These are a must try!
I made this recipe as I went along, just grabbing what I saw in the kitchen and thought would work well together. Not knowing how these would turn out, I was not expecting much, BUT these are sensational! I was so surprised to see how quick and easy it was to make these also. I think this is a must try recipe if your feeling like something sweet and healthy.
So here is what you will need:
- 1 cup of pecan flour
- 1/2 cup of almond flour
- Pinch of salt
- Pinch of cinnamon
- 1 tsp of vanilla essence
- 2 tsp of honey
- 8 prunes
- 1 egg white
- 1 brambly apple
- 1/3 cup of sultanas
- Juice of half a lemon
- GREASEPROOF PAPER. NB
The Preparation
- Get a regular cupcake tin and spray each mould with cooking spray or rub with butter or oil.
- Get a sheet of baking paper roughly about the same size as your cupcake tray. Fold the paper in half, then in quarters, then in eights, so your left with a square with many layers. Each one of these layers is going to be a disc to line the cupcake tray. So cut one circle from your folded paper, and you should come out with 16 circles.
- Line the cupcake tray with the parchment circles, ensuring that the paper sticks to the sides.
- Make your flour.
- Get one cup of pecans, add to blender and pulse until it is a fine sandy consistency. It is okay if there are still some bigger pieces of pecan left in flour, this adds to the texture of the pastry.
The prunes in this recipe are treated similarly.
- Add 8 prunes to your blender and pulse till you get a wet paste. This is the part that will help bind all the dry ingredients together.
Method
- Heat oven to 170 degrees Celsius.
- In a mixing bowl, add pecan flour, almond flour, salt & cinnamon.
- Stir to combine dry ingredients.
- Separate egg and add egg white and honey to dry ingredients.
- Mix through the mixture with a spatula.
- Add the prune paste until the pastry comes together. It will be fairly moist.
- Section off about 1/8 of the mixture, this is going to be used as the base for the pies.
- Put a golf ball size drop of pastry in each cupcake mould.
- Press the pastry up the sides of the tin using your wet teaspoon and fingers.
- Then with the pastry that you sectioned off, press a little bit down in each mould to form the base of the pastry case.
- I found this the easiest way to fill the cupcake tin.
- Leave the skin on the bramble apple.
- Chop in half and thinly slice each half.
- Cut the thinly sliced halves in to quarters (like small pizza slices)
- Fill the pastry cups with the apple, having the skin facing upwards.
- Squirt a few drops of lemon juice on top of the apples.
- Top with a few sultanas, a sprinkle of sugar & cinnamon.
- Bake in the oven for 10-12 minutes, or until the edges of the pastry has started to turn brown and the apple is tender.
Serve with custard or ice-cream or simply enjoy them on their own. I absolutely adore them when they are just out of the oven, the tender brambly apple is perfectly warm and tart, and the base is moist and packed with flavor.