfect treat for bonfire night) I will try using cooking apples as they are bigger and stronger. I'd also like to get some apple concentrate as the juice wasn't strong enough.