This whole time change thing has been putting a serious strain on my blogging.  It's the daylight really... or well, the lack of it.  There just doesn't seem to be enough time to make something and then get a good shot before the light is gone.  We're not even talking about sunlight here.  I know that would be completely unreasonable to expect.  Nope just plain old day, ie not night, ie not pitch black.
Yeah folks, it's serious gone by about 4:30 these days.  Now I know that there isn't long to go until the winter solstice and all that.  I know that once we pass that then things start to get a bit brighter.  But keep in mind that at that point we're talking about January and February.  Not exactly the happiest months of the year.


I don't have a light box for taking pictures of my food in.  I don't really want a light box either.  I like the natural light so that is going to mean getting crafty with some pictures in the near future.  For example, what I did today was make this cake in the middle of the day (weekend eh!).  I'm so much happier when I don't have to fiddle too much with the pictures.  These ones were actually fun ('cause I ate the cake while I was taking them ;-)


The cake itself.  Nice.  The Pioneer Woman says that it's the best coffee cake ever.  I think that she's pretty close to right about that.  Beware though, I used a pyrex baking dish and I ended up burning the edges and bottom of my cake ever so slightly.  Other than that... YUMMY.  I added apple to it because I needed to use them up and because kid #2 is refusing to eat apples these days.  I figured this way I could get apples into him without him seeing them.  Crafty I am!  It worked too....


Apple Coffee Cake (adapted only slightly from The Pioneer Woman Cooks)

Cake:
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 cups (scant) sugar
3 cups unbleached, all purpose flour
4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 1/4 cups milk
3 lg egg whites, whipped until stiff
dash of vanilla

3 med to small apples, peeled and sliced thin

Topping:
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
3/4 cup all purpose flour
2 tbsp cinnamon
1 1/2 cup pecans (optional if you are using the apple)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Grease and flour a 9x13 inch pan.

Combine the flour, baking powder and salt together  in a bowl and set aside.
Cream the butter and sugar together until fluffy.  Add in the vanilla.
Add the flour mixture and milk alternately, mixing well after each addition.  Begin and end with the flour.  Don't over mix.
Fold egg whites gently into batter.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan.
Top with sliced apples.
Combine the topping ingredients until they are crumbly.  Sprinkle the topping over the cake and apples.
Bake for about 40 - 45 min.  The centre might still be a slight bit jiggly but that's ok.
Cool for at least 10 minutes before attempting to remove from the pan.  Or just eat it straight out of the pan!