Going back to childhood, the Yogurt Cake – Traditional French yogurt cake with apples
De retour en enfance, le gâteau au yaourt
In France, yogurt cake is an institution, everyone has its own version of it and it’s the first cake kids learn how to bake in school. I seriously doubt there is one French person who doesn’t know how to bake this cake. I made my first yogurt cake when I was 12 in school during the “travaux pratiques” class, literally translated as “Applied work”, it was a class where kids learnt how to develop “manual skills”, learning how to bake, create all kinds of artistic activities. This is the cake for beginners because you cannot fail.
The base of this cake is eggs, sugar, yogurt, oil, and flour. Then you can flavor it the way you like it, with rum, fruits, vanilla, orange zest, coconut, etc…and yes, in France, they teach you how to bake in school, probably because food is quite an important part of French culture.
For this cake, I used non fat plain yogurt from Straus, it has a creamy and thick texture and tastes wonderful. You can get Straus yogurt almost in every supermarket that sells organic food in the Bay Area (I have not seen it in Safeway though not even in their organic section). Not that I am a complete “non-fat” food supporter, but because why use something heavier that taste as good as a its lighter version? Also, I added apples, now the pear version with almond meal is delicious too, but I only had one pear left.
Instructions
In 2 mixing bowls, separate the yolks from the whites. Add sugar to yolks and beat to a white and fluffy texture so that it doubles volume. Beat the whites to a stiff consistency and set aside.
Add the yogurt to the yolks/sugar mixture, and mix well. Add the oil, the flour, the baking powder and baking soda, vanilla extract, the cognac and the apples. At the end mix the egg whites carefully.
Pour mixture in a greased round pan, about 20 cm diameter wide and of 5 cm height. Place in the pre-heated oven at 370F for about 45 min or until the middle is cooked. Use a knife and check the middle is cooked.
Ingredients for about 6 to 8 people
- 3 eggs
- 200 gr sugar
- 200 gr plain unsweetened yogurt (can be non fat, low fat, etc…)
- 80 gr vegetable oil
- 250 gr white flour
- 2 apples
- 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tbs Cognac or Rum
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I like the ease of prep here and how you can flavor it however you like. My cousin is having a housewarming party this Sunday, and I think I might have found the dish to bring! I have dried dates at home, what flavors do you think would go with dates??
In school, we had a few different classes for hand’s on skills. Home Economics and Industrial Arts. In Home Economics we had full kitchens and cooked in teams which was a lot of fun, sewed pillows and shorts, and also had to work with children. In Industrial Arts we learned how to make silk screens to make graphic tee-shirts and even made a wooden magazine rack! I wish those kind of classes existed in college :0)
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#7 written by world chef 14 years ago
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How lucky that you got to learn how to do this as a girl! All I learned as a girl was how to open packets and put them in the microwave. : ( This must be wonderful with a good cup of coffee. The yogurt must keep it incredibly moist as well.